Congolese politician and independence leader (1925–1961)
The first prime minister of an independent Congo, in office for three months before a coup, capture, torture, and execution that Belgium would apologize for four decades later.
Born Isaïe Tasumbu Tawosa on 2 July 1925, he led the Congolese National Movement from 1958 and became prime minister in June 1960 after the May election that followed independence from Belgium. An African nationalist and pan-Africanist, he held the role until September, when an army mutiny triggered the Congo Crisis. After a coup by Joseph-Désiré Mobutu, he tried to reach Stanleyville to join supporters who had formed the Free Republic of the Congo. State authorities captured him en route, sent him to Katanga, where separatist forces under Moïse Tshombe — aided by Belgian mercenaries — torture…
Sourced, dated quotes from Patrice Lumumba
We who suffered in our bodies and hearts from colonialist oppression, we say to you out loud: from now on, all that is over.
No Congolese worthy of the name will ever to be able to forget that this independence has been won through a struggle in which we did not spare our energy and our blood...
While our brothers in Kenya, Nyasa-land, Rhodesia, South Africa and Angola are still fighting for their freedom, look at the wonderful future that smiles at us.
We are no longer your monkeys.
I have never doubted for a single instant that the sacred cause to which my comrades and I have dedicated our entire lives would triumph in the end.
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