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Quote by Marcel Yabili

“In Belgium, secularism manifested itself in anticlericalism allied to the Freemasons. This led to the establishment of a secular university in Lubumbashi to counter the launch of the Catholic University, Lovanium, in Kinshasa. The first university courses were taught during the Second World War; this event is cut from the history of the country because it was the initiative of Catholic missionaries. For the same reasons, Jef Van Bilsen and the Manifesto of African Conscience of 30 June 1956 are cited as precursors of independence, without any mention of the Catholic bishops who had previously taken some distance from the Colony by calling for the political emancipation of Blacks and by condemning racism in all its forms. Such political rebellion by missionaries were common in Africa and it is still perpetuated within episcopal conferences.”

Quote by Marcel Yabili

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Marcel Yabili

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“Scholarly studies have made missionaries the "pillars" of Belgian colonization, while, at least, evangelization and freedom of religion were compulsory programs of the Treaty of Berlin in 1885. Anticlericalism was thus militant and reductive, and falsified many aspects of history. It linked the low level, although widespread and free, of education to the racism of missionaries who would not have believed in the intellectual capacities of Blacks, even though they had started by training black priests or pastors’ counterparts.”

“It was put in the books that Thomas Kanza was the first university graduate, but he was a secular and a Congolese from Belgium (1956). The very first graduate was Paul Panda Farnana, an agronomist trained in Belgium (1907). But considering post-secondary education, it is father Stefano Kaoze (1917) who is the first graduate trained in Congo.”

“The obsession with seeking in Africa's colonial past the causes of all its miseries today is the work of people intimately convinced that Africa is doomed, that it is unable to take care of itself today, and that, finally, the fate of the Black will only improve if the White comes back to repair what he has done wrong: these “hidden Afro- pessimists “ are hiding, under gratuitous accusations, anger, or demand for reparation, their own disarray. This explains why their words are sterile, never accompanied by proposals for solutions to the problems they evoke. They are doing a lot of harm to Africa because they divert issues that have worth.”

“This heroism was also that of the first missionaries. They had a life expectancy of about 5 years in Congo, and some were given extremely anointing at the time of their journey to Africa. There were many young idealists. Their graves are still lined up in the Mpala locality, which overlooks Lake Tanganyika. The Catholic mission was a fort where people who fled slavers and brutality took refuge.”

“Because I was sent to free the Kongo Peoples and the World Black Race. The Black Man will become White and the White Man will become Black. For the spiritual and moral foundations, as we know them today, will be deeply shaken. Wars will persist across the world. Kongo will be free and Africa too. The Black Man will become White and the White Man will become Black.”

“Ik stelde voor dat ik met de koning op staande voet Leopoldstad zou verlaten en dat de regering het daags voordien gesloten vriendschapsverdrag met Kongo opnieuw zou onderzoeken. Buitenstaanders hadden blijkbaar mijn woorden opgevangen, want niet lang daarna deed de ambassadeur van Ghana een demarche bij mij met de vraag of de zaak niet min of meer kon worden bijgelegd. Ik ging daarmee akkoord. Er volgde een bijeenkomst van enkele ministers. Het voorstel was dat Lumumba tijdens de lunch die na de middag was gepland een tafelrede zou houden waarin hij hulde zou brengen aan de koning en het Belgische koloniale werk. Minister van Buitenlandse Zaken Pierre Wigny en de diplomatieke adviseur van gouverneur-generaal Cornelis Fredericq De Ridder schreven in mijn bijzijn de redevoering. Ik liet vervolgens de tekst aan Lumumba bezorgen met de vraag of hij die al dan niet aannam. Het antwoord was positief. De ambassadeur van Ghana trad hierbij als tussenpersoon op.”