30/10/94

Sr. M,

You did ask if you could “contact” my London family? The answer is “Yes”. I think they will value it.

I am sending you a letter for Robin Sharp, formally introducing you to him as acting on my behalf. You did indicate that you might find it necessary.

I envy you the meeting with our people. They must have been pleased with the song of praise in Tell magazine listing the Ogoni as the most polit­ically aware in Nigeria. The article was good, although it had many gram­matical errors. The Newswatch report was probably more “in-depth”—as regards my person.

The big essay [for the RLA Award Ceremony] is sent here in long hand. I hope that you can wait to have it word-processed. It need not come back to me. You can correct it and take it along. Please watch out for typos. Emeka tends to make mistakes on crucial words. In the Acceptance Speech, “Ogoni Woman” was typed “Ogoni Women” which altered the meaning radically. “Wasting Storms” came off as “Washing Storms” an entirely dif­ferent thing.

I had expected Appolos here last night when I would tidy up plans for meeting with you with my jailers. He failed to turn up. I hope he has given you the long letter I wrote yesterday asking you to please do a million things for me.

Have a good, safe journey back to Dublin and may God bless you and keep you. I hope to see you soon. Did you see my poem, “A Walk in the Prison Yard”? I’ve asked Deebii to give you £20.00 for stamps for any postages you have to make on my behalf in U.K.^[1]

Ken.

P.S. The cheque for the photographs from Greenpeace is included here­with. Also a cheque for my daughters. They are to split the money equally. I need a new cheque book. There may be one in the house but a request note is included herewith. There is need for them to look through my mail, pay cheques which may have arrived into my a/c. There is, I believe a cheque for £2000+ meant for the a/c of Saros International from my book dis­tributors. All book orders to be re-directed to African Books Collective in Oxford. Ken Junior should be able to attend to all these if he is in London. The insurance for the house may have run out. It should be renewed—the bank should be requested to pay all premiums. The same could apply to the car—possibly.