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Journalism of Courage
Amid the collective outpouring of grief and mourning after the demise of Queen Elizabeth II, several discordant voices have sought accountability for the violent legacy left behind in Africa by the British until about the middle of the 20th century. Over the years, a range of atrocities was committed on the peoples of the continent in the name of the monarchy and, until a few years after her ascension to the throne in 1953, in the name of the Queen herself.
The history of European colonialism in Africa is replete with stories of brutality, including the theft of several blood-soaked “mementos” and “trophies” from the victims.
Members of the Nandi group, an East African ethnic tribe based in Kenya, recently urged Britain to return the severed head of Koitalel Arap Samoei, a spiritual leader who was killed in 1905 when the country was under Britain’s colonial rule.
Samoei had led his community during a prolonged rebellion against the British. He was killed by a British officer named Richard Meinertzhagen, who lured him to a meeting to discuss truce, but shot him instead. Samoei’s head was then severed from his body and shipped to England as a trophy, according to widely recorded testimony.
There is no clarity on where Samoei’s skull currently is. According to a report in The New York Times, the Nandi County government believes that it is either in the possession of a museum in Britain, or it is with the Meinertzhagen family. Neither the British government nor any of the prominent museums have commented on the matter.
In June this year, the Belgian government returned to the Democratic Republic of Congo a gold-crowned tooth of Patrice Lumumba, the hero of the country’s freedom movement who went on to become its first Prime Minister after liberation from Belgium in 1960.
Lumumba, who was considered close to the USSR during the Cold War, was regarded with suspicion by Belgium and other European nations.
While delivering a speech on Independence Day in 1960, Lumumba accused Belgium of holding the people of Congo in “humiliating slavery”, demonstrating a stridency that outraged many Europeans. Months afterwards, following a coup by Colonel Mobutu, Lumumba, who was 35 years old at the time, was executed by secessionist forces who were actively assisted by Belgian officials.
Lumumba’s body was initially thrown into a shallow grave but was later dug up, dismembered, and dissolved in acid so as to leave no trace of it behind. Belgian policeman Gerard Soete, who had the task of getting rid of the body, took Lumumba’s gold-crowned tooth back with him to Belgium, according to a report in the BBC. It was finally returned to Lumumba’s family and given a proper burial over 60 years after his death.
So brutal was Belgian King Leopold II’s rule in the Congo Free State that, according to some estimates, almost 10 million Congolese were killed in the first 25 years of his regime, which started in 1885. The deaths were due to inhuman labour conditions, relentless violence by Belgian companies, and multiple fatal diseases.
The Belgian colonialists turned the country into a vast labour camp, and indiscriminately looted its resources. Those who refused to work were killed, and sometimes entire villages were destroyed in retribution, according to historical records. Workers who couldn’t meet their quota of rubber collection were punished by amputation of their hands and feet, a punishment that was sometimes extended to their wives and children as well.
In a particularly perverse action, the severed limbs were collected, often of the dead but sometimes even of those who were still alive, to prove that the soldiers were not wasting their ammunition. The limbs were reportedly “smoked” and preserved, and presented in bunches to their commanders. The higher the number of amputated limbs presented by a soldier, the greater the reward he received.
