It remains to be seen, however, whether ~~ in the absence | of a revolutionary party -- these tendencies will prove sufficiently strong to prevent the Lumumbist leaders from dropping into Tshombe!'s web, thereby granting him the. opportunity he seeks to achieve a kind of temporary neocolonialist stabilization, If they prove alert to the trap, Tshombe's "national reconciliation" will turn out to be nothing but a regroupment of conservatives -- against the rising tide of the Congolese revolution,
To Understand the Events in the Congo
KIVU WAS AIWAYS LUMUMBIST
By Anicet Kashamura
[This article appeared in the June 27 issue of the Belgian socialist weekly La Gauche, from which it has been translated, Anicet Kashamura was born in 1928 at Kalehe in Kivu province, Trained as an accounting clerk, he became interested in politics between 1950 and 1956 while working for the Water Board, In 1958 he came to prominence as leader of the Centre de Regroupment Africain (CEREA). Two years later he became Minister of Information in the Cabinet of Patrice Lumumba, When counterrevolutionary forces brought this government down, he attempted to escape. from Leopold-~ ville together with Lumumba but was captured by Mobututs troops, ~~ He managed. finally to escape to Kivu where he set up a government that was linked for a time with the Gizenga regime in Stanleyville. ]
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In January, Pierre Mulele, who was in the underground, opened an insurreoctional movement against the constituted. authorities, The inhabitants of Kouilou had decided to face the cannons, the bombs, the machine guns of a power imposed - from abroad, with spears and arrows,
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Is Mulele a Communist? No. Everybody knows that in the Congo political labels are used with little attention to their exact meaning. In our country there are many people inthe left; to isolate them, it is customary to place foreign labels on them, —
Mulele appeared in a situation which was humanly insupportable, and everyone is behind him: the Communists, the Socialists, Christians and democrats, Only a-heart of stone could fail to respond to conditions under which people have to carry out surgical operations with razor blades, conditions close to barbarism. Mulele started from the principle that present conditions do not yet make it possible to mobilize the whole Congolese people,
In Kivu, on the contrary, the Lumumbist parties (MNC-Lumunba, UFPC-Balubakat and LUKA) formed a popular front. Aside from that the revolutionary character of the province of Kivu is well khown, It was there that the famous left socialist party was born, the CEREA, which later broke into several factions of which the largest, the left wing, took the name of UFPC (Union des Forces Congolaises).
A region with an elevation of some 6,500 feet, Kivu enjoys a climate that is perpetual spring. In January 1961 a workers and peasants government was established in this province over whioh I had the honor to preside and whose Minister of Justice was Gaston Soumialot, the present head of the insurrectional movement in Kivu. At that time a genuine fighting temperament began to be formed in: the people. The workers occupied the offices and plants abandoned by the white colonialists; the peasants occupied the plantations. Since there was lack of labor, they began to organize self-management; the workers and peasants of Kivu thus demonstrated what a black man caén.do when he works in freedom, as Patrice Lumumba pre-~ dicted,
I, too, have been charged with being a Communist beoause I refused to shoot at an underfed population that had taken over the biens vacants [vacant property]. It should be added that they were not really biens vacants, since they belonged to the Congolese people, ‘ oS
-- In 1962 the peasants commanded by the revolutionary leader | Alexandre Kabaré occupied Bukavu; it took the guns of the UN to compel them to return to their mountains, In December 1963 the Lumumbist. parties registered a victory at the elections, winning ~ 86% of the votes. One could ask how the insurrectional center was able to establish its center in the territory of Uvira, the least Lumumbist part of.Kivu., The Lumumbists, in fact, are backed by 60% of the population there, wheréas the figure is as high as 95% in the other regions, a -
The explanation is that Uvira occupies an important strategic position. It involves a port on Lake Tanganyika where gasoline:
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in particular is stored. The only automobile highway in the east of the Congo, about 68 miles‘long, crosses the insurgent region for about 38 miles, In the Ruizizi plain a plant has been construoted belonging to the biggest sugar enterprise in Central Africa, The Lumumbists know, of course, that it is not enough to occupy a town like Uvira to claim victory. This is only a stage which opens the road to further success, an
At the moment the Lumumbist strategy is to seek international alliances that could destroy the clique of opportunists, real African Chiang Kai-sheks. As Fidel Castro said in Havana May 1: “May . the Amerioan leaders realize their errors and the stupidity ef their polloy. . ." oo
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[Since this article was written, new events have occurred on the Congo front. -The Lumumbist Youth Movement: of the Balubakat has again taken Albertville.after retreating in the-face of oounterrevolutionary forces a fow weeks ago,.. They have announced establishment of a provisional Lumumbist government. Such provisional governments have now been declared. in three provinces: Eastern Province, Kivu and North Katanga. The insurrection has spread to. Maniema and South Kasai.
[the reactionary "Congolese National Army" has launched a desperate counteroffensive in hope of separating the Kivu revolutionary forces from those of North Katanga and of strengthening the defenses of Bukavu, the capital city of Kivu...
[During this counteroffensive such. horrible deeds were come. mitted by the repressive forces that even some of the ministers of the puppet regime of Adoula-Kasavubu rebuked the army in public, In response to this, General Mobutu, one of the real dictators in the Congo, threatened to balt all operations until his forces were publicly cleared of all "infamous. accusations."
[Among the Lumumbist forces, ‘two trends seem to be appearing. One is headed by most of the members of the "Committee of National Liberation" established in exile in Brazzaville, This tendency favors "national reconciliation" with even such neocolonialist stooges as Tshombe, whose private "army" of mercenaries is now hiding out in Angola awaiting the departure of UN forces, and. Kalonji, who was personally responsible for the murder of most of the Lumumbist leaders in 1961,
{The other trend, especially strong in the eastern Congo, is said to. be inspired by the Chinese Communist party. This .trend . wants to establish a popular Lumumbist government in the iiberated. areas and then extend it to. the whole coun try. | 7
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