Title: The Lumumba Plot
Rating: 4 Stars
For those of you not up on your Marx Brothers films, Duck Soup is the story of Rufus T Firefly (Groucho) taking over leadership of the country Freedonia and the merry mix ups that then follow (a peanut vendor (Chico) is appointed Secretary of War, a neighboring country threatens war, and it ends in a massive food fight). Although much more serious, I couldn’t help thinking about that film as I was reading about the first days of Congo’s independence.
Congo had had a rough time of it for some time. Nowadays, when people think of Belgium, they think of chocolate or waffles. If you’re a history major, you might think about the tiny, brave, doomed Belgium desperately fighting for its life against a German surprise invasion in the opening days of World War I.
This tiny, seemingly innocent country has a brutal history of colonialism. For the really gory details, check out King Leopold’s Ghost, by Adam Hochschild. The TL;DR is that the Belgian King Leopold II had a hankering for some colonial territory. Shut out of most places, in the 1880s he finally landed upon a giant chunk of territory in Africa. Not even claiming it for Belgium (at least at first), he took ownership of it as his own private property and named it the Congo Free State (hint, it wasn’t exactly free to the people currently living there),
Hungry for the riches to be found in ivory and, later, in rubber, his agents enslaved the Congolese population to meet nearly impossible quotas. Congolese were tortured and murdered. Hands and feet were amputated if quotas were not met. Over a million Congolese died as a result. These actions were the cause of one of the first uses of the phrase, “crimes against humanity”.
Eventually, that era ceased but the Congolese lives were still harsh. Discriminated against, they were barely educated. If a Congolese was lucky enough to get an office job, they were paid 1/5 of what a Belgian would make for the same work.
In the wake of World War II, there was a rise in decolonization movements. Even into the 1950s, the Belgians were sanguine. Convinced that the Congolese were essentially a passive people satisfied with the status quo, the Belgians were confident that independence, if it were to come, was some decades off.
Into this stepped Patrice Lumumba. Equipped with only a primary school education, even at a young age he was outgoing and precocious. He was fluent in some five languages, was well read, and wrote poetry.
He started off as an admirer of Belgium and European ways and sought to emulate them. He was a supporter of some kind of gradual emancipation, something along the lines of W.E.B. Du Bois’ idea of the talented tenth.
He worked at a post office for a number of years, that is, until he was arrested for embezzlement at the post office. Married with children, he found it impossible to live an assimilationist European lifestyle when he was only making twenty percent of an actual European living in the Congo.
Released after a short stint in prison, he started over by moving to the capital, Leopoldville, and becoming a beer distributor. He was successful and, while performing these duties, he met many new people. An inveterate schmoozer, he joined some half a dozen or so different clubs and often ended up serving as a club officer. His natural charismatic leadership marked him as having a political future.
All thoughts of assimilation ended in 1959 when a banned independence protest erupted in riots. The Belgians cracked down, arresting, convicting, and jailing Lumumba.
However, the fires of Congolese independence could not be quenched. The Belgians agreed to hold a conference to discuss independence. The other Congolese leaders refused to meet unless Lumumba was freed. Once freed, at the conference, much to everyone’s astonishment, Lumumba demanded immediate independence. After negotiation, Congo independence was agreed to take place in six months time.
There was no question that Lumumba was going to be the first prime minister of the independent Congo. The Belgians, embittered at being pushed aside, in denial, and still harboring designs of exerting major influence in Congo, did everything they could to hamstring the new government.
The government had enough problems even without Belgian interference. Since so few Congolese were formally educated, finding qualified government ministers was impossible. There were less than twenty Congolese college graduates in the entire world. Most of the original cabinet did not finish high school. The cabinet included seventeen local chieftains, most of whom were illiterate. Within two weeks of independence, sixty thousand out of eighty thousand Europeans had left the country. The national treasury was empty. The richest province, Katanga, was actively trying to secede. Pockets of the army were in open rebellion. Lumumba tried to placate the soldiers in the army by giving literally everyone in the army promotions (eg privates become corporals, corporals become sergeants).
Within two weeks of independence, Belgium was trying to figure out ways to get rid of Lumumba. They produced obvious forgeries that made him seem like a Soviet stooge. Belgian pilots (since there were no Congolese trained to be pilots) would intentionally fly Lumumba to the wrong city.
Despite the fact that Lumumba openly admired the United States, US officials saw him as another Castro. Lumumba did not help his case when, stymied by both the US and the UN, he did reach out to the Soviet Union for help, not much of which was forthcoming. He was essentially nonideological, willing to work with anyone that was willing to provide assistance.
Eisenhower, nearing the end of his presidency, just wanted it all to go away. At a cabinet meeting, he apparently turned to his CIA director and told him (in plausible deniability government speak) to assassinate Lumumba. At first, not taking him seriously, his orders were repeated by his National Security Advisor at the generically named committee The Special Group.
This caused a flurry of actions. Various French speaking foreign nationals not averse to doing wet work were brought into the Congo by the CIA. Even Sidney Gottlieb got into the act. In case you need a reminder, Gottlieb was the chief poisoner of the CIA (I’ve written about this lovely man here and here). Gottlieb provided the CIA station chief with poison and instructions on how to use it.
Belgium also was trying to kill Lumumba. They did not have much luck. They hired a Greek hitman for 200,000 francs and he promptly disappeared.
While all of this was going on, both UN officials and US officials were whispering in Joseph Mobutu’s ear. Chief of staff of the army, he was in position to stage a coup. Since Lumumba was a mentor and once a close friend, this was not an easy decision for Mobutu. His indecision led him to being called the Hamlet of the Congo. Eventually, he did overthrow Lumumba and put him under house arrest. Lumumba’s house were surrounded by an inner ring of UN forces to keep others out and an outer ring of Congolese soldiers to keep him in.
Trapped, Lumumba decided to make a break to his home state that still strongly supported him. Sneaking past both rings of security, he almost made it to Stanleyville. At the last ferry crossing, he was captured by his sworn enemies. After brutally torturing him, he was murdered and his body soaked in acid to remove all traces of his corpse. Only one tooth was left, which somewhat macabrely was kept as a souvenir.
Mobutu, in the pay of the UN, Belgium, and the CIA, eventually ended up the Congo leader. In a tragedy for the Congolese, his thirty year reign was a kleptocracy that left the population deeply impoverished.
As I read this, it’s amazing to me how fast events unfolded and how young everyone is. In 1956, Lumumba was in prison for post office embezzlement and in 1960 he was prime minister. In the first part of 1959, Belgium thought they’d be in charge for fifty years. They lasted barely one. Within a week of independence, Congo was descending into chaos. Lumumba was deposed within three months. Lumumba became prime minister at 35. Mobutu deposed Lumumba when Mobutu was 30.
It’s hard to say if Lumumba’s leadership style of frenetic chaos would have led to a better result, but it’s hard to imagine a worse result.
dorkenstein 