Yorkshire,
Uganda –
live on air
WOW, a blast from the past. A voice-over clip comes to me via former Durban city councillor Laurie Kaplan of a local newspaperman interviewing Ugandan military strongman and dictator Idi Amin, back in the 1970s.
The interviewer was Yorkshireman Brian Parkes, at the time chief sub-editor of the Sunday Tribune, in his day the country's most brilliant newspaper design and make-up man. Brian had an instinct for news.
He'd been to see the movie General Idi Amin Dada: a self- portrait, a documentary made (in English) by French film-maker Barbet Schroeder, with Amin's full co-operation. It featured such scenes as Amin beating all comers in the swimming pool.
It also showed him declaring that any Ugandan citizen could approach him personally with any problem. He gave an Entebbe telephone number. At which Parkes reached for his cigarette box and scribbled it down.
Next morning he placed an international call from the Tribune switchboard. Amin's voice came booming down the line with an accent as rich as Parkes's broad Yorkshire.
"Natal? Natal? Where's this Natal?" Amin demanded as Parkes explained where he was phoning from. It went on for some minutes, Uganda versus Yorkshire. "Natal… Natal …" (I know. I was there in the switchboard office).
Then: "Ah, Natal province." Somebody must have put a map in front of him. The penny dropped. Amin then went on to warn Parkes in a fairly friendly sort of way to get out of Durban fast because he'd just taken delivery of some MiG fighters and he was coming to invade.
It made front page. But when it came to transcribing the recording of the conversation, they had some difficulty distinguishing which voice was Idi Amin and which Brian Parkes.
Brian died some years ago. The clip sent to Laurie Kaplan came from his son, Kim. It's a gem and it's good to know it's still around.
Was this serious journalism? I suppose not really, but heck it was fun.
Cage fight coming?
WHAT'S this impeachment investigation in America all about? Is it a witch-hunt with no substance as Donald Trump claims? Or did the US president really use military aid blackmail to attempt to persuade Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to dig the dirt for him on Joe Biden, his probable Democrat opponent in next year's election?
The allegation appears to have come from a whistlrblower in the US intelligence services, but the issues – the facts - are so far not at all clear.
So I tuned in to a TV interview – Kellyanne Conway, one of Trump's senior advisers, being questioned by CNN's Dana Bash – hoping for some elucidation.
No such luck, I'm afraid. The two ladies were like feral cats mewing and spitting at each other, interrupting, speaking at the same time in rapid-fire, impossible to follow. Most unusual TV. We'll have to wait and see.
Meanwhile, President Trump is not allowing the furore to distract him from his everyday interests. The other evening he attended the Ultimate Fighting Championship – cage fighting – at Madison Square Gardens in New York, according to the BBC, accompanied by his two sons.
Their reception was overwhelmingly positive according to Donald Trump jr, who put a video clip on social media.
Cage fighting? Hmmm, maybe that's an allegory of what's in store.
Tailpiece
ONCE you've seen one rugby joke, you've seen a maul.
Last word
An intelligence test sometimes shows a man how smart he would have been not to have taken it. - Laurence J Peter
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