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Democratic Republic of Congo

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Country Facts

The historical roots of modern-day DRC date back to the late fourteenth century when the Kongo Kingdom was founded. The Kongo Kingdom formed a close trading relationship with the Portuguese, who soon turned their attention to the trade in slaves. During the reign of King Affonso the slave trade began to escalate, much to his regret in later years. While the nineteenth century witnessed the end of the slave trade, the Congo would face equally great horrors under the tyrannical rule of King Léopold of Belgium, the only man to personally own an African colony.

Léopold intentionally and misleadingly named his possession the Congo Free State (CFS). While falsely presenting his colony to the world as a bastion of freedom for Africans who he claimed would otherwise be enslaved, he was all along forcing the region's indigenous people to labor against their will in order to exploit the colony's vast natural resources, especially rubber. In order to confer international legitimacy on the CFS, Léopold was forced to hand his colony over to the Belgium state in 1908, upon which it was renamed Belgian Congo. This transition of power, however, did not signal the end of human rights abuses in Congo. It is therefore no surprise that the seeds of Congo's nationalist movement were sewn early on. The development of religious movements in the 1920's with pronounced nationalist agendas would be followed, in the post-WWII era, by the formation of widespread urban-based movements for increased political rights. During the mid-1950's the newly formed Alliance of the Kongo People and the Confederation of Katanga Associations forced Belgium to entertain the idea of granting its colony independence. It was, however, the 1958 formation of the Congolese National Movement (CNM) that became the primary forced behind the independence movement.

The internal divisions within the CNM foreshadowed the direction that Congo's post-independence political history would move in. On June 30, 1960 the First Republic of Congo was established with H.E. Patrice Lumumba serving as the nation's Prime Minister and Kasavubu as president. Shortly thereafter ideological and personal differences divided Lumumba and Kasavubu and led to Kasavubu's ousting of Lumumba. With the complicity of the CIA, Patrice Lumumba was murdered within a matter of months and Mobutu Sese Seko's rise to power began. In 1965 Mobutu led a successful coup in which he installed himself as president, initiating the nation's second republic. Mobutu managed to stay in power for 32 years and faced both extreme domestic and international pressure during his reign, particularly its last decade. Suffering from ill health and widespread criticism Mobutu fled the country in 1997 and Laurent Kabila declared himself president of the newly renamed Democratic Republic of Congo (formerly Zaire). Four years later, on January 16, 2001 Kabila was killed. His son, military leader, Joseph Kabila was then appointed president. The civil war ravaging the DRC has both exacerbated and been exacerbated by this intense political instability. While the DRC is undoubtedly one of Africa's most potentially prosperous nations, its future has yet to be determined.

President: His Excellency Joseph KABILA Kabange

Minister of Mines: Martin Kabwelulu LABILO

Ministère Des Mines

3ème Niveau, Building Gècamines

Boulevard du 30 Juin

Kinshasa/Gombe,

République Démocratique du Congo

Telephone: +243 12 21238

Fax: +243 12 42816

E-mail: minimes@ic.cd

Website: http://www.miningcongo.cd

Population: 70,916,439

Capital: Kinshasa

Major languages: French, Lingala, Kiswahili, Kingwana, Kikongo, Tshiluba

religions: Christianity, Islam, Indigenous Belief Systems

Life expectancy: 47 years (men), 51 years (women)

Monetary unit: 1 Congolese franc = 100 centimes

Main exports: Diamonds, copper, coffee, cobalt, crude oil

Average annual income: US $100

Internet domain: .cd

International dialing code: +243

Chairman's Statement:

Found in multiple shapes (ranging from cubic, octahedral and dodecahedral forms) and in various colors (ranging from yellow to brown), the diamonds produced in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) are of good quality.

With 18% of world production, the DRC is the second largest producer of diamonds by weight (20 million carats in 1995) after Australia. However, only 6% of the diamonds found in the DRC are of high gem quality, while another 40% are small stones of near-gem quality, which are cut in India. The DRC province of Mbuji-Mayi is home to one of the world's most prolific mines. In recent years, production has been about 5 million carats per year.