Unité Centrale de la Diaspora Rdc

A Brief History 

The Democratic Republic of Congo, originated from the “Kingdom of Kongo”, once known 
as Zaire (today, Democratic Republic of Congo) has been the subject of instability, wars 
and division since the Berlin Act. Congo is the most riches country in the world due to its 
natural resources and its estimated to have $24 trillion (equivalent to the combined Gross 
Domestic Product of Europe and the United States) worth of untapped deposits of raw 
mineral ores, including the world’s largest reserves of cobalt and other minerals such as 
copper, diamond, gold, silver, uranium, manganese, tin, zinc, lead, tantalite, germanium, 
oil etc. 
The Congo is the Earth's second largest river by volume and has the world's second 
largest rainforest (18% of the planet's remaining tropical rainforest).
The Congo Basin represents 70% of the African continent's plant cover and makes up a 
large portion of Africa's biodiversity with over 600 tree species and 10 000 animal species.
The DR Congo has vast agricultural potential; if unleashed, this potential could significantly 
reduce poverty, hunger, and malnutrition, which affect more than 70% of the African 
population.
The Congo’s fertile fields and tropical forests cover an area bigger than United Kingdom, 
Spain, Italy, France, Belgium and Germany combined; and can feed the whole of central 
and part of southern Africa.
The Congo is home to the mighty and ancient yet intact rainforest on the planet. Covering 
an area more than twice the size of France (1.3 million square kilometers or 358 million 
acres), DR Congo’s rainforest is the second largest area of contiguous moist tropical forest 
left in the world and represent approximately one fifth of the world's remaining closed 
canopy tropical forest. 
This vast area hosts a wealth of biodiversity, including over 10,000 species of plants, 1,000 
species of birds, and 400 species of mammals, and three of the world's four species of 
great apes; and provide livelihoods for over 50 million people. Congo’s rainforest also play 
an important role in both biodiversity protection and global climate stability: 8% of the 
earth’s carbon that is stored in living forests worldwide is stored in the forests of the DR 
Congo – that is more than any other country in Africa and makes the Congo the fourth 
largest forest carbon reservoir of any country in the world. 
The DR Congo is rich in rivers with untapped reserves of gas, oil and hydro-electric 
capacity, and largest diversity of fishes.Why Congoʼs Problem Is Your Problem?
It is very important to understand that the problem of the DR Congo is the problem 
of the world. Without security and stability in the Congo, mineral such as “Uranium” 
could easily end up in the hands of irresponsible people or government. This of 
course will have  devastating consequences. 
More than 80% of the worldʼs supply of “Coltan” come from DR Congo, which the 
UN says is subject to "highly organized and systematic exploitation." Coltan is a 
heat resistant powder, metallic tantalum which has unique properties for storing 
electrical charge (tantalum capacitors) which is used in mobile phones, laptop etc.
There are thousands of people dying, mostly children and women in the Congo. According 
to the recent UN report and US scientists, an average of 48 women and girls aged 15-49 
are raped every hour. The genocide in Congo has left over 8 million deaths, therefore it is 
in the best interest of humanity that we put an end to the tragic history of “127 years” of 
pain, slavery, exploitation, wars and on going conflicts.
The Congo Conference 2011
Conferenceʼs aim:
Today, the Congo “again” is still facing the biggest threat ever in its history. The enemies 
of the Congo are decided to pursuit what they always wanted which  is to divide our great 
nation “the Democratic Republic of the Congo” in order to better controlled and exploit the 
natural riches of the Congo.
The enemies of the Congo are playing the same game of creating division among the 
Congolese leaders and their supporters which they hope as result will create chaos that 
will bring instability in the country. The rational is to frustrate the Congolese population to 
the point that they become extremely desperate so that any form of resolution that the socalled “the international community” will come out with, the Congolese people will have no 
other option than to accept it, since they have been going through a lot of pain, wars, rape, 
poverty and so on.
Again, They are planning the use the election as a platform in which they will use to bring 
instability in the country. Their assessments are that; no matter what the result of the 
election would be, the congolese are already divided, which means, if the current 
government wins, the opposition will not accept it which will provoke protest and lead to  chaos and insecurity in the country. Vice Versa is the same, and if the election has been 
postponed this will also lead to the same result which has already been programmed. At 
the same time, they are carefully trying to find congolese who will be willing to separate 
their region/province from the central government in Kinshasa and claim that they want to 
be independent from Kinshasa for different reasons.
What Will Be “THAT RESOLUTION”
To divide the Democratic Republic of Congo  
What Can We Do?
Dialogue “inter-Congolais” to promote UNITY and warn every Congolese of the 
consequences in the event that we are not united. We are informing and advising every 
political leader, religious leader, entrepreneur, public personality, community leader 
and every Congolese who cares about the future of our mighty country to come to 
Berlin in November 15, 2011 at Adlon Kempiski Hotel, located at Unter den Linden 
77, 10117 Berlin, Germany.
After the conference, a cocktails event “Congo Business Networking” will take place at 
the luxurious area of the Adlon Kempiski. All participants will have the opportunity to meet 
with congolese business community, politicians, religious leaders and others. There you 
may find a business partner, a friend or just someone you share the ideology.
The history of Berlin Conference, the division of Africa and The Congo Free State
Started in November 15, 1884, ended in February 26, 1885.
At the Berlin residence of the German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, located at 
Reichskanzlerpalais, Wilhemstrasse 77, in November 15, 1884, the foreign ministers of 
thirteen European nations including Turkey and the US established ground rules for the 
future exploitation of Africa and the Africans. No African nation was represented nor any 
African King or personality was invited at the conference, even though  the conference 
was about Africa.
The Congo Free State, conceived as a "neutral" zone to be run by an international 
association in the interest of bringing science, civilization, and Christianity to the 
indigenous people, received the Berlin Conference's blessings. Belgium's King Leopold II, 
a man who exploited Congo’s resources and contributed to up to 10 million deaths, soon 
took control, reaping fabulous personal profits. Belgium extracted rubber, ivory, diamonds, 
and uranium from the Congo and gave back nothing: no schools, no hospitals, no 
infrastructure except that which facilitated the export of resources. The uranium used to make the atom bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki came from mines in the 
Congo.
The European colonial powers shared one objective in their African colonies; exploitation. 
But in the way they governed their dependencies, they reflected their differences. Some 
colonial powers were themselves democracies (the United Kingdom and France); others 
were dictatorships (Portugal, Spain). The British established a system of indirect rule over 
much of their domain, leaving indigenous power structure in place and making local rulers 
representatives of the British Crown. This was unthinkable in the Portuguese colonies, 
where harsh, direct control was the rule. The French sought to create culturally assimilated 
elites what would represent French ideals in the colonies. In the Belgian Congo, however, 
King Leopold II, who had financed the expeditions that staked Belgium's claim in Berlin, 
embarked on a campaign of ruthless exploitation. His enforcers mobilized almost the entire 
Congolese populations to gather rubber, kill elephants for their ivory, and build public 
works to improve export routes. For failing to meet production quotes, entire communities 
were massacred. Killing and maiming became routine in a colony in which horror was the 
only common denominator. After the impact of the slave trade, King Leopold's reign of 
terror was Africa's most severe demographic disaster. By the time it ended, after a growing 
outcry around the world, as many as 10 million Congolese had been murdered. In 1908 
the Belgium government administrators, and the Roman Catholic Church each pursued 
their sometimes competing interest. But no one thought to change the name of the colonial 
capital: it was Leopoldville until the Belgian Congo achieved independence in 1960.
George Washington Williams - A black American soldier, minister, politician and historian. 
Shortly before his death he travelled to King Leopold II's Congo Free State and his open 
letter to Leopold about the suffering of the region's inhabitants at the hands of Leopold's 
agents, helped to sway European and American public opinion against the regime running 
the Congo, under which some 10 million people lost their lives.
In this letter, he condemned the brutal and inhuman treatment the Congolese were 
suffering at the hands of the colonizers. He mentioned the role played by Henry M. 
Stanley, sent to the Congo by the King, in tricking and mistreating the Africans. Williams 
reminded the King that the crimes committed were all committed in his name, making him 
as guilty as the actual culprits. He appealed to the international community of the day to 
“call and create an International Commission to investigate the charges herein preferred in 
the name of Humanity”.
Belgian colonialism: 1908 - 1960 and Congo’s Independence
The Belgian government immediately set to work to remedy the worst excesses of the 
King. Belgian colonial ideology constructed the Congolese people as children who 
required a benign but firm hand of control. The state would ensure their wellbeing and in 
turn demanded their loyalty, obedience and hard work. While brutal practices such as 
massacres and the chopping off of hands of peasants who failed to fulfill their quotas ceased, the exploitative practices of forced labour and compulsory production were only 
slowly phased out.
Belgian government of the territory was an uneasy mixture of indirect rule through existing 
chiefdoms, which were substantially remodeled to conform to the exigencies of colonial 
needs, and ridged and pervasive measures of social control. The attempts to transform 
traditional rulers into salaried functionaries, and the endless tampering with these 
structures that followed on this, undermined their legitimacy and hastened their 
disintegration as valid expressions of indigenous civic life. The curfews, population 
resettlements and stringent police controls, on the other hand, engendered hostility without 
creating structures of enduring value.
In line with prevailing European thinking on such matters, the colony had to be made to 
pay for itself. Social expenditures on health, education and welfare were avoided by 
delegating responsibility to missionary groups (especially Catholic orders), who were 
encouraged to set up operations within the territory. Business interests were allowed, and 
even required, to exercised functions that would elsewhere be performed by the state.
The entire, rather extensive, civil service and the leadership ranks of the security forces 
were staffed by Europeans. No thought was given to the training of indigenous people to 
staff these structures at any point in the future, any more than measures taken to draw the 
Congolese into representation in governing councils or participation in the selection of 
governing agents.
Congolese docility had existed more in the minds of the colonisers than in those of the 
colonised. Almost all Congolese shared a history of resistance to Belgian penetration at 
various places and times. The emergence of the Kimbanguist Church in the 1920s was, as 
the Belgians themselves quickly appreciated, an act of resistance. Belgian persecution of 
the movement only embittered Congolese and hardened anti-Belgian attitudes.
The Second World War accelerated the social transformations already underway, 
urbanisation, proletarianisation and the emergence of an indigenous intelligentsia. These 
new social groups were neither docile nor obedient; they were easily infected with 
European concepts such as self-determination, democracy, socialism and nationalism.
Like other colonial powers Belgium awoke too late to the changes that had been 
unleashed. Reforms promulgated by the government aimed at co-opting and incorporating 
Congolese into governing structures were inadequate to satisfy emerging aspirations, 
while paradoxically reaffirming the legitimacy of those aspirations.
The consequence of all this was the emergence in the 1950s of nationalist leaders and 
groups among the Kongo (the ethnic Alliance of the Kongo People), in Katanga (the 
regional Confederation of Katanga Associations) and in the formation of the Mouvement 
National Congolais (led by the charismatic nationalist Patrice Lumumba.The new nationalist movements expressed themselves in the democratically elected local 
structures created by Belgian reforms. When Belgian efforts at stemming the nationalist 
tide in Kinshasa (then Leopoldsville) provoked riots they abruptly executed a u-turn and 
set the Belgian Congo on a rapid timetable to independence 
In Jun 30, 1960 Belgium was forced to give the Congo independence, Joseph Kasavubu 
was acting as the President and Patrice Lumumba was the Prime Minister of the new 
nation. In January 17, 1961 Patrice Lumumba, the Prime Minister in the Congo's first 
democratically elected government, was seized, tortured, and murdered by a Colonel 
named Joseph Mobutu. Lumumba was considered the most brilliant of the Congolese and 
African leaders. In 1965 Mobutu himself seized power and, with the backing of the United 
States, Belgium and other western countries. Like King Leopold, Mobutu, who re-named 
the country Zaire, ran the economy for his own personal profit and, like the Belgians before 
him, left the Congo impoverished. Mobutu ruled as an absolute dictator until his overthrow 
by Laurent Desiré Kabila in May 1997. Kabila was a youth leader in a party allied to 
Patrice Lumumba in the 1960s. L.D. Kabila was shot on January 16 and died of his injuries 
on January 18, 2001). He was succeeded by his son Joseph Kabila who is the head of 
state until today.
Lumumbaʼs Speech
Patrice E. Lumumba
The First Prime Minister of the Congo 
On June 30, 1960, Independence Day
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]Key Facts about DR Congo
Geography
Location: Central Africa
Total Area: 2,345,000 sq km
Land Area: 2,267,048 sq km
Water: 77,810 sq km
L a n d   b o u n d a r i e s:
total: 10,730 km
border countries: Angola 2,511 km (of which 225 km is the boundary of 
Angola's discontiguous Cabinda Province), Burundi 233 km, Central African 
Republic 1,577 km, Republic of the Congo 2,410 km, Rwanda 217 km, South 
Sudan 628 km, Tanzania 459 km, Uganda 765 km, Zambia 1,930 km
C l i m a t e:
tropical; hot and humid in equatorial river basin; cooler and drier in southern 
highlands; cooler and wetter in eastern highlands; north of Equator - wet 
season (April to October), dry season (December to February); south of 
Equator - wet season (November to March), dry season (April to October)
Ter r ain:
vast central basin is a low-lying plateau; mountains in east
E l e v a t i o n   e x t r e m e s:
lowest point: Atlantic Ocean 0 m
highest point: Pic Marguerite on Mont Ngaliema (Mount Stanley) 5,110 m
Natural resources:
cobalt, copper, niobium, tantalum, petroleum, natural gas, industrial and 
gem diamonds, gold, silver, zinc, manganese, tin, uranium, coal, 
hydropower, timber
L a n d   u s e:
arable land: 2.86%
p e r m a n e n t   c r o p s :   0 . 4 7 %
o t h e r :   9 6 . 6 7 %   ( 2 0 0 5 )
Irrigated land:
110 sq km (2008)
Total renewable water resources:
1 , 2 8 3   c u   k m   ( 2 0 0 1 )Freshwater withdrawal (domestic/industrial/agricultural) :
total: 0.36 cu km/yr (53%/17%/31%)
per capita: 6 cu m/yr (2000)
Natural hazards:
periodic droughts in south; Congo River floods (seasonal); in the east, in the 
Great Rift Valley, there are active volcanoes
volcanism: Nyiragongo (elev. 3,470 m), which erupted in 2002 and is 
experiencing ongoing activity, poses a major threat to the city of Goma, 
home to a quarter of a million people; the volcano produces unusually fastmoving lava, known to travel up to 100 km /hr; Nyiragongo has been deemed 
a "Decade Volcano" by the International Association of Volcanology and 
Chemistry of the Earth's Interior, worthy of study due to its explosive history 
and close proximity to human populations; its neighbor, Nyamuragira, which 
erupted in 2010, is Africa's most active volcano; Visoke is the only other 
historically active volcano
P o p u l a t i o n:
7 0 , 0 0 0 , 0 0 0
R e l i g i o n s:
Roman Catholic 50%, Protestant 20%, Kimbanguist 10%, Muslim 10%, other 
(includes syncretic sects and indigenous beliefs) 10%

M a j o r   c i t i e s   -   p o p u l a t i o n:
KINSHASA (capital) 8.401 million; Lubumbashi 1.543 million; Mbuji-Mayi 
1.488 million; Kananga 878,000; Kisangani 812,000 (2009)
A g r i c u l t u r e   -   p r o d u c t s:
coffee, sugar, palm oil, rubber, tea, cotton, cocoa, quinine, cassava 
(tapioca), manioc, bananas, plantains, peanuts, root crops, corn, fruits; 
wood products

Conseil Pour La Liberation Total Du Congo
Mr. Kussu
Contact: cltcongo@googlemail.com