— Ch. 1 · The Stowaway Who Became Chief —
Mobutu Sese Seko.
~6 min read · Ch. 1 of 6
In 1949, a young Joseph-Désiré Mobutu stowed away aboard a boat traveling down the Congo River to Léopoldville. He was only nineteen years old and had been expelled from his Catholic mission school for pranks that included pointing out French errors made by Dutch-speaking Belgian priests. The colonial authorities found him weeks later and offered him a choice between prison or seven years of service in the Force Publique, the colonial army. He chose the army, finding discipline there where he had found none at home. Sergeant Louis Bobozo became a father figure to the new recruit, while Mobutu borrowed European newspapers from officers to read on sentry duty. His favorite authors were Charles de Gaulle, Winston Churchill, and Niccolò Machiavelli. By 1956, he quit the army to become a full-time journalist writing for L'Avenir, a daily newspaper in Léopoldville. During this period, he met Patrice Lumumba and joined the Congolese National Movement as Lumumba's personal aide. Belgian intelligence reportedly recruited him as an informer during these early political years.
Bloodless Coups And Cold War Chaos
On the 5th of July 1960, soldiers of the Force Publique mutinied at Camp Léopold II in Léopoldville, dissatisfied with their all-white leadership. Mobutu assisted officials in negotiating with the mutineers to secure the release of officers and their families. On August 7, President Joseph Kasa-Vubu convened an extraordinary session to address Africanizing the garrison. The cabinet debated who would make a suitable army chief of staff between Maurice Mpolo and Mobutu. Lumumba favored Mobutu's prudence over Mpolo's courage. On the 14th of September 1960, Mobutu launched a bloodless coup declaring both Kasa-Vubu and Lumumba neutralized. He established a new government of university graduates called the College of Commissioners-General. Lumumba fled to Stanleyville to establish a rival government but was captured by Mobutu's troops in December 1960. Mobutu transferred Lumumba to Katanga on the 17th of January 1961, where he was executed by secessionist forces. In November 1963, Conseil National de Libération militants kidnapped Mobutu during a failed coup attempt, though both he and Victor Nendaka escaped. By mid-1964, Kwilu and Simba rebellions had spread across much of the Congo before Mobutu reconquered the territory through 1965.