19/10/1994

Dear Sr. Majella,

I got your diary which ended on 13th October. And considering that up to yesterday, there was no news of you having got to PH, I’m hopeful that this will get to you before you return to Europe.

Thanks a lot for your letter and for all the information which you gave me. It was most cheering indeed, and brought home to me the loss which I feel at your being so far away. I wonder if you have checked with [initials] if all that you sent me did get to Lagos. Because I don’t appear to have received anything from you since you left Lagos. And I wonder if you did receive my own letters. You do not appear to have indicated so in your recent communication.

There isn’t much to write since I think I wrote you less than a week ago. I hope to hear from you before you return to Ireland. I haven’t heard from my son or daughters and I’m worried about that. Particularly about the girls’ A-level results.

I’m in good spirits. I hope that the Court of Appeal tomorrow at least orders these goons here to allow me visits by family, doctor and lawyer. I don’t expect anything better until the Govt are able or are unable to build the gas pipeline for which they are holding me.

Cheers, Sr. and God bless you.

Ken

P.S. I did receive a message after my devotional hour on Tuesday 11th October of coming good news. I hardly thought it was going to be the Right Livelihood Award^[1] which has cheered me a great deal. The message I got spoke of a wider role for me in which my MOSOP and Ogoni experi­ences would come in handy. The Award has raised the morale of the Ogoni people and is a psychological defeat for our enemies.

By the way, you might take away the recent NTA [National Television Authority] Port Harcourt propaganda film done to discredit me. The most important bit is the point where the Commander of the Task Force [Paul Okuntimo] describes how he tortures Ogoni people. Europeans should see that clip.