– Introduction:  A Typical Post-Colonial Debate.

  “Un Peuple sans Histoire est un Peuple Mort.” Vieux Proverbe Woloff (Senegal).[1]

  This paper was prepared as a part of a series entitled “Problems And Readings In African Political History - Aspects of African Response to European Rule” dealing with the 1880 – 1960s phenomenon known as the European “Scramble for Africa”, with emphasis on conquest, consequent colonization and the rise of mass nationalist movements whose resistance struggles resulted in the final ejection of Europe from Africa.  In the course of this paper, we will deal specifically with “Response Issues”:  flight, collaboration, Resistance and Diplomatic maneuverings.

The purpose of this particular piece of research is to shed some light on issues as various and complex as the fundamental roots of instability of the Congolese state, the involvement of the superpowers in the further destabilization of an African State, the responsibility of Congolese leaders in the downfall of their country, and indeed many others. A man, at the epicenter of this whole “Greek Tragedy” was Congo’s first – and only – freely elected Prime Minister, Patrice Emery LUMUMBA. The controversy surrounding his death continue to this day to fuel multiple theories of conspiracies, treasons and machiavellian calculations, as well as they perpetuate the image of Lumumba as one of Africa’s martyrs of “true independence”. The specialists labeled the theoretical framework of researches of this kind “Post-colonialism”, or “Post-Colonial Debates”.

According toWikipedia[1] “Postcolonialism refers to a set of theories in history, philosophy, film and literature that grapple with the legacy of colonial rule. As a literary theory or critical approach, it deals with literature produced in countries that were once colonies of other countries, especially the major European colonial powers Britain, France and Spain; in some contexts, it may include also countries still under colonial arrangements. It may also deal with literature written in or by citizens of colonizing countries that takes colonies or their peoples as its subject matter. People from colonized countries, especially the British Empire, came to universities in Britain; their access to education that was then still unavailable in the colonies opened a new criticism, mostly in literature, especially in novels. Postcolonial theory became part of the critical toolbox in the 1970s, and many practitioners take Edward Said's book Orientalism to be the theory's founding work. Perhaps more than any other field, postcolonial studies has, since its inception, been the site of anxious and often polemical debates about what have been perceived — even by many postcolonial practitioners themselves — as its boundaries, limits, excesses and failings, revisionism being the most common. In recent years, the questioning of the boundaries and limits of postcolonial studies has taken on a new dimension, with an intriguing series of parallel and somewhat contradictory debates emerging that are concerned with the shape and future of this field of inquiry. Within its heartland in English literature departments, postcolonial studies has increasingly been challenged by new theoretical models, particularly globalization theory, together with transnational, trans-cultural and intercultural paradigms. At the same time, within French/Francophone Studies departments, there have been numerous attempts to draw more extensively on the postcolonial paradigm and to define more clearly the nature of Francophone postcolonial studies, simultaneously borrowing from and challenging the established ‘norms’ of Anglophone postcolonial criticism. Thus, on the one hand, we are presented with the latest ‘crisis’ in a postcolonial studies careering towards its demise, while on the other, we are offered the enabling prospect of a postcolonial studies expanding into important new spaces. The case we are going to study, Congo’s political crisis and the subsequent death of Lumumba falls right in the midst of the post-colonial debates.

II- Country’s Background, Definition of concepts and the international context of the Cold War era.

In this part of our study, we are going to examine the following topics:

- Congo’s colonial experience.

- De-colonization, Independence, Neo-colonialism.

- The raging underlying Cold War proxy battles.

- The main local protagonists: Joseph Kasa-Vubu, Patrice Emery Lumumba, Moise Kapenda Tshombé, and Joseph Désiré Mobutu.

Congo’s colonial experience.

The following compilation of historic data as well as the subsequent biographies of the leaders of the conflict[2] were made available to us thanks to the following sources:  The Library of Congress Country Studies,[3] the US State Department Country Background Notes[4], CIA’s World Factbook[5], Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[6], and InfoPlease – All the knowledge You Need[7].

Up till the “scramble for Africa”, of the late 19^th Century, Pygmies, who were pushed into the mountains by Bantu and Neolithic invaders, inhabited Congo.  European exploration and administration took place from the 1870s until the 1920s — first by Sir Henry Morton Stanley who undertook his explorations mainly under the sponsorship of King Leopold II of Belgium, who desired what was to become the Congo as a colony. The American correspondent navigated the Congo River in 1877 and opened the interior to exploration. In a succession of negotiations, Leopold, professing humanitarian objectives in his capacity as chairman of the Association Internationale Africaine, played one European rival power against the other. The Congo territory was acquired formally by Leopold at the Conference of Berlin in 1885. Leopold accumulated a vast personal fortune from ivory and rubber through Congolese slave labor; 10 million people are estimated to have died from forced labor, starvation, and outright extermination during Leopold's colonial rule. His brutal exploitation of the Congo eventually became an international cause célèbre, prompting the Belgium government to take over administration of the Congo in 1908.

Léopold II made the land his private property and named it the Congo Free State. His regime began undertaking various projects, such as the railway that ran from the coast to Léopoldville (now Kinshasa) which took years to complete. Nearly all these projects were aimed at increasing the capital Leopold and his cohorts could extract from the colony, leading to atrocious exploitation of Africans. In the Free State, the local population was systematically brutalized in exchange for rubber, a growing market with the development of rubber tires. The selling of the rubber made a fortune for Leopold, who built several buildings in Brussels and Ostend to honour himself and his country. During the period between 1885 and 1908, between five and 15 (the commonly accepted figure is about ten) million Congolese died as a consequence of exploitation and diseases. A government commission later concluded that the population of the Congo had been "reduced by half" during this brutal period. To enforce the rubber quotas, the Force Publique (FP) was called in. The FP was an army, but its aim was not to defend the country, but to terrorise the local population. The Force Publique made the practice of cutting off the limbs of the natives as a means of enforcing rubber quotas a matter of policy; this practice was widespread. “Bula matari” ("he who breaks rocks" in Kikongo, the language of the Kongo people) became the name of the Léopoldian state at its very beginning and is still used to refer to the state, for example in radio broadcasts in indigenous languages. The name graphically symbolizes the brutal form of extortion - extracting ivory and wild rubber from the Congolese - by which Léopold attempted to pay the cost of penetration of the territory and development of infrastructure.

The actions of the Free State's administration sparked international protests, led by E. D. Morel and British diplomat/Irish patriot Roger Casement, whose 1904 report on the Congo condemned the practice, as well as famous writers such as Mark Twain. Joseph Conrad's novel Heart of Darkness also takes place in Congo Free State. In 1908, the Belgian parliament, which was at first reluctant, bowed to international pressure (especially from Great Britain) by taking over the Free State from the king as a Belgian colony. From then on, it became the Belgian Congo, under the rule of the elected Belgian government.

The Belgian administration: Belgian Congo (1908 – 1960)

On November 15, 1908, King Léopold II of Belgium formally relinquished personal control of the Congo Free State and the renamed Belgian Congo came under the administration of the Belgian parliament, a system which lasted until independence was granted in 1960. Conditions in the Congo sightly improved followed the Belgian government's takeover. Select Bantu languages were taught in primary schools, a rare occurrence in colonial education. Colonial doctors were to greatly reduce the spread of African trypanosomiasis, commonly known as sleeping sickness. The colonial administration implemented a variety of economic reforms that focused on the improvement of infrastructure: railways, ports, roads, mines, plantations and industrial areas. The Congolese people, however, lacked political power and faced legal discrimination. All colonial policies were decided in Brussels and Leopoldville. The Belgian Colony-secretary and Governor-general, neither of whom was elected by the Congolese people, wielded absolute power. During World War II, the small Congolese army (Force Publique) achieved several victories against the Italians in North Africa. The Belgian Congo, which was also rich in uranium deposits, supplied the uranium that was used by the United States to build the atomic weapons that were used in the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945.

The Belgian Congo was run on a somewhat different basis. Philosophically, "paternalism" served to guide and justify the actions of the administration. But coercion or the threat of coercion never was far from the surface. The brutality of colonial rule, particularly in its early years, left a double legacy. On the one hand, it created strong resentments on which nationalist movements could draw. At the same time, it generated a mood of fear and hopelessness that deterred the appearance of nationalist movements.

The state shared responsibility for administration and development with the Roman Catholic Church and business interests involved in mining and plantations. State, church, and business thus constituted what was called, even by Belgian officials, the "colonial trinity." It was not simply a question of the state's taking care of administration, the church of evangelization, and the business community of economic development. Rather, the tasks of the three overlapped and reinforced one another. In the postcolonial era, particularly after 1965 under Mobutu, finding a new equilibrium among the members of the "trinity" and sorting out the areas of responsibility of each would pose major problems, particularly with regard to education and management of the economy.

Among the Congolese people, resistance against their undemocratic regime grew over time. In 1955, the Congolese upper class (the so-called "évolués"), many of whom had been educated in Europe, initiated a campaign to end the inequality.

Definition of important concepts is crucial to the overall understanding of the times and circumstances surrounding the events leading to the tragic death of Lumamba. Here is, in a few words, how these definitions are presented on Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

Cold War, the Iron Curtain, the policies of Containment, Nuclear Deterrence and Mutual Assured Destruction (M.A.D.).

Cold War is a term used to describe the shifting struggle for power and prestige between the Western powers and the Communist bloc from the end of World War II until 1989. Of worldwide proportions, the conflict was tacit in the ideological differences between communism and capitalist democracy. Mutual suspicion had long existed between the West and the USSR, and friction was obvious in the Grand Alliance, during World War II. After the war the West felt even more threatened by the continued expansionist policy of the Soviet Union, and the traditional Russian fear of incursion from the West rose to new heights. Communists seized power in Eastern Europe with the support of the Red Army, the Russian occupation zones in Germany and Austria were sealed off by army patrols, and threats were directed against Turkey and Greece. Conflict sometimes grew intense in the United Nations, which was at times incapacitated by the ramifications of the cold war, at others effective in dealing with immediate issues.

In a famous speech in 1946 at Fulton, Mo., outgoing British Premier Winston Churchill warned of an implacable threat that lay behind a Communist “iron curtain.” The United States, taking the lead against the expansion of Soviet influence, rallied the West with the Truman Doctrine, under which immediate aid was given to Turkey and Greece. Also fearing the rise of Communism in war-torn Western Europe, the United States inaugurated the European Recovery Program, known as the Marshall Plan, which helped to restore prosperity and influenced the subsequent growth of what has become the European Union.

The Eisenhower Doctrine was first presented in a message to the United States Congress on January 5, 1957, but had been the foreign policy guideline of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, a veteran of the World War II, for a while. The doctrine stated that the United States would use armed forces upon request in response to imminent or actual aggression to the United States. Furthermore, countries that took stances opposed to Communism would be given aid in various forms. The military action provisions of the Doctrine were applied in the Lebanon Crisis the following year, when America intervened in response to a request by that country's president.

In the global political context, the Doctrine was made in response to the possibility of a generalized war, threatened as a result of the Soviet Union's attempt to use the Suez War (a military attack on Egypt by Britain, France, and Israel beginning on 29 October 1956. The attack followed Egypt's decision of 26 July 1956 to nationalize the Suez canal after the withdrawal of an offer by Britain and the United States to fund the building of the Aswan Dam) as a pretext to enter Egypt. Coupled with the power vacuum left by the decline of Great British and French power in the region after their failure in that same war, Eisenhower felt that a strong position needed to better the situation was further complicated by the positions taken by Egypt's Nasser, who was rapidly building a power base and using it to play the Soviets and Americans against each other, taking a position of "positive neutrality" and accepting aid from the Soviets.

During the cold war the general policy of the West toward Communist states was to contain them (i.e., keep them within their current borders) with the hope that internal division, failure, or evolution might end their threat. In 1948 the Soviet Union directly challenged the West by instituting a blockade of the western sectors of Berlin, but the United States airlifted supplies into the city until the blockade was withdrawn. The challenges in Europe influenced the United States to reverse its traditional policy of avoiding permanent alliances; in 1949 the United States and 11 other nations signed the North Atlantic Treaty (NATO; North Atlantic Treaty Organization). The Communist bloc subsequently formed in 1955 the Warsaw Treaty Organization as a counterbalance to NATO.

Mutual assured destruction (MAD) is a doctrine of military strategy in which a full-scale use of nuclear weapons by one of two opposing sides would effectively result in the destruction of both the attacker and the defender. It is based on the theory of deterrence according to which the deployment of strong weapons is essential to threaten the enemy in order to prevent the use of the very same weapons. The strategy is effectively a form of Nash equilibrium, in which both sides are attempting to avoid their worst possible outcome — nuclear annihilation. Another expression frequently employed at the time was the phrase "balance of terror". This was usually used in reference to the nuclear arms race between the United States and the Soviet Union during Cold War. It describes the tenuous peace that existed between the two countries as a result of both governments being terrified at the prospect of a world-destroying nuclear war. The term is usually used for rhetorical purposes, and was probably coined by Lester Pearson in June 1955 at the 10th anniversary of the signing of the UN Charter: "the balance of terror has replaced the balance of power".

Some political scientists use this phrase as a means of differentiating the world situation that followed World War II from that which preceded it.

Worldwide Cold War.

In Asia, the Communist cause gained great impetus when the Communists under Mao Zeroing gained control of Mainland China in 1949. The United States continued to support Nationalist China, with its headquarters on Taiwan. President Truman, fearing the appeal of Communism to the peoples of Asia, Africa, and Latin America, created the Point Four program, which was intended to help underdeveloped areas. Strife continued, however, and in 1950 Communist forces from North Korea attacked South Korea, precipitating the Korean War. Chinese Communist troops entered the conflict in large numbers, but were checked by UN forces, especially those of the United States. The focus of the cold war in Asia soon shifted to the southeast. China supported insurgent guerrillas in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia; the United States, on the other side, played a leading role in the formation of the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization and provided large-scale military aid, but guerrilla warfare continued.

Decolonization refers to the achievement of independence by the various Western colonies and protectorates in Asia and Africa following World War II. This conforms with an intellectual movement known as Post-Colonialism. A particularly active period of decolonization occurred between 1945 to 1960, beginning with the independence of Pakistan and the Republic of India from Great Britain in 1947 and the First Indochina War. A number of national liberation movements were established prior to the war, but most did not achieve their aims until after it ended. Decolonization had two faces, one that involved peaceful negotiation and the other, which was produced through violent revolt and armed struggle by the native population.

Independence is the self-government of a nation, country, or state by its residents and population, generally exercising sovereignty. The term independence is used in contrast to subjugation, which refers to a region as a "territory" —subject to the political and military control of an external government. The word is sometimes used in a weaker sense to contrast with hegemony, the indirect control of one nation by another, more powerful nation. Ahmed Sekou Toure of Guinea and authors like Frantz Fanon favored an independence captured by force, rather than a independence negociated with the former colonial power.

Pan-Africanism literally means 'all Africanism'. It is a sociopolitical world view, as well as a movement, which seeks to unify and uplift both native Africans and those of the African diaspora, as part of a "global African community".

Positive neutrality: Defined in Lumumba’s own oft repeated statements, that his government was not “communists, catholics or socialists” but “african nationalists [who] reserve the right to be friendly with anybody we like”[8].

Neocolonialism[9] can be defined as a disguised form of imperialism, by which a country may grant independence to another country but continue to dominate it by control of markets for goods or raw materials.The term was popularized by Ghanean first President and another prominent voice of Pan-africanism, Nkwame Krumah. Ghana achieved its independence from Britain in March 1957, and started off on cordial terms with the USA, where Nkrumah had studied. But by September 1960 this relationship was close to rupture, with Washington charging that Ghana was taking too much after the Soviet Union. It is, however, argued that the circumstances leading up to the chilling of US-Ghana relations in 1960 were more complex, and that the clear point of departure was the Congo crisis. Almost from the onset, leaders of both countries had substantial differences over the crisis, and the more the crisis deepened, the more the gulf between the two widened. Eisenhower wanted Congo to remain in the lines of the so-called free world; Nkrumah supported Lumumba’s right to choose.

The first African colonies to become independent were located in North Africa. They included Libya in 1949 (granted by the UN), Egypt (and Sudan) in 1952, Morocco and Tunisia in 1956, and Algeria in 1962. Only Algeria had a substantial European settler population, and only there did independence require a war.

In West Africa, the independence of AOF (Afrique Occidentale Française, French West Africa) and AEF (Afrique Equatoriale Française, French Equatorial Africa) provided examples of one of the basic problems facing African independence leaders: what size should the independent African state be? Should it be based on ethnic boundaries, geographic boundaries, colonial boundaries, territorial boundaries or a new relationship with the old metropolis?

The countries in East Africa fall into two categories: those that were British colonies and all of the rest. The British colonies form a coherent group because there were many plans to combine them into an East African Federation at independence.

Independence in southern Africa was substantially different from that of other regions thanks to the presence of large white settler populations in Southern Rhodesia and South Africa, and the presence of enormous mineral wealth in the Katanga region of the Belgian Congo. Of all the areas in Africa that were under European rule, this was the area that Europeans wanted least to give up. Consequently, independence struggles were long, drawn-out affairs.

The newly emerging nations of Asia and Africa soon became the scene of cold-war skirmishes, as the United States and the Soviet Union (and later China) competed for their allegiance, often through economic aid; all these regimes equated political opposition with a desire to overthrow capitalism and nationalize the private sector. In this they were discreetly supported by most of Western Europe and America. The West was willing to turn a blind eye to institutionalized racism and minority rule government, if that meant keeping commercial and mining investments safe from nationalization.  The Belgium government (and public) received all of its information about African public opinion from the big Belgian companies (Union Minière du Haut Katanga, for example) and missionaries, and neither group was particularly perceptive. Despite all the turmoil of the 1930s and 1940s, it was not until 1954 that a reform government allowed a few Congolese to study in Belgium. Belgium made almost no plans for independence in the Congo. In 1956, only 120 Congolese held the carte d'immatriculation out of a population of 13 million, and there were only thirty university students from the Belgian African colonies (Congo, Rwanda, Burundi). There was no African soldier with a rank higher than sergeant.

The main local protagonists: Joseph Kasa-Vubu, Patrice Emery Lumumba, Moise Kapenda Tshombé, and Joseph Désiré Mobutu.

The following brief biographies were put together with sources from InfloPlease – All the Knowledge You Need[10], Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[11].

Joseph Kasavubu (1917 – 1969), was also referred to by his admirers as “Le roi Kasa” (“King Kasa”), for his perfect manners.  Born near Tséhla, he was the first president of the Republic of the Congo from 1960 to 1965. He studied for the Roman Catholic priesthood but did not complete his training. Later, he became active in the nationalist movement while teaching school and working for the Belgian government in the Congo. In 1946 he asserted that the Congolese were the legitimate owners of the country and that the Belgians, as intruders, had to leave. In 1955 he became president of Abako, a cultural association of the Bakongo people. Under his leadership Abako became a powerful political organization. Briefly imprisoned in 1959 for inciting violence, he later attended (1960) the conference at Brussels that led to independence for the Congo. He became (1960) the Congo's first head of state. There ensued a struggle for power between him and Patrice Lumumba, the premier, in which each attempted to dismiss the other. Kasavubu ousted Lumumba with the help of Colonel Mobutu. In 1965, Mobutu deposed Kasavubu, who retired from politics.

Moïse Kapenda Tshombé (1919-1969), a Congolese political leader, was the figurehead of the Katanga (now Shaba) secession. His chief stock-in-trade was his cynical reliance on foreign-interest groups and white mercenaries.

Moïse Tshombé was born in Musumba in southwestern Katanga, the son of a well-to-do father who combined success as a trader with social prominence in his traditional milieu, as a direct heir of the Mwata Yamwo, the Lunda king.  Moïse Tshombé himself married a daughter of the Mwata Yamwo of the Lunda, and his uncle and brother were subsequently enthroned as emperors while he was at the height of his political career. Tshombé was educated by American Methodist missionaries and joined his father in his business, only to prove himself a rather incompetent manager. He repeatedly had to be rescued from commercial failure and after his father's death in 1951 became involved in questionable deals which reportedly put him at the mercy of European creditors.

Tshombé's early steps into public life, first as a nominated member of the advisory Katanga Provincial Council, then as local chairman of an association of middle-class Africans, were undistinguished. His emergence on the political scene really began in November 1958, when the Lunda tribal association (Gassomel), of which he had been elected chairman, took part in the creation of Conakat (Confédération des Associations du Katanga), along with other ethnic associations such as Balubakat, the association of Katanga Baluba, led by Jason Sendwé. Within a few months, however, Conakat had accepted the affiliation, as well as much of the political program, of the leading white settlers' organization in Katanga, a decision that led to Balubakat's withdrawal.

Now led by Tshombé, Conakat sought maximum autonomy for Katanga in a context of close association with Belgium, a position which placed it squarely at odds with leading advocates of Congolese nationalism, particularly Patrice Lumumba's Mouvement National Congolais (MNC). Locally, Conakat's insistence that all responsible positions in Katanga should go to "authentic Katangese" (a category in which they were willing to include white settlers but not immigrants from neighboring provinces of the Congo) led to the alienation of an important and influential segment of the African urban population and contributed to establishing the party's reputation for separatism.

The views defended by Conakat and by its settler associates found little audience at the Round Table Conference, where, in early 1960, the foundations of an independent Congo were laid down. Conakat won only eight seats out of 137 in the National Assembly in the May 1960 elections, but in Katanga itself, where it actually gained fewer votes than its adversaries, it managed to secure a one-seat margin in the Provincial Assembly and to exclude the opposition from the provincial government.

A first attempt at secession by Tshombé and his supporters two days before independence was foiled by the Belgian authorities. Less than two weeks later, under a transparent pretext, Tshombé declared Katanga's independence nevertheless.  

Exile and Death.

In 1965, Tshombé had exhausted his usefulness, once the rebellion had been contained, and he now was increasingly viewed as an embarrassment to the regime and to its Western backers. Tshombé's avowed ambition to wrest the presidency from President Joseph Kasavubu put him on a collision course with the durable, soft-spoken head of state, who dismissed him from office on Oct. 13, 1965. Like Lumumba 5 years earlier, Tshombé fought back to a stalemate, but on November 25 the army under Col. Joseph Mobutu took power, thus eliminating Tshombé from the scene.

From his exile in Europe, Tshombé continued to plot his return to power, hoping to draw support from Belgian mining interests threatened with nationalization by the Mobutu regime. Not only were the two uprisings carried out in his name unsuccessful, Tshombé himself was kidnapped on June 30, 1967, and delivered into the hands of the Algerian government. The extradition of Tshombé, who had been sentenced to death in absentia, was never carried out, and he remained confined in Algeria until he died (allegedly from a stroke) on June 29, 1969.

Joseph Désiré Mobutu. Born Oct. 14, 1930, in Lisala, Joseph Désiré Mobutu was educated in missionary schools and began his career in 1949 in the Belgian Congolese army, the Force Publique, rising from clerk and army sergeant during the colonial period, to colonel and army chief of staff by 1965. In 1956, he returned from studying in Brussels to the then Belgian Congo, joining the nationalist movement led by Lumumba as his personal secretary. On September 5 1960 Kasa-Vubu and Lumumba each announced the other's dismissal, creating a stalemate that was only ended on September 14 with army commander Joseph Mobutu's seizure of power in support of Kasa-Vubu. Over the next five years, Kasa-Vubu presided over a succession of weak governments. In July 1964 he appointed former Katangan secessionist leader Moise Tshombe as prime minister and permitted the use of European mercenaries against leftist rebels. Mobutu seized power for a second time on November 25, 1965, this time deposing Kasa-Vubu and subsequently declaring himself head of state.

 He assumed the office of prime minister, then established in 1967 a presidential form of government headed by himself; the constitution did not come into force until 1970, when Mobutu was old enough to become president.

The country was renamed the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 1997, which had been its name before Mobutu changed it to Zaire in 1971, as part of his program of “national authenticity.” The next year, h changed his own name to Mobutu Sésé Séko Nkuku Ngbendu Wa Za Banga ("The all-powerful warrior who, because of his endurance and inflexible will to win, goes from conquest to conquest, leaving fire in his wake and arising from the blood and ashes of his enemies like the Sun which conquers the night.”). Citizens were required to drop their Christian names, or face prison and heavy fines; place names were Africanized. Power was concentrated in Mobutu, who, backed by Western intelligence agencies that saw in him a foil to such leftist states as Angola, established a one-party state and a cult of personality. Mobutu was one of Africa's archetypal Big Men, putting his image on currency, on pictures in public buildings and on billboards across the country. The evening news on national TV began with images of him descending, god-like, through the clouds. He changed the name of lake Albert, on the Congo-Uganda border into lake Mobutu Sésé Séko. He suppressed tribal conflicts and encouraged a sense of nationhood, but at the same time amassed a huge personal fortune through economic exploitation and corruption, leading some to call his rule “kleptocracy.” He so feared coups that he built few roads that might assist advancing armies, leaving a country the size of the eastern United States with only 300 miles of mostly battered pavement. And he sharply limited political debate, allowing for most of his reign only a single party -- his own Mouvement Populaire de la Revolution. The nation suffered from uncontrolled inflation, a large debt, and massive currency devaluations. In 1977, invaders from Angola calling themselves the Congolese National Liberation Front pushed into Shaba and threatened the important mining center of Kolwezi. France and Belgium provided military aid to defeat the rebels. By 1991 economic deterioration and unrest led him to agree to share power with opposition leaders, but he used the army to thwart change until May 1997, when rebel forces assisted by Uganda and Rwanda and led by Laurent Désiré Kabila expelled him from the country. Mobutu died in Rabbat, Morocco on September 7 1997, from prostate cancer.

Patrice Emery Lumumba was born July 2, 1925 in the village of Onalua in the Katakokombe region of the Kasai province of the Belgian Congo. He was a member of the small Batété ethnic group, a fact that was to become significant in his later political life. His two principal rivals, Moise Tshombé, who led the breakaway of the Katanga province, and Joseph Kasavubu, who later became the nation's president, both came from large, powerful tribes from which they derived their major support, giving their political movements a regional character. In contrast, Lumumba's movement emphasized its all-Congolese nature.

Raised in a Catholic family as one of four male children, he was educated at a Protestant primary school, a Catholic missionary school, and finally the government post office training school, passing the one-year course with distinction. Lumumba went on to work in Kindu-Port-Empain, where he became active in the club of the “évolués” (educated Africans). He began to write essays and poems for Congolese newspapers. Lumumba next moved to Léopoldville (now Kinshasa) to become a postal clerk and went on to become an accountant in the post office in Stanleyville (now Kisangani). There he continued to contribute to the Congolese press. He applied for and was granted full Belgian citizenship.

Yet, by the time he had reached the age of 30 his outlook had become more African. In 1955 he became regional president of a purely Congolese trade union of government employees that was not affiliated, as were other unions, to either of the two Belgian trade-union federations (socialist and Roman Catholic). He also became active in the Belgian Liberal Party in the Congo. Although conservative in many ways, the party was not linked to either of the trade-union federations, which were hostile to it. In 1956 Lumumba was invited with others to make a study tour of Belgium under the auspices of the Minister of Colonies. On his return he was arrested on a charge of embezzlement from the post office. He was convicted and condemned one year later, after various reductions of sentence, to 12 months' imprisonment and a fine. The formation of the French Fifth Republic in 1958, the independence of Guinea, and political activity in other French colonies like Congo-Brazzaville stimulated political activity in the Belgian Congo. In addition, members of the Congolese elite attended the 1958 World's Fair in Brussels as part of the Belgian delegation, where they met other Africans, including some from independent countries.

When Lumumba got out of prison, he grew even more active in politics. In October 1958 he founded the Congolese National Movement (Mouvement National Congolais; MNC), the first nationwide Congolese political party. In December he attended the first All-African People's Conference in Accra, Ghana, where he met nationalists from across the African continent and was made a member of the permanent organization set up by the conference. His outlook and terminology, inspired by pan-African goals, now took on the tenor of militant nationalism.

The next two years were characterized by a rapid succession of events. In 1959 the Belgian government announced a program intended to lead in five years to independence, starting with local elections in December 1959. The nationalists regarded this program as a scheme to install puppets before independence and announced a boycott of the elections. The Belgian authorities responded with repression. On October 30 there was a clash in Stanleyville that resulted in 30 deaths. Lumumba was imprisoned on the charge of inciting the riots.

The MNC decided to shift tactics, entered the elections, and won a sweeping victory in Stanleyville (90 percent of the votes). In January 1960 the Belgian government convened a Round Table Conference in Brussels of all Congolese parties to discuss political change, but the MNC refused to participate without Lumumba. Lumumba was thereupon released from prison and flown to Brussels. The conference agreed on a date for independence, June 30, with national elections in May. Although there was a multiplicity of parties, the MNC came out far ahead in the elections, and Lumumba emerged as the leading nationalist politician of the Congo. . He faced opposition from parties organized along regional or ethnic lines, including the largest, ethnic group, the Association pour la Sauvegarde de la Culture et des Intérêts des Bakongo (ABAKO) led by Joseph Kasavubu.

Maneuvers to prevent his assumption of authority failed, and he was asked to form the first government, which he succeeded in doing so. He presented his cabinet on June 23 and was sworn in as Prime Minister.

Lumumba's declared policy was one of "positive neutralism", defined as a return to African values, rejection of outside ideology (capitalist and communist) and control of the nation's wealth. This latter point was unacceptable to the old imperial powers, which controlled the profitable mining industry in the Congo's Katanga province.

III- The Congo Crisis and the death of Lumumba: A Tragedy in three acts.

We now move to study the heart of the crisis, as it unfolded in the summer of 1960:

- The Diplomatic crisis: Independence Day and the visit of King Baudouin.

- Local politics: Ethnic politics and the role of the military.

- The murder.

From its inception, the Congo crisis had an international dimension. The chaos that followed on the heels of independence was caused not only by conflict among Congolese but also by foreign interference. Politics in the First Republic involved numerous rivalries among political leaders on behalf of various Congolese constituencies, ethnic or otherwise. At the same time, however, outside forces clearly intervened in Congolese politics and decisively determined outcomes.

In the 1960s, the Congo was a key area in terms of the geopolitics of Africa, and because of its wealth, its size, and its contiguity to white-dominated southern Africa, Lumumba's opponents had reason to fear the consequences of a radical or radicalized Congo regime. In an article entitled “A killing in Congo” first published on July 24, 2000, Kevin Whitelaw of US News Online, declares: “Lumumba clearly scared the daylights out of the Eisenhower administration.”[12] Evidence has since emerged in Washington that President Dwight Eisenhower directly ordered the CIA to "eliminate" him:

A recently published transcript of a 1975 previously unpublished interview with the minute-taker Robert Johnson, who took minutes at some meetings at an August 1960 White House meeting of Eisenhower and his national security advisers on the Congo crisis, has caused more controversy. In the transcript, which apparently only came to light by accident when it was misfiled with material relating to the assassination of John F. Kennedy, allegedly claims that Eisenhower ordered the killing of Lumumba at a meeting in August 1960. The interview is apparently from the House subcommittee that investigated assassinations in the mid-1970s and concluded that the CIA played a role in Lumumba's assassination and that evidence pointed to a direct role for Eisenhower in that decision. Robert Johnson, said in the interview that he vividly recalled the president turning to Allen Dulles, director of the CIA, "in the full hearing of all those in attendance, and saying something to the effect that Lumumba should be eliminated". Mr. Johnson recalled: "There was stunned silence for about 15 seconds and the meeting continued."

"In high quarters here, it is the clear-cut conclusion that if [Lumumba] continues to hold high office, the inevitable result will [have] disastrous consequences . . . for the interests of the free world generally," CIA Director Allen Dulles later wrote. "Consequently, we conclude that his removal must be an urgent and prime objective." At the same time, Dulles authorized a crash-program fund of up to $100,000 to replace the existing government of Patrice Lumumba with a "pro-western group''.

The troubled role of the military in Congolese politics also has its roots in the colonial era. Since the days of the Congo Free State, the state has had a strong military dimension. The Force Publique, the colonial army, was essentially used to subdue and control the indigenous population, although it served outside the colony during the two world wars. Many of the Free State's administrative personnel were military officers, drawn not only from Belgium but also from the United States, Canada, and European countries ranging from Norway to Turkey. Although courses were set up to train civilian administrators, the Force Publique remained the backbone of the Congo Free State and the Belgian Congo. The first rank-and-file troops were foreigners from the coasts of East Africa and West Africa, but as the Free State began to recruit Congolese, it tended to rely on what were seen as "martial races," first people of the middle reaches of the Congo River (the so-called Ngala or Bangala) and then the Tetela from southeastern Zaire. Although later quotas spread recruitment more evenly across the colony, there is some reason to think that the early imbalances were perpetuated by differential re-enlistment and promotion. During decolonization, military men of Ngala and Luba-Kasai backgrounds, in particular, played major roles in the fall and murder of the first Prime Minister, Patrice Lumumba.

After a series of revolts had demonstrated the danger of ethnically defined units, the Belgians made sure that all units down to the lowest levels were ethnically mixed. The Force Publique supposedly was the most "national" institution of the Belgian Congo, as well as the guarantor of the “Pax Belgica”. But with the benefit of hindsight, it is evident that both the Pax Belgica and the national quality of the Force Publique were somewhat mythical.

The Speech.

Lumumba was a determined nationalist with a great gift to inspire the people of Africa. His impromptu response to the condescending speech of the Belgian king at the independence ceremony will be remembered forever. When the king admonished the Congolese to be thankful for the gifts of civilization that Belgium was leaving behind, Lumumba’s speech ignored the agenda of the carefully planned event and reminded everyone present of the endless suffering and exploitation during Belgium's colonial rule.

According to Jean Van Lierde[13], then a young Belgian radical who had befriended the young leader, "Lumumba was the only Congolese leader who rose above ethnic difficulties and tribal preoccupations that killed all the other parties."

At the Independence Day celebrations of June 30, 1960, Belgium's hostility to Lumumba deepened. Excluded from the official program, Lumumba was advised by Van Lierde to get up and make an impromptu speech. To many, that was the worst advice Lumumba ever got, as it set his fate. He did speak indeed, passionately denouncing the harsh brutalities and indignities suffered by the Congolese under Belgian colonial rule. Diplomacy it was not. Here is the transcript of the memorable speech[14]:

“Men and women of the Congo,

Victorious fighters for independence, today victorious, I greet you in the name of the Congolese Government. All of you, my friends, who have fought tirelessly at our sides, I ask you to make this June 30, 1960, an illustrious date that you will keep indelibly engraved in your hearts, a date of significance of which you will teach to your children, so that they will make known to their sons and to their grandchildren the glorious history of our fight for liberty.

For this independence of the Congo, even as it is celebrated today with Belgium, a friendly country with whom we deal as equal to equal, no Congolese worthy of the name will ever be able to forget that is was by fighting that it has been won [applause], a day-to-day fight, an ardent and idealistic fight, a fight in which we were spared neither privation nor suffering, and for which we gave our strength and our blood.

We are proud of this struggle, of tears, of fire, and of blood, to the depths of our being, for it was a noble and just struggle, and indispensable to put an end to the humiliating slavery which was imposed upon us by force.

This was our fate for eighty years of a colonial regime; our wounds are too fresh and too painful still for us to drive them from our memory. We have known harassing work, exacted in exchange for salaries which did not permit us to eat enough to drive away hunger, or to clothe ourselves, or to house ourselves decently, or to raise our children as creatures dear to us.

We have known ironies, insults, blows that we endured morning, noon, and evening, because we are Negroes. Who will forget that to a black one said "tu", certainly not as to a friend, but because the more honorable "vous" was reserved for whites alone?

We have seen our lands seized in the name of allegedly legal laws which in fact recognized only that might is right.

We have seen that the law was not the same for a white and for a black, accommodating for the first, cruel and inhuman for the other.

We have witnessed atrocious sufferings of those condemned for their political opinions or religious beliefs; exiled in their own country, their fate truly worse than death itself.

We have seen that in the towns there were magnificent houses for the whites and crumbling shanties for the blacks, that a black was not admitted in the motion-picture houses, in the restaurants, in the stores of the Europeans; that a black traveled in the holds, at the feet of the whites in their luxury cabins.

Who will ever forget the massacres where so many of our brothers perished, the cells into which those who refused to submit to a regime of oppression and exploitation were thrown [applause]?

All that, my brothers, we have endured.

But we, whom the vote of your elected representatives have given the right to direct our dear country, we who have suffered in our body and in our heart from colonial oppression, we tell you very loud, all that is henceforth ended.

The Republic of the Congo has been proclaimed, and our country is now in the hands of its own children.

Together, my brothers, my sisters, we are going to begin a new struggle, a sublime struggle, which will lead our country to peace, prosperity, and greatness.

Together, we are going to establish social justice and make sure everyone has just remuneration for his labor [applause].

We are going to show the world what the black man can do when he works in freedom, and we are going to make of the Congo the center of the sun's radiance for all of Africa.

We are going to keep watch over the lands of our country so that they truly profit her children. We are going to restore ancient laws and make new ones which will be just and noble.

We are going to put an end to suppression of free thought and see to it that all our citizens enjoy to the full the fundamental liberties foreseen in the Declaration of the Rights of Man [applause].

We are going to do away with all discrimination of every variety and assure for each and all the position to which human dignity, work, and dedication entitles him.

We are going to rule not by the peace of guns and bayonets but by a peace of the heart and the will [applause].

And for all that, dear fellow countrymen, be sure that we will count not only on our enormous strength and immense riches but on the assistance of numerous foreign countries whose collaboration we will accept if it is offered freely and with no attempt to impose on us an alien culture of no matter what nature [applause].

In this domain, Belgium, at last accepting the flow of History, has not tried to oppose our independence and is ready to give us their aid and their friendship, and a treaty has just been signed between our two countries, equal and independent. On our side, while we stay vigilant, we shall respect our obligations, given freely.

Thus, in the interior and the exterior, the new Congo, our dear Republic that my government will create, will be a rich, free, and prosperous country. But so that we will reach this aim without delay, I ask all of you, legislators and citizens, to help me with all your strength.

I ask all of you to forget your tribal quarrels. They exhaust us. They risk making us despised abroad.

I ask the parliamentary minority to help my Government through a constructive opposition and to limit themselves strictly to legal and democratic channels.

I ask all of you not to shrink before any sacrifice in order to achieve the success of our huge undertaking.

In conclusion, I ask you unconditionally to respect the life and the property of your fellow citizens and of foreigners living in our country. If the conduct of these foreigners leaves something to be desired, our justice will be prompt in expelling them from the territory of the Republic; if, on the contrary, their conduct is good, they must be left in peace, for they also are working for our country's prosperity.

The Congo's independence marks a decisive step towards the liberation of the entire African continent [applause].

Sire, Excellencies, Mesdames, Messieurs, my dear fellow countrymen, my brothers of race, my brothers of struggle - this is what I wanted to tell you in the name of the Government on this magnificent day of our complete independence.

Our government, strong, national, popular, will be the health of our country.

I call on all Congolese citizens, men, women and children, to set themselves resolutely to the task of creating a prosperous national economy, which will assure our economic independence.

Glory to the fighters for national liberation!

Long live independence and African unity!

Long live the independent and sovereign Congo!”

[Applause, long and loud]

"The king was very angry. The Belgians wanted nothing to do with him after that. People say it was this speech that brought his end," says Van Lierde. The Guardian of London vividly recalls the gravity of the “Crime de Lese-Majesté” this speech caused, in its article first published on Friday, July 1^st, 1960, entitled: Marred: Lumumba's offensive speech in King's presence.[15]

A few days after independence, some units of the army (The “Force Publique”) rebelled, largely because of objections to their Belgian commanders, killing some and inciting thousands of Europeans to flee the Congo. In the confusion, the mineral-rich province of Katanga proclaimed secession. Belgium sent in troops, ostensibly to protect Belgian nationals. But the Belgian troops landed principally in Katanga, where they sustained the secessionist regime of Moise Tshombé.

On July 11, 1960, the Katanga province seceded from the Congo and asked for Belgian military assistance. Lumumba and the national government interpreted this as an attempt by Belgium to retain control of the richest part of the country. On July 13, 1960, the Congolese government asked for UN assistance to expel the Belgians. The USA refused to participate, but did not block it in the Security Council, and a multi-national force headed by Ghana, went to the Congo. The UN occupied Leopoldville and prevented the Katangan secession but the central government soon collapsed.

As prime minister, Lumumba did what little he could to redress the situation. His army was an uncertain instrument of power, his civilian administration untrained and untried; the United Nations forces (whose presence he had requested) were condescending and assertive, and the political alliances underlying his regime very shaky. The Belgian troops did not evacuate, and the Katanga secession continued.

Since the United Nations forces refused to help suppress the Katangese revolt, Lumumba appealed to the Soviet Union for planes to assist in transporting his troops to Katanga. He asked the independent African states to meet in Léopoldville in August to unite their efforts behind him. His moves alarmed many, particularly the Western powers and the supporters of President Kasavubu, who pursued a moderate course in the coalition government and favored some local autonomy in the provinces.

On September 5, president Joseph Kasa-Vubu announced over Leopoldville radio that prime minister Patrice Lumumba was dismissed. In his place, Kasa-Vubu appointed Joseph Iléo, a respected moderate.

 Lumumba immediately contested the legalities of the move. He went on national radio to explain to the Congolese people what had happened:

"...I wish to announce that a Council of Ministers will be held this evening to examine the situation that has just been created this evening by the unexpected declaration of Mr. Joseph Kasavubu, who has publicly betrayed the nation. Mr. Kasavubu did not consult me, nor has any minister or any member of parliament been consulted. Democracy requires that a government rule only if it is elected by the people and has the confidence of the people. We enjoy such confidence. We have proved to the people, to the entire world, that the national popular government, which you freely elected to defend your interests, to defend your national patrimony, has worked up to the present in the superior interest of the nation. In the name of the democratically elected government, in the name of all our elected officers, all those who voted for Kasavubu, I proclaim that we withdraw our vote. The popular government remains at its post. Beginning today, I proclaim that Kasavubu, who has betrayed the nation, who has betrayed the people, is no longer Chief of State because he has collaborated with the Belgians and the Flemish." Iléo tried to form a cabinet but did not manage to get his new government approved by parliament. There were thus two groups now claiming to be the legal central government. Hammarskjold publicly endorsed Lumumba’s dismissal before the Security Council, and when Lumumba tried to broadcast his case to the Congolese people, UN forces closed the radio station. Instead, he appeared before the legislature, and by dint of his formidable powers of speech, both houses of Parliament voted to reaffirm him as prime minister.

Even out of office, Lumumba remained under the microscope of Western spy services. His ties to Moscow frightened Washington. His fierce anti-colonialism unnerved Brussels. Years later, Under Secretary of State C. Douglas Dillon told a Senate investigating committee (the Church committee) that the National Security Council and President Eisenhower had believed in 1960 that Lumumba was a "very difficult if not impossible person to deal with, and was dangerous to the peace and safety of the world." On September 14 the Congolese army leader Colonel Joseph Desire Mobutu, who later reached a working agreement with Kasavubu, seized power. In October the General Assembly of the United Nations recognized the credentials of Kasavubu's government. The independent African states split sharply over the issue.

In November Lumumba sought to travel from Leopoldville, where the United Nations had provided him with provisory protection, to Stanleyville, where his supporters had control. With the active complicity of foreign intelligence sources, Joseph Mobutu sent his soldiers after Lumumba. He was caught after several days of pursuit and spent three months in prison, while his adversaries were trying in vain to consolidate their power. Finally, aware that an imprisoned Lumumba was more dangerous than a dead Prime Minister, he was delivered on January 17, 1961, to the Katanga secessionist regime, where he was executed the same night of his arrival, along with his comrades Mpolo and Okito.

IV- The aftermath.

This lat section will deal with the Partition of Congo (the Katanga debacle and the demise of Tshombé), the ascendance to power of Mobutu, unending conspiracies theories and lasting controversies about the death of Lumumba.

Katanga’s  Secession was proclaimed on July 11, 1960.

The new "state" was organized with massive military and civilian assistance from Belgium but had to face the hostility of a considerable portion of its population (mostly in northern Katanga). Prime Minister Lumumba's attempt to end the secession by force failed when he was dismissed from his post by President Joseph Kasavubu, and the deposed Lumumba was eventually delivered into the hands of the Katanga government and assassinated in Elisabethville, although Tshombé himself apparently played only an indirect role in this episode. Negotiations to secure the Congo's reunification were pursued during most of 1961, leading at one point to Tshombé's brief imprisonment by the central government, but it was only through the repeated intervention of United Nations forces (backed by the United States) that the Katanga secession was finally brought to an end in January 1963. Tshombé himself was not arrested, due to the influence of Western powers, but he found his position increasingly uncomfortable and left the Congo in June 1963. During the following 12 months he actively prepared his reentry on the Congolese political scene from his Spanish abode, but, despite the fact that mercenaries and troops of the former Katanga state were kept in readiness in neighboring Angola with Portuguese complicity, his second chance came not from a reactivation of the Katanga secession but from the fear of a fast-spreading peasant insurrection.

In June 1964, having spurned offers to serve under Premier Cyrille Adoula, Tshombé was recalled as prime minister of the Congo. In a sense, his best qualification for the job was his demonstrated readiness to turn over the running of the country to Western technicians and soldiers. This he promptly did, and with the help of white mercenaries and some direct intervention by Belgium and the United States he presided over the ruthless liquidation of the rebellion. His attempt to organize a nationwide political party under the name of Conaco was much less successful, however; and although the party won an overwhelming majority in the highly irregular election of 1965, he still lacked a genuine power base.

Researcher and historian, Ludo de Witte, who has scrutinized documents held in the Brussels' archives for forty years, says the Belgian government was secretly protecting its interests and directing Katanga's secession from behind the scenes[16].

"The documents are very clear. All those officers and functionaries were following orders from the Belgian government, and following Belgian policy,"

Lumumba demanded that Belgian troops withdraw - they didn't. He expelled Belgian diplomats and called on the United Nations to defend the newly independent state. He hinted that it might be necessary to ask the Soviet Union to assist unilaterally. That set alarm bells ringing in the West.

A multinational UN peacekeeping force was deployed.

"It is on record in UN reports that Belgian civilian personnel made it impossible for the UN civilian experts to work properly", says Brigadier Indarjit Rikye, the Secretary-General's military representative in Congo.

Lumumba was frustrated. Finally he accepted a consignment of Soviet transport planes, military trucks and, it was suspected, guns. The American ambassador in Leopoldville began referring to the prime minister as "Lumumbavitch".

On October 6, 1960, the Belgian Minister for African Affairs, Count d'Aspremont Lynden, sent a cable to Katanga's capital, Elizabethville, stating clearly that policy was now directed at the "definitive elimination" of Patrice Lumumba.

In London's Whitehall, analysts at the British Foreign Office were considering reports from the UK's ambassador in Leopoldville. One deskman, later to become head of the internal security service MI5, opined. “ I see only two possible solutions to the problem. The first is the simple one of ensuring Lumumba's removal from the scene by killing him. This should, in fact, solve the problem.”

Larry Devlin, the CIA station chief in Leopoldville received orders from Washington to await the arrival of "Joe from Paris".

"I recognized him as he walked towards my car, but when he told me what they wanted done I was totally, totally taken aback", says Devlin now. "Joe from Paris" was better known as the CIA's chief technical officer, Dr Sidney Gottlieb. He had brought with him a special tube of poisoned toothpaste. Devlin's job was to get the toothpaste into Lumumba's bathroom.

"It would put the man away", recalls Devlin, who was aghast at the plan. "I had never suggested assassination, nor did I believe that it was advisable," he says now. The toothpaste never made it into Lumumba's bathroom. "I threw it in the Congo River when its usefulness had expired."

Devlin says he suspected, but didn't know for sure, that the order to assassinate Lumumba must have come from President Eisenhower himself. In August this year, however, Devlin's suspicion was confirmed officially by Washington - the order had come from the President.

Lumumba now made perhaps the worst decision of his life. He decided to escape. Smuggled out of his residence at night in a visiting diplomat's car he began a long journey towards Stanleyville. Mobutu's troops were in hot pursuit. Finally trapped on the banks of the impassable Sankuru River, he was captured by soldiers loyal to Colonel Mobutu.

He appealed to local UN troops to save him. The UN refused on direct orders from headquarters in New York. He was flown first to Leopoldville, where he appeared beaten and humiliated before journalists and diplomats.

"He was chained in the back of a truck. He was bleeding, his hair was disheveled, he'd lost his glasses", says Rikhye. "But we could not intervene."

Further humiliation followed at Mobutu's villa, where delighted young soldiers whooped with joy as they beat the elected prime minister in full view of television cameras. Lumumba was dispatched first to Thysville military barracks, one hundred miles from Leopoldville.

The Belgians demanded a more decisive ending - they wanted Lumumba delivered into the hands of his most sworn enemy, President Tschombé of Katanga. On January 15 1961, the Belgian Minister for African Affairs wrote to his apparatchiks in Elizabthville instructing them to inform Tschombé that he must accept Lumumba without delay. It was in effect a death warrant. After a moment's hesitation Tschombé agreed.

Lumumba was beaten again on the flight to Elizabethville on January 17. He was seized by Katangese soldiers commanded by Belgians and driven to Villa Brouwe. He was guarded and brutalized still further by both Belgian and Katangese troops while President Tschombé and his cabinet decided what to do with him.

That same night it is said Lumumba was bundled into another convoy that headed into the bush. It drew up beside a large tree. Three firing squads had been assembled, commanded by a Belgian. Another Belgian had overall command of the execution site. Lumumba and two other comrades from the government were lined up against a large tree. President Tschombé and two other ministers were present for the executions, which took place one at a time.

The following day Katanga’s interior minister called a senior Belgian policeman to his office with orders to conceal the killings. "He said 'You destroy them, you make them disappear. How you do it doesn't interest me," claims Gerard Soete[17], then Commissioner of the Katangese Police. Soete and a companion (in some accounts presented as… his own brother[18]) exhumed the bodies from shallow graves, hacked them into pieces and dissolved them in acid from the Belgian-run mines nearby.

"We were there for two days," says Soete. "We did things an animal wouldn't do. That's why we were drunk. Stone drunk." When they ran out of acid, they made a fire for the last remains. When they had finished, there was no trace of human remains.

Nothing was said for three weeks - though rumor spread quickly. When Lumumba's death was formally announced on Katangese radio, it was accompanied by an elaborately implausible cover involving an escape and murder by enraged villagers. No one believed it.

The research by Ludo de Witte and the recent testimony from witnesses and accessories have caused soul-searching in Brussels. The Belgian Parliament has opened a Commission of Inquiry into the events of forty years ago.

"It is time to address our history," said Geert Versnick, a Flemish liberal politician and member of Open VLD and quoted by de Witte. Versnick is a Member of the Belgian Chamber of Representatives since 1994 who chairs the commission that begun collecting evidence as early as 1998. "If there was wrong-doing in some of our former colonies, especially in the case of Mr. Lumumba, then we should address our history."

In “The Assassination of Lumumba,”[19] Ludo De Witte begins his study with these strong words against Belgium:

“Belgium had finally decided that it should be seen to shed its empire, and organized elections for a post-occupation government. In fact, the elections were a set-up, and Belgium intended to drive from the back seat so that their surreptitious looting of the Congo's vast mineral wealth could continue. They had reckoned without nationalist hero Patrice Lumumba, who stormed to power despite the Belgian attempts to elect a puppet ruler. Lumumba humiliated the Belgian king in his victory speech, denounced the years of Belgian occupation and gave notice that he would not be anyone's tool. The republic of Congo would be the very model of an African powerhouse: progressive, fair and democratic, ruled by the Congolese.

From there, things turned nasty very quickly. The Belgians immediately provoked secession by the Congolese province of Katanga and installed their puppet regime there instead. Lumumba appealed to the UN to intervene, but Belgium had already whispered to secretary-general Hammarskjöld, who promptly recognized the illegal breakaway of Katanga and sent in 'peacekeeping' forces to patrol the Congo - but not Katanga - in effect preventing action by Lumumba's legitimately elected government.

The situation was worsened by a (wrongheaded) US perception that Lumumba was a crypto-Communist. President Eisenhower called for Lumumba's murder, and a CIA effort was initiated, involving the infamous hit man known as QJ/WIN (identified in De Witte's text for what I believe is the first time). That this attempt came to nothing (and not for want of trying) does not alter the fact that the USA conspired to murder the democratically-elected head of another country - but then, we all knew that they did that sort of thing anyway, didn't we? It's shocking how boring some shocking facts are.

Amid this climate, Lumumba's situation went from bad to worse: placed under house arrest, ostensibly for his own protection by the UN, his government was taken over by Belgium-friendly parliamentary opponents. Lumumba escaped and headed north to Stanleyville, where he would be able to regroup his followers and begin the expulsion of the Belgians and the UN. En route - despite his supposed international immunity as head of government - he was arrested by UN forces and fell into the hands of the Belgians.

Belgium now had a dilemma. A flurry of diplomatic cables flew between Brazzaville and Brussels, concerning the troublesome prime minister whom they dared not kill, dared not release. Eventually, it was arranged that Lumumba should be transferred to his mortal enemies in breakaway Katanga, who had previously threatened to eat him (and they eventually did eat six other nationalist leaders, shortly after the death of Lumumba: it is a measure of De Witte's integrity that he does not flinch from discussing this incident). After a horrifying plane journey (bound, with tape across his eyes, ears and mouth, and receiving regular beatings), Lumumba was kicked and punched into the hands of the Katanga regime. Here the Belgian involvement supposedly ended: in fact, Belgian officers were constantly present throughout what followed, guiding events in a hands-off diplomatic style. After a further night of torture at the hands of the Katangan cabinet, Lumumba was taken out to a clearing and shot by Katangan soldiers, the Belgians looking on impassively.”

Now the assassination - achieved by proxy, under cover of an artificial civil war and in the name of stilling deliberately provoked unrest - moved into its 'cover-up' phase. The Belgians let it be announced that Lumumba (who, as far as anyone knew at this stage, had simply disappeared) had escaped from custody and was on the run. They then dug up Lumumba's body and had it dissolved in acid. After this, they announced that hostile villagers had killed Lumumba. And that, until De Witte's research was published, was that.

Remember, the above is not supposition or vulgar 'conspiracy theorizing'. This is how it happened. According to the website africawithin.com which reproduced experts of this research, De Witte's research deserved a 9 out of 10 until early this year: he had managed to initiate a Belgian parliamentary investigation into the death of Lumumba, true, but after all, no boo can be really perfect. But in January 2002, a trap set by De Witte finally closed. He had established in his work that Belgium was the guiding force in Lumumba's death, but - and this is a matter conspiracy researchers seldom consider - unless you can prove beyond doubt that a crime has been committed by strict definition of the law, your case need never be tested. De Witte knew he would never obtain a confession from any of the principals, despite a mountain of incriminating evidence he's unearthed (and for the same reason he'd never be sued for libel and have a chance to establish his case that way). So De Witte had constructed a parallel case to the murder charge: Belgian soldiers were in position around Lumumba at every stage of the assassination, right up to his death. Under its own 'Good Samaritan' laws, Belgium was clearly legally culpable for failing to prevent the assassination from taking place. And, in January 2002, the Belgian government officially recognized that it was guilty of this crime, and issued a formal apology.

In January 13, 1995 the Office of the Historian, Bureau of Public Affairs of the United States’ Department of State published its volume XX, consecrated to the crisis in the Congo. Interestingly, no mention is made of the death of Lumumba. This volume is one of 25 print volumes and 6 microfiche supplements documenting the foreign policy of the Kennedy administration. Here are some highlights of the official version of the facts, according to the State Department[20]:

“During the Congo crisis of 1960-1961, both the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations were deeply concerned with the threat of Soviet domination of the Republic of the Congo (now Zaire) and with Soviet influence on the charismatic Patrice Lumumba and his followers. Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961-1963, Volume XX, Congo Crisis, the latest volume in the Department of State's Foreign Relations series, documents U.S. policy with respect to the recurrent crisis in the Congo during the Kennedy administration and offers insight into U.S. policy toward the newly- independent countries of Africa during the Cold War.

As John F. Kennedy prepared to take power in January 1961, the Congo seemed to be disintegrating. The Congolese Government controlled only two of six provinces, while two were controlled by Lumumba's supporters. The province of Katanga had announced its secession months earlier, and another province was attempting to follow its example. Just before Kennedy's inauguration, Lumumba was killed in Katanga. His death eased American fears that the crisis would open an avenue for Soviet power into the heart of Africa.

When a coalition government was formed in August 1961 under Prime Minister Cyrille Adoula, it seemed that the crisis was ending, but it entered a new phase with the outbreak of hostilities in Katanga a month later. For the next 16 months, the Kennedy administration sought to bring an end to the Katanga secession. U.S. policymakers feared that loss of Katanga's mineral wealth would undermine the Congo's economic viability, bring about the collapse of the moderate Adoula government, and open the door to the extension of Soviet influence”.

The volume provides a case study of a major U.N. intervention of the 1960s. It also reveals the foreign policy problems that confronted the United States as a result of the multilateral operation. Although American forces were not directly involved in the Congo, the United States played an essential role by providing financial and logistic support.

While this volume focuses on U.S. policy rather than on U.N. operations, it includes much documentation on U.S. discussions with Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjold, his successor U Thant, and other world leaders about U.N. goals and methods.

On June 26, 2007, the Central Intelligence Agency released the "family jewels", a report detailing 25 years of the Agency misdeeds worldwide. According to the Washington Post, “the 702-page collection was delivered by CIA officers to the US National Security Archive 15 years after the Archive filed a request under the Freedom of Information Act for the documents. The documents were compiled in the midst of the 1973-74 Watergate scandal, sparked by the bungled burglary of Democratic Party offices in Washington, in which two of the perpetrators were long-time CIA operatives. The CIA assembled the documents as part of an attempt to shield itself from the ensuing crisis of the Nixon administration. The documents provide a written record of crimes ranging from the CIA’s collaboration with the Mafia in the attempted assassination of Cuban President Fidel Castro to an assassination plot against Congolese Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba, spying on journalists, antiwar and civil rights activists and other opponents of US government policy, and infiltration of covert agents into left-wing organizations.

In a statement to CIA staff members on the release of the documents, the agency’s current director, Michael Hayden, described the declassification as an effort to close the door on an unpleasant but long ago concluded chapter in the CIA’s history. The documents provided few new details of CIA operations, most of which were revealed long ago, either by Congress or the media. Rather than being a comprehensive accounting of a quarter-century of agency history, they were a haphazard collection of internal memos, communications with Congress and press clippings. Many contained deletions, and a number of pages were blank”. The most compelling account on US collusion with the fate of Lumumba comes in the form of a news article, written by a long time critic of American involvement in the region, Dr. Stephen R. Weissman.

On July 21, 2002 Stephen R. Weissman wrote an article in the Washington Post, entitled “Opening the Secret Files on Lumumba's Murder.”[21] Dr. Weissman was staff director of the U.S. House of Representatives subcommittee on Africa from 1986 to 1991. He has done extensive research on U.S. policy in the Congo as well as other African countries. Here are some key parts of his analysis:

“(…) The conventional explanation of Lumumba's death has been that he was murdered by Congolese rivals after earlier U.S. attempts to kill him, including a plot to inject toxins into his food or toothpaste, failed. In 1975, the U.S. Senate's "Church Committee" probed CIA assassination plots and concluded there was "no evidence of CIA involvement in bringing about the death of Lumumba."

Not so. I have obtained classified U.S. government documents, including a chronology of covert actions approved by a National Security Council (NSC) subgroup, that reveal U.S. involvement in -- and significant responsibility for -- the death of Lumumba, who was mistakenly seen by the Eisenhower administration as an African Fidel Castro. The documents show that the key Congolese leaders who brought about Lumumba's downfall were players in "Project Wizard," a CIA covert action program. Hundreds of thousands of dollars and military equipment were channeled to these officials, who informed their CIA paymasters three days in advance of their plan to send Lumumba into the clutches of his worst enemies. Other new details: The U.S. authorized payments to then-President Joseph Kasavubu four days before he ousted Lumumba, furnished Army strongman Mobutu with money and arms to fight pro-Lumumba forces, helped select and finance an anti-Lumumba government, and barely three weeks after his death authorized new funds for the people who arranged Lumumba's murder.

Moreover, these documents show that the plans and payments were approved by the highest levels of the Eisenhower administration, either the NSC or its "Special Group," consisting of the national security adviser, CIA director, undersecretary of state for political affairs, and deputy defense secretary.

These facts are four decades old, but are worth unearthing for two reasons. First, Congo is still struggling to establish democracy and stability. By facing up to its past role in undermining Congo's fledgling democracy, the United States might yet contribute to Congo's future. Second, the U.S. performance in Congo is relevant to our struggle against terrorism. It shows what can happen when, in the quest for national security, we abandon the democratic principles and rule of law we are fighting to defend.

In February, Belgium, the former colonial power in Congo, issued a thousand-page report that acknowledged "an irrefutable portion of responsibility in the events that led to the death of Lumumba." Unlike Belgium, the United States has admitted no such moral responsibility. Over the years, scholars (including myself) and journalists have written that American policy played a major role in the ouster and assassination of Lumumba. But the full story remained hidden in U.S. documents, which, like those I have examined, are still classified despite the end of the Cold War, the end of the Mobutu regime and Belgium's confession.

Here's what they tell us that, until now, we didn't know, or didn't know for certain:

* In August 1960, the CIA established Project Wizard. Congo had been independent only a month, and Lumumba, a passionate nationalist, had become prime minister, with a plurality of seats in the parliament. But U.S. presidential candidate John F. Kennedy was vowing to meet "the communist challenge" and Eisenhower's NSC was worried that Lumumba would tilt toward the Soviets.

The U.S. documents show that over the next few months, the CIA worked with and made payments to eight top Congolese - including President Kasavubu, Mobutu (then army chief of staff), Foreign Minister Justin Bomboko, top finance aide Albert Ndélé, Senate President Joseph Iléo and labor leader Cyrille Adoula - who all played roles in Lumumba's downfall.

The CIA joined Belgium in a plan, detailed in the Belgian report, for Ileo and Adoula to engineer a no-confidence vote in Lumumba's government, which would be followed by union-led demonstrations, the resignations of cabinet ministers (organized by Ndélé) and Kasavubu's dismissal of Lumumba.

* On Sept. 1, the NSC's Special Group authorized CIA payments to Kasavubu, the U.S. documents say. On Sept. 5, Kasavubu fired Lumumba in a decree of dubious legality. However, Kasavubu and his new prime minister, Iléo, proved lethargic over the following week as Lumumba rallied supporters. So Mobutu seized power on Sept. 14. He kept Kasavubu as president and established a temporary "College of Commissioners" to replace the disbanded government.

* The CIA financed the College and influenced the selection of commissioners. The College was dominated by two Project Wizard participants: Bomboko, its president, and Ndélé, its vice-president. Another CIA ally, Lumumba party dissident Victor Nendaka, was appointed chief of the security police.

* On Oct. 27, the NSC Special Group approved $250,000 for the CIA to win parliamentary support for a Mobutu government. However, when legislators balked at approving any prime minister other than Lumumba, the parliament remained closed. The CIA money went to Mobutu personally and the commissioners.

* On Nov. 20, the Special Group authorized the CIA to provide arms, ammunition, sabotage materials and training to Mobutu's military in the event it had to resist pro-Lumumba forces.

The full extent of what one U.S. document calls the "intimate" relationship between the CIA and Congolese leaders was absent from the Church Committee report. The only covert action (apart from the assassination plots) the committee discussed was the August 1960 effort to promote labor opposition and a no-confidence vote in the Senate”.

How did Lumumba die?

This part is composed of accounts from different historians and witnesses assembled in a number of books and publications[22]. Rather than quieting the polemic, some accounts have made the issue even more contentious.

“After being ousted Sept. 5, Lumumba rallied support in parliament and the international community. When Mobutu took over, U.N. troops protected Lumumba, but soon confined him to his residence. Lumumba escaped on Nov. 27. Days later he was captured by Mobutu's troops, beaten and arrested.

What happened next is clearer thanks to the Belgian report and the classified U.S. documents. As early as Christmas Eve 1960, College of Commissioners' president Bomboko offered to hand Lumumba over to two secessionist leaders who had vowed to kill him. One declined and nothing happened until mid-January 1961, when the central government's political and military position deteriorated and troops guarding Lumumba (then jailed on a military base near the capital) mutinied. CIA and other Western officials feared a Lumumba comeback.

On Jan. 14, the commissioners asked Kasavubu to move Lumumba to a "surer place." There was "no doubt," the Belgian inquiry concluded, that Mobutu agreed. Kasavubu told security chief Nendaka to transfer Lumumba to one of the secessionist strongholds. On Jan. 17, Nendaka sent Lumumba to the Katanga region. That night, Lumumba and two colleagues were tortured and executed in the presence of members of the Katangan government. No official announcement was made for four weeks.

What did the U.S. government tell its Congolese clients during the last three days of Lumumba's life? The Church Committee reported that a Congolese "government leader" advised the CIA's Congo station chief, Larry Devlin, on Jan. 14 that Lumumba was to be sent to "the home territory" of his "sworn enemy." Yet, according to the Church Committee and declassified documents, neither the CIA nor the U.S. embassy tried to save the former prime minister.

The CIA may not have exercised robotic control over its covert political action agents, but the failure of Devlin or the U.S. embassy to question the plans for Lumumba could only be seen by the Congolese as consent. After all, secret CIA programs had enabled this group to achieve political power, and the CIA had worked from August through November 1960 to assassinate or abduct Lumumba.

Here, the classified U.S. chronology provides an important postscript. On Feb. 11, 1961, with U.S. reports from Congo strongly indicating Lumumba was dead, the Special Group authorized $500,000 for political action, troop payments and military equipment, largely to the people who had arranged Lumumba's murder.

Devlin has sought to distance himself from Lumumba's death. While the CIA was in close contact with the Congolese officials involved, Devlin told the Church Committee that those officials "were not acting under CIA instructions if and when they did this." In a recent phone conversation with Devlin, I posed the issue of U.S. responsibility for Lumumba's death. He acknowledged that, "It was important to [these] cooperating leaders what the U.S. government thought." But he said he did "not recall" receiving advance word of Lumumba's transfer. Devlin added that even if he had objected, "That would not have stopped them from doing it."

Lasting consequences.

By evading its share of moral responsibility for Lumumba's fate, the United States blurs African and American history and sidesteps the need to make reparation for yesterday's misdeeds through today's policy. In 1997, after the Mobutu regime fell, the Congolese democratic opposition pleaded in vain for American and international support. Since then, as many as 3 million lives have been lost as a result of civil and regional war. The United States has not supported a strong U.N. peacekeeping force or fostered a democratic transition. The collapse in late April 2002 of negotiations between Congolese factions threatens to re-ignite the smoldering conflict or ratify the partition of the country.

After Mobutu's fall, the country endured years of devastating wars under both Laurent Kabila, who was assassinated in 2001, and Joseph Kabila, who signed a peace deal the following year. But during the strife, foreign governments and investors divvied up much of Congo's vast mineral wealth. Deaths from the years of instability were estimated at 4 million, with most coming from easily preventable diseases and famine.

Elation over Mobutu's downfall quickly faded, as Kabila's own autocratic style emerged, and he seemed devoid of a clear plan for reconstructing the country. In Aug. 1998, Congolese rebel forces, backed by Kabila's former allies, Rwanda and Uganda, gained control of a large portion of the country until Angolan, Namibian, and Zimbabwean troops came to Kabila's aid. In 1999, the Lusaka Accord was signed by all six of the countries involved, as well as by most, but not all, of the various rebel groups.

In Jan. 2001, Kabila was assassinated, allegedly by one of his bodyguards. His young and inexperienced son Joseph became the new president. He demonstrated a willingness to engage in talks to end the civil war. In April 2002, the government agreed to a power-sharing arrangement with Ugandan-supported rebels and signed a peace accord with Rwanda and Uganda. More than 2.5 million people are estimated to have died in the Congo's complex four-year civil war, which involved seven foreign armies and numerous rebel groups that often fought among themselves.

On July 17, 2003, the Congo's new power-sharing government was inaugurated, but the fighting and killing continued. In April 2003, hundreds of civilians were massacred in the eastern province of Ituri in an ethnic conflict. In 2004, an insurgency in Bukavu erupted, other areas of the Congo grew restive, and Rwanda continued to support various rebel groups fighting the government. By the end of 2004, the death toll from the conflict had reached 3.8 million.

Despite instability, political progress continued. In May 2005, a new constitution was adopted by the national assembly, and overwhelmingly ratified in January 2006. On July 30, 2006, the first democratic election in the country since 1970 took place. The United Nations had a 17,500-member force in Congo, the largest peacekeeping operation in the world. In advance of the presidential election, won by Joseph Kabila. U.N. tanks drove through Kinshasa while Congo's own military was confined to barracks. President Kabila received 44.8% of the vote, which was not enough to win the election outright. Fighting broke out between factions supporting the two major candidates, setting off the worst violence the country has seen since the 2002 peace deal was signed. Kabila was declared the winner in the October run-off election, winning 58% of the vote, the country's first freely elected president in four decades.

The Uranium curse.

On March 23, 2004 BBCNEWS published online the following article[23]:

“Authorities in DR Congo say they need help from the international community to control access to a mine which has produced uranium for nuclear bombs.

The country's Mining Minister Diomi Ndongala told the BBC that dangerous activities were taking place at the Shinkolobwé mine, in Katanga province. Earlier, the UN's nuclear watchdog said it was concerned about the mine. The government says it shut down the mine, but a BBC correspondent found 6,000 illegal miners at work there.

They are extracting large amounts of material containing cobalt, copper, platinum and uranium, says our correspondent. The uranium is allegedly sold to nearby furnaces operated mainly by private businessmen from China and India. It is then reportedly illegally exported to the world market via neighboring Zambia. Minister Ndongala said during recent years officials from North Korea and African countries expressed interest in the Congo uranium.

The government has declared the mine a no-go area. However, the country's infrastructure has been crippled by seven years of war and the government's edicts have had little effect at the mine - which is 2,000km (1,250 miles) from the capital Kinshasa.

"We're very concerned. Congo is obliged to report any uranium mining activities as well as exports," IAEA spokeswoman Melissa Fleming told the BBC's News hour program.

"We are of course aware of the turbulent situation in terms of security and political situation in the region, we're aware that the government may not itself be fully aware of the activities ongoing in some parts of the country," she said. "That said, we are demanding information from the government on this alleged illegal mining." Diplomats based in Kinshasa have also expressed concern.

Uranium extracted from the Shinkolobwé mine was used by the Americans in the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan during World War II.”

The Democratic Republic of Congo has perhaps the richest concentration of precious metals and minerals on earth. In an article entitled “The looting of the Congo” published by The New Internationalist on May 1^st, 2004, Colette Braeckman, a journalist for Le Soir de Bruxelles, a contributor to Le Monde Diplomatique and author of several books on Central Africa, described at length how their exploitation by warring factions has fuelled the worst conflict anywhere since the Second World War[24].

On March 24, 2007, BBCNEWS online followed up with this article[25] under the title:

“Two men accused of being part of a network to exploit the Democratic Republic of Congo's uranium have been released after their arrest last week.

Scientific Research Minister Sylvanus Mushi said they are still accused of belonging to the international ring. He said as the nuclear officials had not informed their superiors about a deal they had made with a London-listed company to export uranium, it was void.

But Mr. Mushi's predecessor said on Monday that the deal was legitimate. Kamanda wa Kamanda said that if the deal was cancelled, it would open the door to illegal trading.

The dispute comes amid reports that a large quantity of uranium has gone missing in recent years in DR Congo.

DR Congo's top nuclear official Fortunat Lumu and his colleague were released after being held in custody for three days. BBC's Arnaud Zajtman in the capital, Kinshasa, says they were detained for questioning over allegations of uranium smuggling.

Last week, state prosecutor Tshimanga Mukeba told the BBC that an "important quantity" of uranium was taken from the atomic energy center in Kinshasa, without revealing any figures. Mr. Mushi said the release of Mr. Lumu would harm the potential success of the investigation, which is continuing.

"This was a great disappointment, because we haven't yet uncovered everything there is to uncover," Mr. Mushi, recently appointed as part of a new government, told Reuters news agency. But Mr. Kamanda has accused the new scientific research minister of trying to deprive DR Congo of foreign assistance in its attempt to exploit its uranium for civilian purposes.  

Last August, a British newspaper, the Sunday Times, reported that uranium had been sold to Iran, a charge vigorously denied by the Congolese authorities.

Uranium is the basic raw material of both civilian and military nuclear programs.

A mine in DR Congo's southern province of Katanga supplied the uranium that was used in the atomic bombs that were dropped by the Americans on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. The Americans then funded the creation of DR Congo's nuclear center in 1958. It was established on the university campus and only for research purpose. But in the late 1970s, a bar of uranium disappeared from the center, raising concern about security at the site. Moreover, the site of the center is under risk from erosion. People fear a landslide that could lead to a wider disaster, our reporter says.

In recent years, the International Atomic Energy Agency has visited the center and security was believed to have improved.”

V- Conclusion: Legacy and Tributes.

“Les Morts ne sont pas morts, Ils sont parmi Nous.” Proverbe Africain.[26]

Here is how John Henrik Clarke, a United Nations Correspondent on African Affairs for World Mutual Exchange and International News Features concluded his series on Lumumba: “The important point in the Lumumba story, briefly related, is this: He proved that legitimacy of a postcolonial regime in Africa, relates mainly to its legal mandate; but even more, legitimacy relates to the regime's credentials as a representative of a genuine nationalism fighting against the intrigues of new-colonialism. This is why Lumumba was and is still being extolled this "best son of Africa," this "Lincoln of the Congo," this "Black Messiah," whose struggle was made noble by his unswerving demand for centralism against all forms of Balkanization and rendered heroic by his unyielding resistance to the forces of neo-colonialism which finally killed his body, but not his spirit. This man who now emerges as a strange combination of statesman, sage, and martyr, wrote his name on the scroll of African history during his short and unhappy lifetime.”[27]

Congo still remembers Lumumba as a kind of national savior. Politicians who want to be popular in Congo today call themselves Lumumbists. Mobutu himself—on and off—portrayed himself that way. Even Laurent Kabila claimed to be Lumumbist, though he nevertheless arrested a born Lumumbist - Francois Lumumba, son of Patrice. It is clear Lumumba is still wearing a halo, without any real justification except that he died young. Having been prime minister for only ten weeks, Lumumba never had much chance to prove himself as either a good or bad ruler.[28]

According to many accounts[29], Patrice Lumumba continues to serve as an inspirational figure in contemporary Congolese politics. In the 2006 elections, multiple political parties claim to be motivated by the teachings of Lumumba. This includes the People's Party for Reconstruction and Democracy (PPRD), the political party initiated by the incumbent President Joseph Kabila. Antoine Gizenga, who served as Lumumba's Deputy Prime Minister in the post-independence period, was a 2006 Presidential candidate under the Unified Lumumbist Party (Parti Lumumbiste Unifié (PALU) and was named prime minister at the end of the year. He later resigned his position, citing his age as the main reason. Other political parties that directly utilize his name include the Mouvement National Congolais-Lumumba (MNC-L) and the Mouvement Lumumbiste (MLP).

The reasons that Lumumba provoked such intense emotion are not immediately evident. His viewpoint was not exceptional. He was for a unitary Congo and against division of the country along tribal or regional lines. Like many other African leaders, he supported pan-Africanism and the liberation of colonial territories. He proclaimed his regime one of "positive neutralism," which he defined as a return to African values and rejection of any imported ideology, including that of the Soviet Union.

Lumumba was, however, a man of strong character who intended to pursue his policies, regardless of the enemies he made within his country or abroad. The Congo, furthermore, was a key area in terms of the geopolitics of Africa, and because of its wealth, its size, and its contiguity to white-dominated southern Africa, Lumumba's opponents had reason to fear the consequences of a radical or radicalized Congo regime. Moreover, in the context of the Cold War, the Soviet Union's support for Lumumba appeared at the time as a threat to many in the West.

Lumumba's death caused uproar throughout Africa. In an attempt to sway the populations, Patrice Lumumba's image was rehabilitated by the Mobutu regime in 1966. Furthermore, plans were made to erect a spire in Lumumba's memory (which was never completed), and the anniversary of Lumumba's death was commemorated every year, at least until 1974, upon the unveiling of Mobutism. Also, Brouwez House was later neglected and allowed to fall into disrepair. Later on, Laurent Desire Kabila proclaimed him a national hero and martyr of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. By a presidential decree, the Brouwez House, site of Lumumba's brutal torture on the night of his murder, became a place of pilgrimage in the Congo.

A major transportation artery in Kinshasa, the Lumumba Boulevard, is named in his honor. The boulevard goes past an interchange with a giant tower - known as Tour de l'Echangeur (the main landmark of Kinshasa) in honor of the martyr prime minister. On the tower's plaza, the Kabila regime erected a tall statue of Lumumba with a raised hand, greeting people coming from Kinshasa International Airport.

In Bamako, Mali, one of the most popular places is Lumumba Square, a large plaza with a life-size statue of Lumumba, a park with fountains, and a flag display. Around square Lumumba are various businesses, embassies and Bamako's largest bank.

Streets were also named after him in Ghana, Dar Es-Salam, Tanzania, (Lumumba Street) Kampala, Uganda (Lumumba Avenue), Budapest, Hungary (between 1961 and 1990); Bata and Malabo, Equatorial Guinea; Tehran, Iran; Algiers, Algeria (Rue Patrice Lumumba); Santiago de Cuba, Cuba (since 1960, formerly Avenida de Bélgica); Łódź, Poland; Kiev, Ukraine; Rabat, Morocco; Maputo, Mozambique.

The Peoples' Friendship University of the USSR was renamed "Patrice Lumumba Peoples' Friendship University" in 1961, but it was later renamed "The Peoples' Friendship University of Russia" in the post-Soviet landscape in 1992.

In Belgrade, Serbia, "The Patris Lumumba Hall of Residence" at Belgrade University was built in 1961 and continues to carry Lumumba's name.

In Kampala, Uganda, "Lumumba Hall" of Residence at Makerekere University continues to carry his name. "Lumumba" remains a popular choice for children's names throughout Africa.

Thierry ONGA,

PhD Student, IQHEI,

Teaching Assistant, Department of Political Science,

Laval University, Québec, (QC) CANADA.

Researcher, Center for Strategic Studies,

Hudson Institute, Washington, D.C.

Sources & Bibliography.

Patrice Emery Lumumba, “Congo, My Country”, 1962, New York: Praeger (Books That Matter).

“Lumumba Speaks: The Speeches and Writings of Patrice Lumumba”, 1958-1961 [Collection of Speeches, Little, Brown and Company, 1972] Translated by Helen R. Lane. Ed. Jean Van Lierde.

“Who Killed Lumumba?” By BBC Correspondent David Ackerman. Saturday, 21 October, 2000: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/correspondent/974745.stm

Aimé Césaire, “Une Saison au Congo” (1966); Eng. trans. by Ralph Manheim, A Season in the Congo (1969). A poetic drama about the career and death of Lumumba.

W. A. E Skurnik, “African Political Thought: Lumumba, Nkrumah, Touré” (Social Science Foundation and Graduate School of International Studies, University of Denver. Monograph series in world affairs, v. 5, no. 3-4), 1968, Denver: University of Denver, ASIN B0006CNYSW.

Ludo De Witte, “The Assassination of Lumumba”, Trans. by Ann Wright and Renée Fenby, 2002 (Orig. 2001), London; New York: Verso, ISBN 1-85984-410-3 196 pages.

Thomas R. Kanza, “Conflict in the Congo: The Rise and Fall of Lumumba” (Penguin African library), 1972, New York: Penguin, ISBN 0-14-041030-9.

Robin McKown, “Lumumba: A Biography”, 1969, London: Doubleday, ISBN 0-385-07776-9.

“Congo Uranium and the Tragedy of Hiroshima” by Mads Fleckner and John Avery. University of Copenhagen, July 2005 (http://www.pugwash.dk/Dokumenter/FlecknerAvery.doc)

“The Global Cold War: Third World Interventions and the Making of Our Times” By Professor Odd Arne Westad. Publisher: Cambridge University Press, May 2007, 498 pages, ISBN-13: 9780521703147.

“The looting of the Congo” by Colette Braeckman . New Internationalist; May 1, 2004 2,775 Words (http://newint.org/features/2004/05/01/congo/)

“Opening the Secret Files on Lumumba's Murder.” By Stephen R. Weissman Sunday, July 21, 2002; Page B03. © 2002 The Washington Post Company. http://www.africawithin.com/lumumba/murder_of_lumumba.htm

G. Heinz, “Lumumba: The Last Fifty Days”, 1980, New York: Grove Press, ASIN B0006C07TQ.

Panaf, “Patrice Lumumba” (Panaf Great Lives), 1973, New York: St. Martin's Press, ISBN 0-901787-31-0.

K. Nkrumah, “Challenge of the Congo”, 1967, New York: International Publishers,

InfoPlease:  http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/world/A0857522.html The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th ed. Copyright 2007, Columbia University Press. All rights reserved.

Encyclopedia of World Biography 2007: Moïse Kapenda Tshombé

The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition 2007: Joseph Kasa-Vubu.

The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6^th ed. 2007, Columbia University Press: Joseph Désiré Mobutu.

Central Intelligence Agency (10 January 2006). "Democratic Republic of the Congo", CIA - The World Factbook. ISSN 1553-8133. 

U.S. State Dept. Country Notes: Congo (Kinshasa):

http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/2823.htm

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE 95/01/13 Foreign Relations, 1961-63, Vol. XX, Congo Crisis. http://dosfan.lib.uic.edu/ERC/frus/summaries/950113_FRUS_XX_1961-63.html

On US interests in the Congo:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/africa/3566701.stm

http://www.pugwash.dk/Dokumenter/FlecknerAvery.doc

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/africa/6445303.stm

http://www.worldpolicy.org/projects/arms/reports/congo.htm

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Africa/US_Recolonization_Congo.html

© Thierry ONGA