Biography: Patrice Emery Lumumba

One of the most acclaimed post-colonial African leaders, with the distinctly infamous short-lived reign was one Patrice Emery Lumumba. Perhaps, if he had lived today, he would be termed a maverick or even a self-seeker. But the paradox of his fame at the twilight of colonialism in Africa, and the blatant despise for independent thinkers in Africa by the Colonial West, culminated in his murder in January 1961.

Born in July 2 1925 in Kasai province in the former Belgian Congo, Lumumba had a modest education in protestant and catholic schools, before undergoing clerical training at the Post Office training school where he passed with distinction. He rose to the regional headship of postal services in Kisangani. He worked in the then Leopoldville (Kinshasa) and Stanleyville (Kisangani) before becoming a beer salesman. He married Pauline Opangu in 1951.


At the time of his stint as the regional head of the Post Office he had become well known all over the country and in Belgium. In 1955, when he joined the Liberal Party of Belgium and began distributing and editing party literature, his enemies sought to forestall his rising star by arresting and charging him with the embezzlement of Post office funds. He was released when his lawyer appealed on the evidence that he had actually returned the money.

In 1958, he founded the Mouvement National Congolais (MNC) through which he represented Congo at the All-African Peoples congress in Accra Ghana in December of the same year. As his profile now rose across the continent and the world, he was arrested again on framed-up charges of inciting an anti-colonial riot in January 1960, where thirty people were killed. For this he was committed to six months in prison. As it turned out, this was the time that a round-table conference was to be held in Brussels to finalize the future of Congo, and his arrest was meant to give room for manipulation of the talks.

But pressure from the delegates secured his release, and subsequently his attendance of the conference. From then onwards, Lumumba and MNC became synonymous with the independence of Congo, and it was not surprising, therefore, that at only 35 years of age, Patrice Emery Lumumba became the Prime Minister of Congo after the May 11-25 1960 elections.

However, events leading to the independence celebrations, or prior to that, seemed to have sealed his fate. At the June 30 1960 independence celebrations, which Belgian King Baudouin attended, the Prime Minister's name was deliberately omitted from the program. Somehow, he managed to deliver his now famous independence speech which King Baudouin thought was disrespectful to him. The writing was now clearly on the wall. Soon after wards, Katanga province declared independence with Belgian support.

Unknown to many Congolese, the CIA with covert Belgian support had blacklisted Lumumba as a communist. His arrest, torture and the seemingly laid-back attitude of the UN troops in Congo formed the backdrop that became the Congo crisis.

Not surprisingly, in January 1961, the rest of the world watched in disbelief as a popularly elected African leader was hounded, arrested and murdered by hooligans helped by Belgian connivance, as two super-powers engaged in sparring, on the sidelines.

Bibliography:
De Witte, L. (2001), The Assassination of Lumumba; London, New York: Verso

Mkown, R. (1969), Lumumba: A Biography; London, New York: Doubleday publishers.

Panaf, (1973), Patrice Lumumba; London: St.Martin's Press.