A Question Of Loyalty

This story was first published in The Horizon Magazine in Zimbabwe, as I was very young when I wrote the story, I really can’t take all the credit. Forthwith, I acknowledge the help I got from Mr Peter Birkett, the British Airways Chief Security Officer who “taught me how to hijack planes.” Thanks also to Andrew Moyse, the Horizon Editor, for leaving out some of the laughable conversations I had included in the original script. Other than that, this is a story of my creation. The Zimbabwe Defence Forces also took a flirting interest in the story when it was published but it was all very cordial, very amicable. Read here therefore, the most beautiful story I have ever written. I closely followed the pattern of the master – Alistair Maclean – “no romance, it just slows down the action!”

This is the South African Airways Airbus A300 where the story narrated below may or may not have happened.

by Kudakwashe Kanhutu

The trip should have carried no drama at all. The flight to Johannesburg would be slightly under two hours and every time I had done the Jo’burg run, which is a relatively short hop and over land too, I was confident my safety was guaranteed, not that air safety was a major concern. As a high-ranking air force officer, I had seen so much combat action from military planes to the effect that civilian flight did not even stir my blood. I had no way of knowing that this particular trip would reshape my entire philosophy and forever change my laissez-faire attitude towards life.

As the big Airbus A300 aircraft swept off the runway into the night sky, my mind focused on the problems we were facing at home: nationwide workers’ strikes, university students’ demonstrations and a weak economy. It just wasn’t healthy. It was not my area of concern, but as I sized it up I conceded that disloyalty seemed to be taking over. Now, loyalty meant living to me. Those without loyalty left me cold and sad. I could not understand why one skilled at his work would do his country a disservice and go to serve abroad. University students and the workers’ strikes and the denunciation of government were cases of rebellion fit for animals, and wild animals at that. I believed everyone had a duty to the country, to the president and to God. I had taken the vow as a mere Red Cross youth member, as a Boy Scout, then again when I joined the air force and most recently when I took office within the defence forces. I therefore strongly felt everyone had to be loyal to the country and submit to government decisions and control. According to the bible, a leader of a country is installed by God and to despise his authority is blasphemy and a punishable sin.

But not for me. I was the one to stand up and be counted for my country. Fanatical loyalty was my daily bread, in my heart I believed that I was an integral part of government and therefore knew “government employee” would be my name until death. It was my view that the acute unemployment in the country existed only because school leavers were too choosy and afraid of hard work, so they stayed home and played havoc with the statistics. I had heard of innocent people wrongly sent to jail, but of course I had never heard of anyone who admitted to being guilty.

With that line of thought everything was cosy between the leadership of the country and me. I wished everybody would find solace in hard work and the spirit of aspiring to achieve a better status or go to jail to regain some manners relative to loyalty. The government always acted in the best interests of its citizens. Fantasy. I might as well have believed that the Devil took good care of his people.

Thirty minutes into the night flight I turned my attention to my fellow passengers. There were the two teenagers wearing hippy clothing and indecent haircuts. I grieved for the past. Further on, without having to strain my neck, there was the nervous couple in seats 23A and B. But it was behind them, in seats 24A, B and C, that my eyes rested. There was a mother and her two children – sweet twins aged about six. I gave them ten out of ten. A sense of peace and kindness descended upon me just watching the kids’ kitten like antics, 13 000 above planet Earth and they were so carefree.

I was about to turn to the newspaper the air hostess had handed me, when the pilot announced flatly that we had been hijacked by a lone gunman who was yet to make his demands known. Paralysis gripped me. First to go was the notion of air safety. How had the heavily armed gunman sneaked through airport security? A thousand years later, which I suppose was 15 minutes, the gunman made known his demands. He was a member of a commando unit and wanted two South African commandos, captured as cross – border saboteurs during the apartheid era, to be released and put onto a plane. These men were to be given weapons and flown by a civilian crew into South African air space and then para – dropped.

A time limit was given: in the 40 minutes we still had to touchdown in Johannesburg, a plane was to be refuelled and made to stand by. The South African authorities would make ‘phone call one’ – high priority phone call for exactly five minutes to the authorities of my country, where these commandos were being held. My country would then authorise the release of the prisoners, drive them to the airport and allow them to make sure there no security personnel masquerading as crew or hiding somewhere on board. After the airliner had taken off, the government of my country would only have lost two hours fuel and would have saved the 176 lives on board our aircraft. The operation was to take 40 minutes flat and anyone who slipped up on the deadline would be held responsible by the world for the 176 lives that would surely perish if the deadline was not met.

If the deadline was met, the lone gunman would receive a secret message, the first would come in 20 minutes to show that positive action was taking place and the second message after the plane had taken off with the prisoners on board. This meant there were many accomplices on the ground, who would phone Johannesburg’s control tower then get the passwords relayed to our aircraft. This was clearly a military operation. During my military service I had undergone anti – hijack training. I knew all about staying calm, assessing the situation, calculating the risk and taking appropriate action, but despite that my fear was all consuming and was reflected all around me by my fellow passengers. Returning to earth, out of control and at bullet-speed is never part of the bargain when we take to the sky. Also, the fact that the hijacker had not misdirected his energy running up and down aisles threatening every passenger in sight credited him as a highly trained and focused soldier, and identified him as a formidable foe.

But what really was there to my fear? My government knew that I and other passengers were on board. The terrorist’s demands would be met on the double and all 176 passengers would disembark at Jan Smuts Airport, shaken but with big smiles and a tale each for their folks. It was easy really, the two commandos, weak from the long stay in jail would bash their heads against rocks during the para – drop and foil their own escape.

I was deadly wrong. My trip was now a frightful flight with a big banner that said “governments do not make decisions under pressure from terrorists.” I could not believe it; my own government would actually make us go through such an ordeal just for the sake of a twisted political standpoint. It was said that terrorism should be discouraged in its infancy; if terrorists won a small victory they would insist on bigger things. Of course who ever said this was conveniently not on board the same plane as me. Looking across at the twins I was overwhelmed by helpless anger. They were worth a thousand terrorists’ political demands and yet my government had authorised “whatever measures might be necessary to free the hostages”!

Things were happening all at once, the gunman had instructed the pilot to dump almost all fuel as a negotiating tactic, our engines would clank shut any moment, and without thrust our aircraft was as impressive as a mouthful of dust. If our government intervened we would just make it to landing. I had lived my last and all my loyalty and confidence in government suddenly waned. I cursed the vulgarity of politics and with it our expendability; we were just pawns on a very big chessboard.

Promptly the gunman emerged in the aisle. He was a white man in his thirties and he wore a black combat outfit and his face was painted black. A handgun was stuck in his belt within easy reach and a sub – machine gun was slung casually over his shoulder, his ammunition belt was well supplied. However, he was not shooting. He had high explosive charges which he place randomly around the plane. One mistake and we would all be blown to smithereens. I visualized little pieces of metal and human flesh raining down on the slumbering city of Jo’burg. As he carried out his operation, his eyes were ever watchful and his reflexes fully alert. I knew a surprise attack would only end with the incapacitation of the perpetrator, and so to keep my mind off it I looked out of the window. I saw a fighter plane performing a steep climb with the blue blow – torch after burner flame trailing behind. Fancy dramatics I thought bitterly. When I looked back, the air pirate was standing, looking down at the twins. Their mother was clutching the twins desperately, protecting them from the menacing gaze. 

The gunman was a terrorist and would stop at nothing. I thought, he would now begin the killing and it seemed he had chosen the twins to be the first. God, how I wished I had stayed on the anti – hijack team. Now would have been my day. However, I still knew a thing or two, my hands were starting to grasp the metal head of my seat belt when the hijacker moved off, heading swiftly to the cockpit. I sat at ease.

Our descent was sharp but I hardly noticed. When we levelled off I could see the Jo’burg lights. Then the plane banked sharply and we began heading west, away from the airport, shortly after, all our lights were extinguished, even the anti – collision lights went off, at first I imagined the aircraft’s systems had gone down, but the steady hum of the engines told me we were still in circulation. I later learned that the commando had said he was a soldier and did not kill children. So the lights off procedure was to facilitate a parachute jump under the cover of darkness. After about a minute of total darkness the lights came back on again. The hijacker had spared our lives but had severed our communications equipment. His jump meant that we were lower than 3 300 metres but still nowhere closer to the airport.

The aircraft banked sharply again and the engines screamed as we regained altitude and increased speed. After a few minutes of climbing sharply the two powerful engines fell silent. But the pilot had anticipated that, for he levelled off the big metal bird. We were now gliding on our own momentum and still in danger of crashing. When we were again above Johannesburg, the plane nose-dived sharply but noiselessly and we had neither radio clearance for landing nor the ability to regain altitude. The aircraft wavered as if to nose dive to our deaths and with both hands on the armrests I resolved that if I came out of this alive, I would never be a government yes – man again and my loyalty would be based on reason. I despised ‘disloyal’ people because I had not yet climbed the hill they had climbed in life. But now I knew the state can be an unfeeling monster.

As if this revelation was the magic moment that accessed our landing, our big airbus appeared directly above Jan Smuts Airport like a ghost, a little lower and the airport building’s roof would have been shaved off by our fully extended landing gear. The pilot wing – tipped the runway and the airbus silently touched down but without thrust reversers, we hurtled on towards the end of the runway on a collision course with a fully laden Boeing 747 – 400 aircraft preparing to take off. The pilot locked on the brakes and with less than 20 metres to spare we shuddered to a halt. The two aircraft sat facing each other peacefully till our peace was shattered some minutes later by black – clad anti – hijack men who, violently blew off our doors and entered with smoke – screens and such fanfare. 

The last I saw of the anti – hijack men our pilot was screaming his head off at their commander for being dramatic for nothing and terrorising the passengers with the violence of their entry. I could have walked off with a big smile if the pilot was hollering at the president of my country. I knew then my loyalty was dead. To the end of my days I will never who is the worse, terrorists who threaten public lives, or politicians who sometimes have the power to avert disaster but sacrifice innocent lives just for the sake of a political stand point.

A copy of the original publication.