Acrylic on Canvas 18” by 24"

Perhaps no nation has a more brutal history of colonialism than the Congo. From the barbaric days of Belgium’s Leopold II’s rule, (which killed 15 million Congolese in ways that one could only hope were the work of fiction), to the modern day Congo, where foreign nations and corporations illegally exploit Congolese in deadly and inhumane ways. Congo has had no respite for the last few centuries from outsiders stripping the nation of its rich resources for financial gain, regardless of the human cost.

The story of Patrice Lumumba is especially disturbing. A revolutionary figure who fought for Congo’s independence, Lumumba was tortured and killed slowly in a CIA driven plot in 1961, with the help of the Belgians who weren’t ready to get rid of their cash cow colony. His remains were dug up and destroyed, with Gerard Soete, the Belgian police commissioner, claiming Lumumba’s gold tooth as a trophy. The Belgians returned the tooth to the Lumumba estate in 2016, in a hollow and worthless attempt at an apology over a half century later.

Congo has seen over 6 million more citizens die in the last two decades as companies like Apple and Google used children to mine the country for their rich minerals that the nation’s population of over 100 million can never utilize to rid themselves of the immense poverty that the West has kept them in for centuries.

This link will take you to the International Rescue Committee’s donation page. The IRC provides financial and medical support to the Congolese suffering from widespread disease and the effects of the ongoing, and seemingly never ending conflict.

For more on the plight of the Congolese, see the dedicated story highlights entitled Congo on my Instagram profile page

Congo