Posted
on June 30, 2014
There
are two “Congos” in Africa. The Republic of the Congo is
sometimes called Congo and sometimes Congo-Brazzaville.
This
Congo, the one that is celebrating its 1960 independence from Belgium
today, is sometimes referred to as DR Congo, DRC, Congo-kinshasa,
DROC, or RDC. (Hmmm...a lot of variation there!)
But this Congo is
also sometimes referred to as Congo, just like that other Congo. So I'm sure that at least once
there has been a misunderstanding about which Congo people are
talking about!
The
dictator Mobutu Sese Seko had changed the country's name to Zaire for
a while, but DRC's president Laurent Kabila restored the name when
Seko finally fell. It's a bummer to acknowledge that Belgium and the
United States supported this authoritarian, corrupt “leader” -
because he was anti-communist. Seko amassed a personal fortune rather
than helped his people, embezzling billions of dollars (up to $15
billion!!!) during his reign.
Sadly,
even after Seko was finally ousted, the nation was torn apart by
civil war...the worst kind of civil war, with nine different African
nations and at least 20 different armed “sides” - with the usual
violence of war coupled with a horrific amount of sexual violence and
atrocities – and with millions more dying from disease and malnutrition.
Hopefully the democratic republic established in 2006 will be stable!
Let's
turn from the sad history of the DRC and talk, instead, about the
geography of the place.
Did
you know....?
The
DRC has more thunderstorms than anywhere else in the world!
The
annual rainfall of some areas of the DRC is almost 7 feet! Compare
that to my own home, in Southern California, where we get only around
16 or 17 inches of rain a year (that's one and a half feet rather
than seven feet!).
The
Congo River and its basin, covered with tropical rainforest, dominate
the entire country, although there are some “rift” mountains. The
Congo Rainforest is the second largest in the world (after the Amazon
Rainforest), and the Congo River's flow is second largest in the
world (again, after the Amazon).
The
rift mountains already mentioned, and the rift valley alongside the
mountain range, are the result of two tectonic plates pulling apart,
causing lava to push upwards and making new land. Because of this
tectonic activity, there is a huge amount of minerals easily
accessible in some parts of the Congo. Cobalt, copper, cadmium,
diamonds, gold, silver, zinc, manganese, tin, germanium, uranium,
radium, bauxite, iron, and coal are all plentiful! (Fighting over
this potential mineral wealth is one reason for the violence,
unfortunately.)
Some
of the most familiar “African animals” live in the DRC, including
chimpanzees and their cousins, the bonobos, gorillas, elephants,
rhinos, and okapis. The DRC is ranked as Africa's most biodiverse
nation – but again, all the warring and violence have threatened
wildlife and their habitats.
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