Red Rubber: Leopold II and his Congo

I will give them my Congo, but they have no right to know what I did there.'

More than a century after this astonishing statement by King Leopold II and the forced transfer of his personal crown domain to Belgium in 1908, it has become clear that Leopold II and his collaborators in Congo caused a humanitarian disaster that is very exceptional in colonial history.

With Rood rubber in 1985, Daniel Vangroenweghe was one of the first in our country to write an in-depth report on the gruesome trade and conduct of Leopold's occupation in the heart of Africa. Based on ten years of research, twenty different archives at home and abroad, previously unpublished documents from the investigation committee and testimonies, the author outlines the structure, design and scope of the rubber exploitation. Forced labour, destruction, hunger, epidemics and exploitation decimated the local population and caused an unprecedented human tragedy that continues to this day.

Red Rubber confronts us with the fact that many balanced and civilized compatriots were involved in a violent and inhumane colonization for the enrichment of a monarch who never bothered to visit the Congo Free State.