Patrice Lumumba

Date: 2008-05-06

Patrice Lumumba - Africa's lost leader

Sometimes the story of one person can disclose all the contradictions and possibilities of an entire epoch. This excellent biography of Patrice Lumumba does exactly that for the decolonisation of the Congo, where Western powers collided with a rising tide of an awaking giant, the young independence movement. Within this struggle Lumumba evolved from an ambitious clerk to a formidable champion of African liberation. The colonial rulers weren't about to give up on their resource-rich treasure-chest and pulled every nasty trick to obstruct real independence. After Lumumba was democratically elected as prime minister the Belgian conspired with the CIA to have Lumumba assassinated. They provoked tribal rivalries, sponsored separatist movements and pressed for bankruptcy of the new state. With help from the United Nations Lumumba was politically isolated, imprisoned, beaten and executed in January 1961, crushing the liberation movement only six months the new government had been installed. Lumumba’s life story gives us a sense of what it's like to fight in the forefront of history. And looking at the Congo today, it also tells us how it could have been radically different, and still can become.

Maina van der Zwan, Bookmarks summer Review of Books