Randal Sadleir

Back in Arusha, I established my two-room office in the new Town Hall building in the main street not far from the provincial headquarters. I was allocated a pleasant bungalow a few hundred yards away, from which I could walk to work each day over a footbridge across the river, if I did not need my new car, a grey Peugeot 203.

I had brought the faithful Kitwana Chumu with me from Dar es Salaam as my PR assistant and proceeded to recruit locally a young Chagga typist called Robert and a bright 17-year-old ex-Standard 8 Mwarush youth called Loanyuni as our local guide and interpreter. Alfred Musa, with whom I stayed in Machame, was a Standard 12 student on holiday employed temporarily. Robert could be sullen and temperamental, but he was a brilliant typist who could take dictation straight onto the machine and he rarely made a mistake.

It was a wonderful feeling to be back upcountry again with a small independent command and no one breathing down one's neck. Best of all, it was fun to be opening a brand new office and carrying out an unprecedented task to which I could devote as much or as little time and energy as I pleased. We started with virtually empty rooms and had to build up the office from scratch. I enjoyed choosing carpets and furniture, and getting a typewriter and stationery. After a week or so we were all set and ready to go. The arrival of our telephone marked the kick-off.

My director in Dar es Salaam and the PC gave me a free hand. The original ideal was to have a PRO in each of the eight provinces, starting with me as a kind of guinea pig in the key Northern Province. In the event, so far as I can recall, I was the first and last provincal PRO and a short-lived one at that. Though I had a successor for a few months, the experiment was not extended.

Back in my office I finished plans for a publicity drive in the province so that no one should be in any doubt whatsoever that the government's policy was to prepare the territory as quickly as possible for a viable independence as laid down by the UN charter. We would go neither too fast nor too slowly, but would continue the present steady progress based on the sound economic development needed to finance each step forward.

For a start, I decided to attack centres of civilization, namely the secondary, middle and even primary schools, where convenient, by talking to them and bombarding them with attractively produced posters and leaflets. Specialist training schools such as the natural resources school in Tengeru and the game college at Mweka were also included, and I made a point of visiting every police unit and prison, whose captive audiences were particularly appreciative.

Sadly, the northern dream was drawing to a close. I was recalled to the political drama fast unfolding in the sultry heat of Dar es Salaam and slowly drove away.

Daydreaming with vivid images racing through my mind, I recalled the pink flamingos and tree leopards of Lake Manyara; the grandeur of Serengeti, Tarangire, Ngorongoro and Ngurdoto; the Masai plains; and the fantasy of Lake Duluti. I remembered the misty pools of Lake Momella; the white rhino and mourning elephants; the stately beauty of the Masai and Iraq; the laughter of smiling Chagga and Meru schoolchildren; and the grave enthusiasm of youth. Towering above all was the cold glory of the mountain.