South Kasai
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 Location of the South Kasai in Congo (Kinshasa) |
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| Political status | Former de facto regime 1960–1961 | |||
| Official language | French | |||
| Capital | Bakwanga | |||
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Independence Date of the unilateral declaration |
June 14, 1960 (Repeated August 8, 1960) |
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| End of secession | December 30, 1961 | |||
| surface | approx. 170,000 km² | |||
| population | approx. 2,000,000 ( 1960 ) | |||
| currency | Congo Franc | |||
South Kasai (official name État autonome du Sud-Kasaï or État minier du Sud-Kasaï ) was an internationally unrecognized state on the territory of the Congo (Kinshasa) during the Congo crisis from 1960 to 1961.
Founding of the state
Kasai was a province of the Belgian Congo , which got its name from the Kasai River . The southern and southeastern part of the province was inhabited by the Baluba people (also called Luba). Even before the Congo (Kinshasa) was granted independence by Belgium on June 30, 1960 , tensions arose between various ethnic groups and the central government. On June 14, 1960, Albert Kalonji , who came from a leading Baluba family, declared the south of the province to be the “Autonomous State of South Kasai”. Independence was confirmed with a second proclamation on August 8, 1960, and the young state was renamed "South Kasai Mining State"; Bakwanga , today's Mbuji-Mayi , became the capital . The notables of the Baluba people called on April 12, a 1961 Albert Kalonjis father to Mulopwe (king), who, however, immediately abdicated in favor of his son.
End of secession
In the war with the central government that began soon after the secession , South Kasai was supported by the Belgian mining company Forminière and the Belgian armed forces. When the undisciplined Congolese army on 25./26. August 1960 briefly succeeded in conquering Bakwanga, there was a massacre among the civilian population. It was not until the autumn of 1961 that the Congolese army, supported by UN units, was able to record military success again, and on December 30, 1961, South Kasai was again under the control of the central government. Albert Kalonji was taken prisoner, from which he escaped on September 7, 1962. The attempt at a new secession failed after just a month.
After the capitulation, the province of Kasai was divided into a western ( Kasai-Occidental ) and an eastern half ( Kasaï-Oriental ).
literature
- Albert Kalonji Ditunga Mulopwe: Congo 1960. La secession du Sud-Kasaï, la vérité du Mulopwe . L'Harmattan, Paris 2005, ISBN 2-7475-8132-2 .
- Peter Scholl-Latour : Murder on the Great River. A quarter of a century of African independence . Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, Stuttgart 1986, ISBN 3-421-06307-9 .
Web links
- www.flaggenlexikon.de accessed on February 16, 2010