The Individual, Auto/biography and History in South Africa

and to correspondents and officials in Tanganyika, Nyasaland and Moscow, including to
the Soviet Africanist, Professor Potekhin. 67 The stated aim of Tabata’s “mission” was to
make his way to China “for consultation and discussions” and to seek political and
material support. 68
Tabata also sought assistance from activists from the Fourth International, who had been
re‐evaluating their position on national and anti‐colonial struggles. He met with Ted
Grant and Jimmy Deane, who gave advice on the value of seeking support in Algeria.
He initiated correspondence with Michel Pablo (M.N. Raptis), who was a political
adviser to the Ben Bella government and whom he and Taylor met in Algiers a few
months later. In travelling to Algiers, Tabata and Taylor held discussions with
Bentoumi, the “second in command” of the FLN, and also asked for support from the
Yugoslav consul. They also made enormous efforts to meet with M. Verges, the head of
the African section of the Algerian Foreign Affairs Department. 69 In Rome, Fourth
Internationalist Livio Maitan assisted them with arrangements. This period may also
have been when Tabata initiated contact with Fourth International member, Ernest
Mandel. It was Mandel who later gave Tabata advice on approaching Ghana’s Kwame
Nkrumah for assistance, as Nkrumah was thought to have much more sympathy for the
“radical wings of the liberation movement”. Mandel also advised that this help should
be sought through George Padmore’s widow Dorothy who was the co‐ordinator of all
Nkrumah’s “non‐governmental foreign contacts”. 70
67 Dora Taylor, Pocket Diary, entries, 26 May – 7 November 1962, I.B. Tabata Collection, BC 925.
68 I.B. Tabata, Letter of Introduction to the Embassy of the People’s Republic of China, UK (“Letters of
introduction to Embassies in the UK”), June 1962, I.B. Tabata Collection, BC 925.
69 Dora Taylor, Pocket Diary, entries, 7 October – 18 November 1962; ‘Meeting with Bentoumi,
representing the politial Section of the F.L.N.’, Algiers, 7 November 1962, I.B. Tabata Collection, BC
925.
70 Ernest Mandel to ‘Friend’ (Dora Taylor), 10 December 1963; Ernest Mandel (‘Walter’) to Friend (Dora
Taylor), 6 February 1964, I.B. Tabata Collection BC 925. While the first letter was signed ‘Ernest’, all his
others were written under his pseudonym, ‘Walter’. In keeping with the anonymities of this encoded
correspondence, Tabata was referred to as ‘Tom’. ‘Tom Bejula’ and ‘Anna Jack’ were the pseudonyms
that Tabata and Taylor generally used at this time when the need for secrecy arose (see Telegram from
Tom to Anna Jack, 18 December 1962, I.B. Tabata Collection, BC 925). Mandel’s recommendation that
Tabata hasten “to get to Accra” was reasserted in early 1964, after the Unity Movement’s unsuccessful
application for recognition to the OAU’s Committee of Nine. Mandel suggested that in places like
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