CONGOBONGO Newsletter | We are Congolese

American Embassy Kinshasa Newsletter April 22, 2010 U.S. Embassy Kinshasa warmly welcomes:  Daniel Renna and his wife

and bids a fond farewell to those leaving before September:               

Andrea Cobb and her family, Ann Tsewole and her family, Bill McClure and his family, Cheryl Anderson, Chris Gu and his family, Craig Cloud and his family, David Benedetti and his family, David and Leilani Boyle and their son, Joshua Reitz, Pat McCarthy, Rodney Cunningham, Scott Womack and his family, Terry Prevey and her husband, Torya Powell, Vincent Cruz and his wife.

We are Congolese Democratic Republic of Congo Ethnic Groups

I

n this edition we present a short description of two of the largest Congolese ethnic groups and in future publications one page will be dedicated to further describe each group. Congolese ethnic groups have particular characteristics which have been preserved over thousands of years. We hope the material is interesting to you. Please enjoy it!

There are over 200 African ethnic groups in the DRC, of which the majority are Bantu. Bantu-speaking peoples form about 80% of the population. Most of the rest are Sudanic-speaking groups in the north and northeast. In the cuvette are found about 80,000–100,000 Pygmies. Among the Bantu-speaking peoples, the major groups are the Kongo, or Bakongo, in Lower Zaire; the Luba, or Baluba, in East Kasai and Shaba; the Mongo and related groups in the cuvette area; and the Lunda and Chokwe in Bandundu and West Kasai; the Bemba and Hemba in Shaba; and the Kwango and Kasai in Bandundu. The four largest tribes—Mongo, Luba, Kongo (all Bantu), and the Mangbetu-Azande (Hamitic)—make up about 45% of the total population.

In this Edition 2 We are Congolese

Democratic Republic of Congo Ethnic Groups 3 Kongo people 5 Luba people 7 Photo shoot 8 CLO’s Line 9 FLO Weekly Update 10 AERWA 11 Human Resources 12 What’s Going On 14 Classifieds 17 Calendar The Congo Bongo is a Bi-Weekly Newsletter

The first inhabitants are believed to have been forest dwellers such as the Teke. Other ethnic groups joined them to form the three kingdoms that ruled the area before the arrival of Europeans: the Kongo, Loango, and Teke. The mouth of the Congo River was the base for the Kongo Kingdom which encountered the Portuguese in 1484. Trading contracts gave the Congolese textiles, jewelry, and manufactured goods in return for ivory, copper, and slaves. Western education and Christianity were introduced into the region at that time.

The Portuguese did not venture into the interior but bought goods and slaves through African brokers on the coast. When the slave trade diminished because of depopulation, the Portuguese bought slaves from other tribes. Fighting between the tribes weakened them as a group, including the Kongo.

This increased the power of the Europeans and strengthened the slave trade. This situation continued until the European powers outlawed slavery in the late 1800s. For the residents, the mythology of the region is tied closely to the mystical powers of animals. Families take a specific animal spirit to represent them and often raise totem poles to signify this event.

SOURCES:  ExpoCongo.com. http://www.expocongo.com/DRCongo/Peuple/details.aspx?TribuID=23

  

The Essence of Africa. http://www.retosa.co.za/countries/dr-congo Democratic Republic of the Congo—People & Culture, by Sean Rosion author of Brad Guide The Scramble for Africa by Thomas Pakenham

Congo Bongo April 22, 2010

2

The Bakongo or the Kongo people (meaning "hunter"), also sometimes referred to as Congolese, is a Bantu ethnic group which lives along the Atlantic coast of Africa from Pointe-Noire (Congo Brazzaville) to Luanda, Angola. In Kikongo their ethnonym is usually given as Besikongo, singular Mwisikongo, though Bakongo is linguistically possible and gaining popularity. In the late 20th century they numbered about 10,220,000.

History The Kongo people probably arrived in the region of the mouth of the Congo River before 500 BCE, as part of the larger Bantu migration. They were already working iron in the region and practicing agriculture by that time. By the late fourteenth century they were living in a number of kingdoms, including the Kingdom of Kongo, Ngoyo, Vungu, Kakongo and others stretching on both sides of the Congo River. During the sixteenth century yet another powerful Bakongo kingdom, Loango, developed and controlled much of the coast north of the Congo River. In 1483 the Portuguese arrived on the coast, and the Bakongo of the Kingdom of Kongo began diplomatic relations which included sending Bakongo nobles to visit the royal court in Portugal in 1485. Bakongo leaders were quickly converted by Christian missionaries and assumed Portuguese court manners, and after an initial confrontation between those who supported the new religion and those who rejected it, the party following King Afonso I triumphed and Kongo became a Christian kingdom. In 1568 Bakongo peoples were invaded by the Jagas (Yaka), and the Bakongo were forced to look to the Portuguese for help, which ultimately allowed the Portuguese to establish a colony in Angola on Kongo's territory, in 1575. In the aftermath of the Battle of Mbwila, 1665, in which a Portuguese-led army from Angola defeated that of Kongo, and the civil war that followed, the Kingdom of Kongo never regained its former power. In the ensuing years the Bakongo alternately fought for and against the Portuguese, eventually being colonized in 1885. The Bakongo political party in Democratic Republic of the Congo Abako played an important part in national independence in 1960.

In its prime, the Kingdom exacted taxes, forced labor, and collected fines from its citizens in order to prosper. At times, enslaved peoples, ivory, and copper were traded to the Europeans on the coast.

The important harbors were Soyo and Mpinda.

When the Kongo Kingdom was at its political apex in the 16th and 17th centuries, the King, who was elected from among a noble class of descendants of former kings, bana Kongo (plural of mwana Kongo), reigned supreme. He was chosen by a group of electors, usually the holders of important offices or governors of provinces. The activities of the court were supported by an extensive system of civil servants, and the court itself usually consisted of numerous relatives of the King. The villages were often governed by lesser relatives of the King who were responsible to him. All members of government were invested with their power under the auspices of a ritual specialist, and frequently a Catholic priest.

Language Most Bakongo speak Kikongo, which is divided into many dialects that are not always mutually intelligible, but they also speak Portuguese as their first or second language in Angola, and French in the Republic of the Congo and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Others still speak Lingala, a common Lingua Franca in Western Congo, or Kikongo ya Leta (also called Kituba in Congo), a creole form of Kikongo spoken widely in the Republic of the Congo, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Angola.

Agriculture The Bakongo cultivate cassava, bananas, maize, sweet potatoes, peanuts (groundnuts), beans, and Congo Bongo April 22, 2010

3

Kongo people (cont窶ｦ) Cash crops are coffee, cacao, urena, bananas, and palm oil. Fishing and hunting are still practiced by some groups, but many Bakongo live, work and trade in towns.

Religion Traditional Kongo religion believed heavily on the concept of the dead, as most of the inhabitants of the other world were held to have once lived in this world. Only Nzambi Mpungu, the name for the high god, is usually held to have existed outside the world and to have created it. Other categories of the dead include bakulu or ancestors, the souls of the recently departed, and in some cases, more powerful beings held to be the souls of the long departed. There are also supernatural beings who are guardians of particular places and territories, sometimes held A Kongo Village; BaKongo People窶年ail fetishes Imagen www.randafricanart.com/imagens/Nail_fetiche_1902_Boma_Congo.jpg to be the soul of the founder, and there are those who inhabit and are captured in minkisi (singular nkisi), or charms, whose operation is the closest to magic. The value of these supernatural operations is generally held to be in the intentions of the worker, rather than the other world having spirits or souls that are intrisically good or bad.

Following the conversion of Nzinga Nkuwu in 1491 most of the inhabitants of the Kingdom of Kongo converted to Christianity, though they continued their older beliefs within its fold, through syncretic practices within the Roman Catholic Church in Kongo. Many thousands of Kongo were transported across the Atlantic to the Americas, and especially to Brazil. The Afro-Brazilian Quimbanda religion is a new world manifestation of Bantu religion and spirituality.

Other Kongo living outside the Kingdom of Kongo were not converted and continued their traditional form of religion. Since the 1880s Protestant missionaries, and then renewed Catholic missionaries, have claimed a large number of Kongo as converts. Following 1921, a new form of Christianity preached by Simon Kimbangu became extremely popular in spite of the attempts of both Belgian and Portuguese governments to suppress it. Kimbanguism is a very powerful religious spiritual force today, as is one of its modern spin-offs, the Dibundu dia Kongo led by Mwanda Nsemi.

Traditions The Kongo week used to consist of four days: Konzo, Nkenge, Nsona and Nkandu. The third day, Nsona, was held sacred. The tradition has continued to the modern days so that among some Bakongo the third day of the week, Wednesday, is revered in the same way as Nsona.

Isabel Maria de Gama is the queen dowager of the Bakongo people. She succeeded her husband, Dom Antonio III upon his death in 1958 as regent for her son, Mansala. Some believe that de Gama is still the regent of the Kongo. Others hold that her regency ended in 1975.

Congo Bongo April 22, 2010

4

The Luba are one of the Bantu peoples of Central Africa. They are native to the Katanga, Kasai, and Maniema regions which are contained as a semi-autonomous regions of present-day Democratic Republic of the Congo.

They speak the Tshiluba and Swahili. The Kingdom of Luba was a pre-colonial Central African state, which arose in the marshy grasslands of the Upemba Depression in what is now southern Democratic Republic of Congo. The Luba had a wealth of natural resources such as gold, ivory, copper, frankincense and ebony but they also produced and traded a variety of goods such as pottery and masks.

History The Luba first appear as a people around the 5th century AD, in the marshes of the Upemba Depression, in what is now the southeastern portion of the Democratic Republic of the Congo known as the Katanga region. In the marshes of the Upemba Depression, large scale cooperation was necessary to build and maintain dikes and drainage ditches. This kind of communal cooperation also made possible the construction of dams to stock fish during the long dry season. By the 6th century the Luba were working in iron and trading in salt, palm oil, and dried fish. They used these products to trade for copper, charcoal (for iron smelting), glass beads, iron and cowrie shells from the Indian Ocean.

Around 1500, possibly earlier, the Luba began to coalesce into a single, unified state, under the leadership of kings ruling by divine sanction. The mulopwe, or king, was drawn from the balopwe, a group who acted as intermediaries between the world of mankind and the world of spirits and ancestors. The mulopwe had three sources of power:  He headed a secular hierarchy of governors and under-governors, running down to local village headmen.  He collected tribute from local chiefs, which was then redistributed in the form of gifts to loyal followers. In practice this tribute system amounted to a network of state controlled trade.  The mulopwe commanded significant spiritual prestige. He was the head of the Bambudye (or Mbudye) secret society, to which all kings, chiefs and officials belonged.

From around 1585 the Luba expanded rapidly, securing control of copper mines, fishing, and palm

cultivation. After c.1700, the Luba acquired maize and cassava (manioc). These new crops allowed a substantial increase in population and stimulated economic growth. This in turn added to the power and prestige of the royal authority.

Between c. 1780 and 1870 the Luba kingdom reached its height under three strong rulers: Ilunga Sunga (c.

1780-1810), his son Kumwimbe Ngombe (c. 18101840), and Ilunga Kabale (c. 1840-1874). Via intermediaries, the Luba traded from the Portuguese outposts in Angola to the Indian Ocean. Crossshaped copper ingots and raffia cloth served as currency in a trading network where arrow poisons, drums, animal hides, ivory and dried fish were bartered for cattle, cotton, beads, iron, tools and implements.

Kings From around 1870 on the Luba kingdom went into decline. The kingship ultimately had no clearly worked out means of succession, so the kingdom was vulnerable to factional infighting. The Luba were also threatened by pressure from the Nyamwezi, a tribe from what is now Tanzania, moving around Lake Tanganyika, and by SwahiliArabs, moving inland from the East African coast.

The Nyamwezi and the Swahili-Arabs had access to guns and were allies, and this proved decisive. The Luba were not conquered, but the Swahili-Arabs were able to cut their access to trade with the jungle tribes to the north, while the Nyamwezi, under the leadership of the energetic Msiri, encroached on Luba trade to the south, where he set up his Yeke/ Congo Bongo April 22, 2010

5

Luba people (cont…)

Hemmed in, the Luba now desperately needed guns, just as their economic position was eroding. To try to stem the decline, the Luba went into slave trading on a major scale, selling to the Portuguese in Angola.

But the slave trade was slowly dying down, and slaves fetched less and less of a price. Also the Luba were less capable of raiding other peoples, so they began slave raiding among themselves, which sped the disruption of Luba society and the disintegration of political unity. In 1874 Ilunga Kabale was assassinated, and thereafter the Luba royal line was divided into quarreling factions. In the 1880s, much of the eastern Congo fell under the control of the SwahiliArab adventurer Tippu Tib (Hamed bin Mohammed al-Marjebi), whose men incidentally brought small pox with them.

After the Independence of the Congo In 1960, the Belgians, faced with the rise of nationalism, granted independence to the Democratic Republic of the Congo. That same year Katanga Province attempted to secede under Moise Tshombe.

The Luba were divided, with one faction under Ndaye Photo by Mary Nooter Robert, Emanuel supporting secession and another under Two Mbudye officials—keepers of memory— with Lukasa Kisula Ngoye supporting the central government. In boards, Luba people, Zaire 1965, when Tshombe's breakaway regime collapsed, Kisula Ngoye became the dominant leader among the Luba.

Traditional Culture The Luba tended to cluster in small villages, with rectangular houses facing a single street. Agriculture was based upon slash-and-burn cultivation in areas with good soil (usually by rivers), supplemented by hunting and fishing in the surrounding bush country. Kilolo, patrilineal chieftains, headed local village government, under the protection of the king. Cultural life centered around the kitenta, the royal compound, which later came to be a permanent capital. The kitenta drew artists, poets, musicians and craftsmen, spurred by royal and court patronage.

The Bambudye secret society had an important mnemonic device to help them keep straight the complex history and ritual life of the Luba nation. It was the lukasa, or memory board. Colored beads and shells set into a carved wooden board gave those who knew how to interpret it a spatial representation that would be used to help them remember important facets of Luba culture and history.

The Luba were famous as wood carvers. Particularly noteworthy were ceremonial masks, and such symbols of kingship as ceremonial canes, bracelets, and axes.

Another significant feature of Luba culture was kibuta – divination. The Bilumbu were spirit mediums who would enter a trance state, gazing into mboko, sacred baskets or gourds, within which ritual objects were Congo Bongo April 22, 2010

6