Black Earth Rising (2018) s01e05 Episode Script

1 This programme contains strong language from the start.
This is a problem for you? Not for me, Blake, but it clearly is for them.
And they pay the bills, or at least their church does.
Then have them speak to my clerk.
It's your bonus.
- You don't think I deserve it? - A fee of this size who does? Me.
For the work I do for you.
Ordinary mortals would never have to work again.
Ordinary mortals wouldn't touch this case.
We are all ordinary mortals in the eyes of the Lord.
Yeah, well the Lord doesn't pay my bills.
And nor will we.
If I decide to sue you, it won't matter how many church fetes you have under whatever tin roof it is you come from, there won't be enough beady bracelets in the whole of the - fucking Congo to pay for your defence.
- Just as I thought.
- What did you think? - I am looking into the eyes of a devil.
No.
That was me.
Last time I met with YOUR client.
And trust me, when I look into the soul of things, I look deep, - and I did not like what I saw.
- In him? Or You? Pay the piper, Padre.
Or I'll pipe the rats right back.
Actually, I'm a pastor.
Yeah? Then go boil some milk.
See you, fellas.
HE VOMITS HE WHEEZES MUSIC: [YOU WANT IT DARKER BY LEONARD COHEN.]
If you are the dealer, I'm out of the game If you are the healer, it means I'm broken and lame If thine is the glory then mine must be the shame You want it darker We kill the flame Magnified, sanctified, be thy holy name Vilified, crucified, in the human frame A million candles burning for the help that never came You want it darker Hineni, hineni I'm ready, my Lord.
I wasn't supposed to be here.
My mother was due to talk with you today.
But instead you've got me.
My mother wanted two things for me.
First, to defeat the evil that had touched me, and second, for that evil to see me grow stronger than it could ever have imagined possible.
When I came here as a student, it wasn't a thirst for knowledge that drove me, or revenge, or anger, or even gratitude for the marvellous generosity of others.
No.
The only thing that drove me was fear.
Fear that whatever it was I had escaped from would catch up and devour me the moment I stopped.
So I didn't.
I pushed on, higher, faster, further.
Until two years ago when I came to an abrupt full stop, self-inflicted.
Because that's when I realised that it doesn't matter how far you think you've gone or who tries to help you get there.
I could never outrun what was chasing me, never.
Because once you've been touched by evil, it never lets go.
It worms its way inside of you, sits there, grows there until the day you suddenly realise that the thing you're most afraid of being caught by, it's already there right in the heart of you.
And nothing you can do will ever defeat it.
I'm sorry about that.
Mr Gaines, sir! I am so sorry.
They, they, they just told me.
I would have brought the car around the front.
It's all right.
I just decided to call it a day.
A weekend! Oh, yeah, so it is.
So, where to, sir? Why do I have so many houses, Samson? Because you are a rich man, sir.
Mmm.
If I had a man who loved me, that'd be the only home I'd need.
I've shocked you.
Really? You'll get used to it.
"What does it profit a man to gain the world, only to lose his soul?" Huh.
And there was me thinking I'd cover myself in all this - bulletproof glass.
- CAR UNLOCKS So, where to, Mr Gaines? You choose.
Jura House.
Good choice.
Today I want to talk to you about greed.
One day Jesus said to the crowd, "Watch out ENGINES REV "Be on your guard against all kinds of greed.
" Then Jesus told them this parable.
"The grounds of a certain rich man yielded an abundant harvest.
"The rich man thought to himself, 'I have no place to store my crops.
' "Then the rich man said, 'This is what I will do.
"'I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will "'store my surplus grain' ".
- Samson.
- Morning, Mr Gaines.
- Are you looking to drown the Maldives? - Sorry, sir? What are you up to? - Just putting them all back in order.
- Hmm.
You got anyone here with you today, Mr Gaines? Why? Well, help shunt these beauties around.
No-one I'd trust.
Well, you've got me, sir.
We can do it together.
Do you mind jumping in the 981? What for? I think the GT3 deserves pole position, don't you? I'll give it a go.
Mr Gaines, sir.
Do you have your phone on you? Why? There's a problem with the front gate, just in case they call.
No, I don't.
It's fine, I, I've got mine.
Good.
PASTOR: " 'And I will say to myself, "'You have plenty of grain left for many years.
Take life easy.
"'Eat, drink and be merry.
'" - There's no key - ENGINE REVS - Hey! - HORN HONKS What the fuck are you doing? My name is not Samson.
- I can't hear you.
- My name is not Samson.
- Oh? - No.
It is Nkanza a Nkanga of the House of Kinlaza.
- OK.
- I come from a line of Congolese kings.
Good for you.
But now only God is my master.
Oh.
PASTOR: "And God said to the rich man, 'You fool "'.
.
this very night your life will be demanded from you.
'" HE COUGHS Fuck it.
HORN BLARES PASTOR: This is the parable of the rich fool.
With God his only master! Amen.
Breaking the soil.
Harvesting the crops, cooking the food.
Always.
My father said my mother even sang when giving birth to me.
I know she sang me to sleep, every night.
Always.
Nothing happens "just like that".
We went into exile 27 years before the genocide.
The Belgians had gone, the Hutus had come to power and the Tutsis were being thrown out.
We stayed for as long as we could until we could not stay any more.
We lived by the river where the water ran slow.
My father said that, should we ever journey south, we could never get lost, because all life returns to the bend in our river, and the dead, too.
And that is where we first saw her, sitting with her family, younger than me and half my weight.
But still she had managed to pull them out.
She would not move until my mother, having packed our world in three sacks, claimed her as the last fruit from our fields, tied her to her back, and sung us all the way to Uganda.
It took many, many months before Bibi Mundanzi began to sing back.
And then she claimed us as her family, and my mother claimed a new daughter.
Until one day, again, we found her by the river.
It was poison from the water, but when the others saw her, they thought the poison came from her and they became afraid of my white-eyed sister.
So my mother sung us north again, until the whispers did not follow.
And there we stayed.
There we grew.
There we took back our lives.
And then, one day, we took back our country, my sister and I.
And the white eyes of Bibi Mundanzi were never seen again.
So, there you go.
Sisters? I never realised that.
- She was never my sister.
- Close enough.
Well, now she has become the "mother" of our nation.
No longer a sister, now a parent.
With draconian house rules, would you not say? - Who else knows? - It is no secret.
That she's a witch.
She is not.
There was a time.
You might want to use that.
Jawbones and tooth rattles? I'm going to pretend I did not hear that.
Ours is a modern society, looking to take its place in a modern world.
There is no "magic" in it.
Why did you give Kate that piece of cloth? It belongs to her.
- Why now? - You know why.
It feels pretty manipulative.
Having another Chuck Yeager moment, Mikey? Yes, I am.
As a matter of fact, if I'm not wearing a space suit these days, I find it increasingly hard to breathe.
We have not been comfortable with any of this for over 20 years.
Why don't we just tell her and have done with it? Because we agreed, all of us, you, me, Eunice and Eve, the moment she hears the truth, everyone else has to hear it, too.
You want to talk about manipulation, talk about my sister.
The constitution, the penal code, political space, press freedoms.
And you want to call her to account on any of that? Then this is the only way to do it.
By using the personal history of an extremely traumatised 28-year-old-woman.
Oh, Michael, you are forgetting in my country, we are all traumatised.
Every single one.
Me included.
And all I am trying to do is to help us come to terms with it.
Please, help me? MONITOR BEEPS REGULARLY BEEPS INCREASE RAPIDLY BEEPS RETURN TO REGULAR PATTERN So, what is it? HE SIGHS I have to tell you, you are something of a conundrum.
To have these kind of seizures as a child is not so unusual.
Neither it is so for them to go away once you enter adulthood, but for them to return at a mature stage of your adult life, that is rare.
So much so it's possible that your suffering is not epilepsy at all.
What else could it be? Your past.
Your present.
Trauma has many ways of finding a way out, particularly if it's been suppressed.
You Westerners are so self-centred, everything about the me.
There's nobody else in the room.
I am president of my nation.
- Of course.
- And now is not the time for my nation to be seeing a "shrink".
So we'll go with the TVNS.
- I will feel it? - A local tingling, no more.
It's a device you attach to your ear.
Visibly? Yes.
It cannot be visible.
It's like a hearing aid thing, in fact, that's what you can say it is.
I will say that I have been deafened by the guns of liberation.
If I were you, President Mundanzi, I'd try and find a way of telling them the truth.
If you were me, you would know there is only so much truth that my country can hear.
Maybe that's why I'm going deaf.
MAN VOMITS SHE SPEAKS IN OWN LANGUAGE HE CHUCKLES Then he'd be ahead of the CIA.
We are ahead of the CIA? Yeah.
But it's probably good that you're going back now.
She is here.
She knows you're about to go.
Are you all right? Yes.
- Are you sure? - Yes! SHE SPEAKS IN OWN LANGUAGE That is not a very good way of going about it.
I had to see you.
Everyone was watching.
The college is being told there's a problem with your visa, it'll be sorted by this afternoon.
And you keep telling me to be discreet.
I couldn't just leave.
I chose this clinic so I could be close.
You're two hours away.
Better than half the world.
Are you OK? I'll be fine.
Well, what is wrong? My hearing.
It's fine, it's nothing.
Was it a good lesson? Bernoulli's equation, it's part of fluid dynamics.
My daughter, the astrophysicist! I got most of my education beneath a tamarind tree! And look where that got you.
I hate all of this.
- What else can I do? - Give it up! - You've got everything you need - Except a mother! - Don't be cross.
- What else do you expect me to be? I have spent half of my life living with strangers and now I, I don't even know who you are.
Except this woman I have to meet in weird places surrounded by dangerous looking men! - It is hard.
- No, Navier-Stokes equations are hard, but this is impossible! - But you are safe.
- From what? Mumma! Nobody in my life wants to kill me, it is only in yours! Do you think that's fair? That I have to live my life because of your choices?! Tell me about your boyfriend I'm not going to tell you about my fucking boyfriend! Not least because I told you already.
Joseph.
His name is Joseph.
Joseph and Mary, that has got to be good, huh? Actually, we had an argument.
About what? What do you care? How are you going to fix it? By sending in the army?! I want you to be happy, that is all.
I want a mother, that is all! I don't want her like this! I'm sorry.
When are you going? Now.
- Well, then go.
- It's OK, I have a few More minutes? Really? How wonderful! I am so lucky! I have lost years, Mumma! Years.
And I am never going to get them back! A father that I never knew and a mother who never knew me! How is that for an upbringing? ENGINE STARTS You're not wearing your ear thing.
Hmmm? No.
You don't have to wear it all the time? Just a few hours a day.
When we arrive back, be sure that you are wearing it then.
"Deafened by the guns of liberation.
" I like that.
- Yes? - Mm, completely.
You have a knack for this sort of thing.
- Maybe I should run for president.
- You already have.
Hmm.
Three times.
It was the right thing to do.
The only thing.
SOFTLY: I'm tired, David.
I know.
SHE SIGHS So, Patrice Ganimana.
It looks like we have a good chance to extradite.
Even from the UK? I'm working on it.
Huh.
The old world is falling.
As I said.
See? Stay strong.
All will be well.
SHE SIGHS MUSIC: [VANISHING ACT BY LOU REED.]
It must be nice to disappear To have a vanishing act To always be looking forward And never looking back How nice it is to disappear Float into a mist With a young lady on your arm Looking for a kiss It might be nice to disappear Float into a mist With a young lady on your arm Looking for a kiss It must be nice to disappear To have a vanishing act To always be moving forward And never looking back How nice it is to disappear Float into a mist With a young lady on your arm Looking for a kiss Looking for a kiss Float into a mist.
Are you allowed to do that? Why are you here? Give me your phone.
What? - Give it to me.
- Why? You want me to help you? No.
You do not trust me? - No.
- Last time I gave you Father Patenaude.
Yeah.
And took a man's eye out.
He was a liar.
And you're not? Then tell me who you work for.
Someone who wants to keep you safe.
That's, that's not an answer.
It is if you're in danger.
- Am I in danger? - Yeah.
Who from? Please, give me your phone.
- Why? - I cannot watch you all the time.
Yeah, I don't want you to watch me at all! And they know it.
Who's they? So if someone comes, and they might you should call me.
This is ridiculous.
Wasn't before, isn't now.
Unlock it.
"A", double "H".
"Ahh"? Ha-ha.
That lawyer you spoke to worked for Ganimana.
You are following me.
He's dead.
How? Dead.
So any trouble? - Call "Ahh".
- I'm serious! And stay away from Patrice Ganimana.
Passion fruit? Maybe melon, do you want some? So? So? What do you expect me to say? Whatever you think.
He's right.
Stay away from Ganimana.
- He works for you? - Me? If I had access to an extra-judicial hit man, do you think I'd be wasting my time here presenting The Infrastructure Projects of the Year? So whose is he? My guess, Bibi Mundanzi, which means the table stakes you're playing at are pretty fucking high! No.
No, she wants Ganimana extradited, why would they want to keep me away? - Unlike you.
- I hoped the UN would pick him up.
Well, it didn't work out that way, did it? - No, it didn't.
- So, now it's just down to them.
Them? Why did David Runihura go and see you? I told you, I can't say.
Was it for a file, Michael? On Patrice Ganimana, drawn up by Eve, by my mother, in '97? He came to see you.
He wants me to fly out there and write a report on the state of their judiciary.
And you said yes? Think I just have.
I pay your bills, Kate.
And I think I've also just resigned.
The Rwandan judiciary does not have the capability of trying a Transfer case, not on their own.
Says who? This country, last year, six, right to a fair trial.
A lot of other countries disagree.
And they're looking to you to prove the British judiciary wrong? That's a pretty tall order, Kate, even for you.
Well, you didn't seem to think so when you had me working for Alice.
Then you had me.
Out there, you'll be on your own.
No, no, I'll be with people willing to prosecute the very man you're not.
I'd like nothing better than to see Ganimana brought to justice.
If, when he does, that's what actually happens.
You know what's really unsettling? It's not just your behaviour, it's my mother's.
To discover she'd even drawn up a file against this guy, but instead of prosecuting the fucker, she decided to go for Simon Nyamoya instead, a man who'd brought the genocide to a close! - It wasn't like that.
- No? So why is Patrice Ganimana sitting two miles away with you DOING NOTHING TO HELP?! Where's that file? You're being played.
Hmm.
Yeah, I think I am.
Stay away from Ganimana.
Says you and your paramilitary buddy.
He's very dangerous.
Yeah, took a guy's eye out.
Ganimana.
Because of Blake Gaines? I looked it up.
Suicide.
Working for a man who's pure evil, I think I'd do the same.
Which is why I want you to stay away from him.
And that's why I wanted YOU to help! Not like this.
What's that, that Yeats poem about it all going to shit? You're better educated than I am, Kate, Eve made sure of that.
Well, it's a shame then because only I can know how your centre couldn't hold.
DOOR SLAMS SHUTS Tell me about Alice Munezero.
There is a tale of a young prince, weak and jealous who thought he would make a better king than his older brother.
So, one day, the old king gave his sons a bundle of tied sticks and asked them to break it in half.
But try as they might, neither could.
So then, the old king cut the cord and handing out the sticks one by one, the princes found that they could snap each, without effort.
"This is the importance of unity," the old king told them.
Whereupon the youngest prince, holding the two halves of a broken stick plunged each into the heart of his father and elder brother, killing them.
And from then on, the young prince was free to rule the kingdom alone and uncontested.
For this story to work for Alice Munezero, you need only change her gender.
- They're sisters? - Of experience, yes.
But, only one knows how to truly lead a nation, Bibi Mundanzi.
Your president broke her own promise to your country.
She ran for a third term.
And she was elected by 91% of the electorate.
And do you know why? Because everything she does improves our country.
It was unconstitutional.
The constitution was changed by 95% of the electorate.
And is that how you do things in your country? If it doesn't work for you, you just change the rules? HE LAUGHS I believe your country recently made changes to fixed-term parliaments.
It's what progressive governments do.
- Yours is a dangerous precedent - No.
A tiny cartel of Western elites, conspiring to manipulate international justice, in an attempt to do what? - What are your friends trying to do? - Who are my friends? Alice.
Michael Ennis.
Who else? Looking to destabilise one of the most forward-thinking states in the entire African continent! That is a dangerous precedent! And that needs to be stopped.
Now.
You know they're lovers.
Then.
And now.
That's not possible.
Except, it is.
Everyone has been lying to you.
Everyone.
You have to help us.
SCREEN UNLOCKS MOBILE PHONE MAKES CALL - MAN: Hello? - Hi, my name's Kate Ashby.
I believe you may know my mother, Eve Ashby.
Yeah.
Sorry to hear what happened.
Bad business.
So the reason I'm calling is because your number is on my mother's mobile phone and I notice she called you - a couple of days before she died.
- Is that right? Yes.
And I was just wondering if you can remember what it was she called about.
Oh, she, she wanted to look at a file.
File? What file? You and I would need to eye-ball each other before I told you that.
Why was she asking you for it? Because I'm the one who's got 'em.
Sorry? In storage.
- You've got - All the company files, yeah.
Because? Because, I'm Mark Viner.
I used to be her head of chambers when she first started out.
- Hmm? - When I retired, I closed the firm.
Your mother went on to join that Ennis fella.
When exactly was that? December '97.
But up until that time she was working For me, yes.
Sir, if I was to come out to your house, would you allow me access to that file? You'd have to have legal authority.
I work for my mother's firm.
Then I can't see why not.
Would tonight be too late? HEAVY RAINFALL CAR ALARM SYSTEM CHIRPS THUNDER SHE GASPS Ms Ashby? My name is Daniel Drewe.
I'm a solicitor.
No, sorry, I'm in a rush.
Er, could you? My client requested that I make contact with you.
He would like to with meet you.
Now, if that's at all possible.
- Who's your client? - Patrice Ganimana.
I have a car waiting.
To go where? Here, in London.
I'll follow.
Forgive me, but I believe you're the one being followed? Which represents an unacceptable risk to my client, again, on my advice.
It depends on how much he wants to see me.
No, I'm afraid on this point, Ms Ashby, it depends on how much you want to hear what he has to say.
The car's just over there.
He, he's not in hospital? He's on rounds of chemotherapy.
He's been freed? House arrest.
- In an embassy? - Friend's house.
On an embassy street? It's a big house.
Some friends.
I will admit, I'm surprised.
I said I didn't think you'd come.
He said he knew you would.
Please.
Bonsoir.
Je savais que vous SHE STIFLES A SOB You fuck, fucked Fucker, you fucker! HE CONTINUES IN FRENCH HE SIGHS HEAVILY Bien sur.
Imbecile! Penser.
And I did not kill your mother.
You killed Simon Nyamoya? No.
He was your enemy.
Yes.
You wanted him dead.
Of course.
But it wasn't me.
Someone did it for you.
I did not order it.
It was not me.
And I did not kill your mother.
So? You want to put me in jail.
- Yes! - Don't.
You won't.
No-one will.
Why not? I'm already there.
I spend every second of my life living with what happened.
With what you did? Every second.
So you admit you're guilty.
I was born at the wrong time, on the wrong side.
THAT is not what I said.
And I have paid the price.
No.
No, no, no, no, you haven't.
A million people paid the price! You just have to live with it! Nothing you could do to me could be worse than what I already live with.
Not enough.
Nowhere near.
Don't try to put me in jail.
Oh, I'm going to try very, very hard.
They won't let you.
Who's they? The people I'm trying to save you from.
The people who own this? Shouldn't be too difficult to find out.
Whoever you think owns this is not who you should be afraid of.
Then who should I be? They will kill you.
They will kill anyone who tries to stop them From doing what? Repeating the past.
That's weird, because killing was so much a part of it! There, I have saved you.
From what? Whether you like it or not.
You have nothing on me.
No, you are free and I cannot follow.
Next time I see you, you'll be in the dock.
If that should be, then you won't ever see me again.
God bless you, Kate Ashby.
You still believe all that? Oh, yes.
It is of Him I am most afraid.