Russia: We Too Are People

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Finally, about 100 students were allowed to interview Soviet Minister of Higher Education Vyacheslav Eliutin, who promised an investigation of the student's death. It was a stormy, two-hour session, with Africans demanding an end to all forms of official discrimination. "African students get beaten up every day," one protested. "And Soviet policemen do nothing."

Neither did Ghana's Ambassador to Moscow, J. B. Elliot. Next day, as students again massed near the embassy, he closed the building (for "repairs" to damaged furniture), raised no objection as police herded the angry Ghanaians away. Elliot tried to laugh off the melee, dismissed talk of widespread bias against students as nothing but "rumors." Relations with Soviet students are cordial, he insisted. "But it's natural to take a punch at each other."

Futile Protest. Even Kremlin propagandists did not make that nonsensical claim. Instead, the Russians clamped a tight censorship on the embarrassing affair, for two days did not print or broadcast one word about the riot all Moscow was talking about. Finally, Izvestia issued a stern warning to the students, told them to "respect Soviet laws" or get out of the country.

Prague has erupted in two race riots within two years. Last February in Sofia, Bulgarian militiamen wielded clubs against 200 Ghanaians who were marching down the main street demanding nothing more than their own campus organization. In Moscow, Africans have been smoldering for years over thinly disguised racial discrimination. Except for a token number of Russian students, the dining rooms and dormitories of Lumumba U. (which Africans sardonically call "Apartheid U.") are segregated. Africans find it difficult to date a Russian girl. Students squirm at the stares they get in public and object to poor service they often receive in restaurants. Despite professions of brotherhood, many Russians still think Africans are half-civilized strangers who have just emerged from the jungle.

"We too are people, not animals," cried one sign carried by students who surged through Moscow's streets last week. To which one Russian replied, obviously groaning under the weight of the imperialist white man's burden: "We help them and give them an education. Then they turn against us."