Debate on Ngongo Leteta
By Professor Antoine Dimandja
Email: profdimandja@yahoo.fr

Translation by James L. Robinson, Emeritus Professor of Biochemistry,
Department of Animal Sciences and Division of Nutritional Sciences,
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
132 Animal Sciences Laboratory, 1207 West Gregory Drive, Urbana, IL 61801 USA. 
Phone: (217) 333-2469   FAX: (217) 333-7088.

Professor Antoine Roger Dimandja was born 7 November 1936 in the maternity wing of the Methodist hospital in Wembo Nyama.  He is from the village of Ngandu Shenga, in the grouping of Olongo Etanga, sector of Lokombe II, territory of Katako-Kombe. 

 After primary education successively at Dingele, Diengenga, Minga and finally Wembo Nyama, he was admitted to the Union Secondary School in Mutoto in the territory of Demba 2 January 1953 and graduated from the school, now moved to Katubue in the territory of Dibaya, district of Lulua (Kasai), 19 June 1959.

 He subsequently enrolled at the official University of the Congo in Elisabethville during the 1959-60 academic year, but was among the survivors evacuated from the Katanga and arrived at Wembo Nyama via Lodja in October 1960.  He then began to teach at the teachers school (now the secondary school of Wembo Nyama) until 1962. 

From 1962-1969, he undertook university studies in the United States. He had a scholarship from the United Methodist Church in New York. As French being his first language, he needed to learn English, so they sent him to the University of Michigan for an intensive six month course. He then attended McKendree College where he graduated with a B. A. in history. In the beginning of 1966, he was offered an assistantship from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale. During this time, he worked hard and graduated with his M.A.  in history

 Returning to the country after a 7-year absence, he was appointed by Bishop Shungu of the Southern Congo Conference of the United Methodist Church (EMSC) as professor to the Institute Brinton at Mwajinga, territory of Sandoa, district of Lualaba, province of Katanga.

 In 1970, precisely on 4 October, he was admitted to the University of Louvain (Belgium) to prepare for his doctorate in history under the guidance of Professors Roger Aubert and Guy Malengreau.  His dissertation was entitled: “The Land of Katako-Kombe in the Colonial Period (1904-1945)”; his secondary thesis concerned the political history of the United States of America in the Twenties.  The public defense of his dissertation took place in the Faculty and he was proclaimed Doctor of Philosophy and Letters: group B:  History (Cum laude) on 21 May 1974. 

 He was then appointed by Monsignor Tharcisse Tshibangu, rector at the time of the National University of Zaire ( UNAZA,), on 15 October of the same year, Assistant Professor in the Department of History, Faculty of Letters, at the Lubumbashi campus  .

 After two years, the revolutionary council of UNAZA promoted him to Associate Professor and then after 4 years of teaching to Professor (Professeur Ordinaire).  His administrative functions on the faculty were successively those of secretary of the History Department, head of department, and dean for research.  He retired from University of Kinshasa (UNIKIN), successor of UNAZA in 1992. 

 Always in contact with his fellow emeritus professors and those who are still teaching, including other scholars spread around the world, Professor Antoine Roger Dimandja is currently living in the United States of America.

Residence of Ngongo Leteta at Ngandu until his execution in September 1893. His son Lupungu occupied it until his eviction and exile from Nyangwe to Stanleyville in 1896.  Ngongo Luhaka who was recalled from the Kondo at Lodja, and  was designated by the whites of the Congo Free State to be the legitimate successor of Ngongo Leteta, occupied the same residence until the destruction of the Ngandu post by the sub-lieutenant Henri De Cort (Bwana Toto) in 1904.  He took this picture in the village of Ngandu at the edge of the left bank of the Lomami River.  He required Luhaka and the other Asambala chiefs to move immediately north to the edge of the equatorial forest near the post of Katako-Kombe, which was established in May 1904.  He demanded that the Asambala collect wild rubber, which the State needed.  One can see how the Asambala dressed in Arab attire in contrast to the native inhabitants of the savanna and the forest.( Cf. Historical archives of Royal Museum for Central Africa in Tervuren, Belgium).

The Debate:

Dear brothers and sisters,

Our debate consists in examining a problem that dates from the XIX century and that continues until now to embroil the history of the Atetela and Asonge peoples.  It consists in knowing with certainty, on all sides, the truth about evidence that Ngongo Leteta was Otetela or Osonge. Our careful research across time and space in the DRC, Belgium and USA with old-timers who were alive and lacked any gaps of memory has not only permitted us to confront different points of view with what was said or written many times, but lead us to conclude that this conflict full of heroism is definitely not solved by us and for our posterity.  History being a subject to explain, we need to make an effort from this point forward to seek the truth for the Diaspora which does not have a close connection with our land. 

 As for all of his contemporaries in the XIX century, no one knows when Ngongo Leteta was born.  It was Patrice Emery Lumumba who first revealed, in the course of an evening interview at the Sabena Guest House, on the Avenue des Aviateurs, adjacent to the old airport in Elisabethville, where he stayed on 8 May 1960, as a member of the executive council accompanying President Hendrik (Henri) Cornelis, governor general of the Belgian Congo and Ruanda-Burundi, on his last tour, that he had read much and discussed the subject with numerous Belgians and Congolese.  Mr. Lumumba, speaking in Otetela, declared that without doubt Ngongo Leteta was our supreme chief and that of the Asonge.  Some Flemish, including specifically Father Boelaert in the Equatorial Province, had called him pejoratively and erroneously Ngongo Lutete in articles in Aequatoria.  He gave as explanation that he was Ngongo, “the vagabond.”

 For us and for the Asonge, he was our national hero. He had been unfairly arrested, put in chains and publicly sentenced in a hurry at the state post at Ngandu by an officer of the Force Publique Jean Scheerlinck.  The latter called a council of war, of which he was president and his two associates were his brothers.  He didn’t even bother to consult with his superior, Commander Dhanis at Kasongo.  He condemned him to death Thursday 14 September 1893.  Ngongo Leteta had hoped to be brought to justice in Lusambo or Leopoldville, instead of out in the bush.  He had also preferred that his son Lumpungu, whose mother was Osonge, originally from Malela (not to be confused with the Osonge chief Lumpungu of Kabinda), be his successor.  “But, it was like beating air!”  In the presence of a large crowd and two other whites, Scheerlinck gave the order to the black execution squad to which one of the whites was added to fire their guns at 7 o’clock Friday 15 September 1893 and Chief Ngongo fell to the ground.

 According to Lumumba, Scheerlinck was unauthorized to make this judgment, only Lieutenant Duchene; station chief at Ngandu was authorized.  Dhanis had been promised by King Leopold II to be made a baron for his victory against the Arabs with the help of Ngongo Leteta and his valiant warriors, without whom all would not have been possible.  The Belgian high officer (Dhanis) regretted this to the end of his life in Brussels in 1909.  The doctoral thesis defended in Flemish at the University of Ghent by Mr. Philippe Marechal, actual head of the History Department at the Musee Royal De L’Afrique Centrale, so attests.

 Responding to our question on one of his articles on Ngongo Leteta in a Methodist journal (EMECOCE) at Wembo Nyama in 1956, Mr. Lumumba confirmed that he had made a habit since he was the postal commissioner in Stanleyville until the present to commemorate the execution and death of our supreme chief or sovereign on 15 September each year.  In effect, it was him and the Asonge chief Lumpungu, Mpaya Mutombo, as well as their brave warriors who delivered us from the Arab occupation and brought an end to the slave trade which they engaged in not only in the Manyema, but also in the Sankuru.  Our brothers and sisters who became slaves transported ivory tusks from Lomani across the Lualaba to the Indian Ocean, where the Arab sultans sold them to Europeans, without any hope of return.  One recalls that Arabs engaged in the slave trade on the African coasts since the XVI century.  In the XIX century, the Congress of Vienna condemned it in 1815, but despite many conventions that prohibited it, the trade would only disappear until shortly after Ngongo Leteta cunningly changed side, namely abandoning the Arabs and supporting the Europeans.  For Mr. Lumumba who was both detribalized and a national leader, he did not care if Ngongo Leteta was Otetela or Osonge.

 At the moment when he joined the whites in his capital at Ngandu on 19 September 1892, Ngongo and his brave warriors became useful instruments of decolonization against the Arabs, as Lumumba was against that of the Belgians in 1960; except that Ngongo played a colonizing role with the Europeans shortly before his elimination by those whom he had just helped in the east of our country.  In brief, Ngongo Leteta was the first martyr, whether Otetela or Osonge.  The old vassal of Ngongo, Lumpungu de Kabinda, managed to escape in the XIX century and lived to die naturally on June 19, 1919, but his successor Lumpungu II was hung by the Belgian colonial administration at Kabinda in 1936 on allegation of barbaric acts or practices against the Asonge, similar to the public trial of Ngongo Leteta against that population on 14 September 1893 before his execution the next morning.

 The second question that one may ask is to know how old he was?  Given ignorance of his birthdate, neither the Atetela nor the Asonge nor even the Arabs, no one can presume to answer this question!  Only one person from the era dared to estimate the approximate age of Ngongo Leteta.  It was Dr. Sidney L. Hinde, English captain in the expedition of Francis Dhanis (Bwana Fimbo Mingi).  The lattler was both the commissioner of the Lualaba District, whose provisional capital was Lusambo after being built by Paul Le Marinel( some sources retained officer A.Legat as true founder on 13 February 1890) on the right bank of Sankuru and commander of the Arab territory whose residence was established at Kasongo after the victory over the Arabs in Nyangwe.  According to Dr. Hinde, he was highly impressed by the talents of Ngongo Leteta in the course of the campaign against the Arabs from 1892 to 1893.  He was the first to estimate in his book “The fall of the Congo Arabs” published in 1897 that he was thirty years old and that he was Ukusu (Otetela) by blood.  One can deduce that he was born around 1863. 

 Additionally, he was not at all a senior that is belonging to the period that follows adulthood when professional activities come to an end.  He was certainly between two periods, specifically youth and old age, neither young nor old.  Our maternal grandfather Utshudi A Koy, an ex-slave of Ngongo at Ngandu and blacksmith at Usumba at Wembo Nyama has often told us that Ngongo Leteta was of medium height and fair complexion.  He had filed teeth, that were the style of the era.  He dressed in white and wore sandals, at times a red fez on his head, at others a multicolored hat with bird feathers(parrot).  Another old slave, Nsenga Iyoko originally of Ikela at Lomela, who was captured young, has told us that he was an eyewitness when Ngongo lived in his palace at Ngandu.  He told us in the village of Kitambala, near the state post of Katako-Kombe, in 1970 that he always had his feet on leopard and lion skins.  He held in his hands the gun (Okuma or tshonge) that the whites had given him.  He spoke more Osonge than Otetela.But he spoke kingwana or swahili with Arabs and later with Europeans.

 For us, he was mysterious, awesome and divine. He did not want one to know his tribe or his origins.  In brief, he knew his days were being shortened by the whites at Ngandu, which is why we dispersed after his execution toward our regions of origin. One must remember moreover that his residence at Ngandu and his grave remain in Asonge land in the territory of Tshofa; these lands were not fertile and people were dying of starvation.  It was not surprising that the men of Ngongo practiced cannibalism.

 Professor Vansina, modern political historian at the University of Wisconsin, who has given his course on African history at the Catholic University of Leuven (KUL) at old Louvain, admitted us as an auditor in his class for a semester during the academic year 1973-74.  He told us in English in effect that when the Arab representative died in the Upper Lomami around 1884, Tippo Tip, an Arab leader (known and called MUTSHIPULE by the Akusu or Atetela) whose residence was at Kasongo on the right bank of the Lualaba, upstream from Nyangwe since 1875, named Ngongo Leteta, an Otetela or Osonge, the first black chief to replace him.

 As we will see later on, Ngongo Leteta came as a youth from the village of Kilembue or Kalemba, as he accompanied Mutshipule on one of his trips.  The latter called him Ngongo Ruweteta or Ngongo Lueteta as his domestic or boy at the court where he grew up.  One must note in passing that the Akusu or Atetela as well as our peoples of Manyema called the river Bahari or Lualaba, specifically at Kindu and in the Sankuru (some still say ” Lukalaba”)..  Far be it for us to make a digression into the origins of Ngongo Leteta.

 In effect, Professor Vansina recommended that we read one of his books published in 1966 entitled “Introduction a l’Ethnographie Congolaise”.  In this work, the author has written that Ngongo Leteta was simply Otetela and not Osonge as we have just seen.  This was the opinion of Dr. Hinde.  The majority of those whom we have interviewed in the countries cited have confirmed our childhood memories that Ngongo Leteta was born in Manyema and was like us a descendant of our eponymous ancestor Mongo of the Equator from whom come the Atetela who occupy locations in the Sankuru and the lands between the Lomami and Lualaba rivers, in this case Manyema.  According to Leon Delcourt, former head administrator of the territory of Katako-Kombe (Bwana Tshuwi) living in Liege, the Atetela have been in these regions for more than three hundred years and he has so written in a letter dated 3 November 1938 to Professor Georges van der Kerken of the Antwerp Colonial University, a former governor of Equatorial Province, a Mongophile and author of “L’Ethnie Mongo”, a work that he published in 1944. 

 Professor Vansina has reviewed and reworked his course and his book whose title is well known “The Kingdoms of the Savanna”, published in 1968.  It seems to us that the author has been careful to retain the first version according to which Ngongo Leteta was either Otetela or Osonge.  For us, we have no doubt, but some people do not like to read or are ill at ease when a novel changes its conclusion.  This type of reader prefers to be held in suspense, with an aspect not resolved or completed.  The English would say a “thriller.”

 In this regard, we had a discussion at a seminar of contemporary history in summer 1988 with Professor Jean Stengers at ULB.  For his part, an historian is neither an advocate, nor a judge who must decide in the middle of what he is studying.  In effect, when he studies the past with a view of elucidating the present as in this case, he must report exactly the facts, that are that he views them objectively without taking a stand and that at the same time he strives to leave the reader the opportunity to draw his own conclusion.  More often, he continues, it is politicians who draw conclusions from all that they study. 

 During our 17-year tenure as professor at UNAZA, Lubumbashi campus first, then  UNILU ( University of Lubumbashi), we have had to read many term papers and dissertations that deal with the history of Ngongo Leteta with documents cited.  The opinion of researchers has often been mixed.  They were not unanimous!  For example, in the Department of History, some of our Atetela graduates concluded that Ngongo Leteta was Otetela while other students from Kabinda district supposed that he was Osonge.  Both groups reported that they had supplemented their oral documentation on the ground in the Otetela, Osonge or Tshiluba languages.

 On the other hand, Atetela students majoring in political science who had made arduous research on the ground either in Manyema or in the Sankuru have given us shock in historical science in the sense that they surprised us in concluding that Ngongo Leteta was Osonge and not Otetela!  Ever since, we do not know at which saint to kneel.  We have asked ourselves if they had definitely resolved the problem and what were their authentic sources.  Until now, our thirst has not been quenched.  We dare to believe that it is similar for other readers interested in this debate.

 A third basic question consists in knowing in which village in Manyema was Ngongo Leteta born.   Is it a village of the Akusu or the Asonge?  We have said earlier that he was from the upper Lomami, that is south of Manyema, where until now the border between the Akusu and the Asonge remains ill defined.  The same problem exists in the Sankuru, specifically at Lusambo and Lubefu.  We will see as well the origin of the name of Ngongo Leteta in time and space, from his youth to his nomination as Chief of the Batetela by the Arabs in 1884.

 Our late brother Joseph Okito, who was a businessman with a beautiful home and sector chief of the Batetela (Atetela) at Lusambo, showed us a study that resulted from his inquiry when we were students at the Union Secondary School at Mutoto.  This study was made in the village of Asambala de Muinyi that we know very well.  Its head was a sub-chief of Omeonga, brother of the former chief Luhaka who died at Shinga I of two simultaneous attacks of apoplexy which paralyzed his left side on 15 July 1919.  The village of Muinyi is 30 Km from the state post of Katako-Kombe on the road to Wembo Nyama via Shungu A Nkoyi.  He was the first to publish the story of the youth of Ngongo Leteta in the journal “COMMUNAUTE” in Luluabourg in 1957-58.  It indicates in effect that Ngongo Leteta was born in the village of the chief of the Ahina.  The latter was Ukusu and was called Pene Muimba.  His father was Kasongo and his sister Wanyeki.  No mention is made of his mother, nor of other members of his family.

 From birth, he received the name of Mwanza Kasongo.  As a boy, he was crafty and swindling.  He got into many scuffles with other boys his age, ending often with broken legs and arms.  His father Kasongo had enough of paying damages and interests.  According to the customs of the Ahina, the chief who held all power (executive, legislative, and judicial) had to exercise his authority as dictator in ordering his goons to take whatever offender to serve as an example and hence avoid the committing of crimes. 

 To the surprise of his subjects, Pene Muimba did otherwise!  In effect, he sent the young Muanza Kasongo for whom he had high regard and admiration for his courageous actions at Kilembue to accompany his daughter who had just been engaged to his fellow chief of the Osonge tribe.  According to oral tradition, this was the first contact that the future Ngongo Leteta would have with the Asonge.

 Thereafter, Mwanza Kasongo went from success to success, for the chief of Kilembue named him “LETETA”, that is “RUNNER” given that he could, fetish horn in hand, run around the whole village very quickly, without resting, from morning until night, when he would return first frantically acclaimed by the people and finally embraced by the chief of Kilembue.  Unfortunately, the name Mwanza was dropped and that of Leteta was on everyone’s lips.  In fact, the Akusu or Atetela refer to Kilembue as Kalemba.  The late Professor Zacharie Tshimanga, Congolese historian of the Baluba of Kasai Oriental, told us during a brilliant presentation in our Congolese political history seminar at Lubumbashi that Ngongo Leteta was born in Kilembue, a village with a mixed or heterogeneous population, while his successor Ngongo Luhaka was Ukusu or Otetela.  The latter is generally regarded as a supporter of slavery having committed most of the atrocities driving the Baluba from south near Mbuji Mayi river to their brother Baluba/ Lulua around Luluabourg state post built by a German explorer von Wissmann in the interest of the great chief Kalamba Mukenge,owner of the land. The Baluba gave him a nickname “ Luhaka Manga “,meaning Luhaka who believes in fetish. In Manyema, he is originally from Aluba stock in Kibombo territory..These Aluba are Akusu or Atetela,not to be confused with those in either Kasai or North Katanga..  

 In principle, Lumpungu de Kabinda claimed to be the chief of all Asonge of whom Mpanya Mutombo was his late father’s old slave.  He was not a friend of Ngongo Leteta before or after he inherited from his father, specifically in seeking the help of Tippo Tip or Mutshipule.  The later traveled from Kasongo to Kilembue where he became friend to the Osonge chief.  It is there that he met Leteta.  The young man still called himself Mwanza Kasongo Leteta.  Everyone was suspicious and afraid of this Arab tyrant, except for Mwanza Kasongo Leteta, who agreed to accompany Mutshipule to his residence in Kasongo.  He began to call the young man RUWETETA as he only spoke Arab and the Kingwana or Swahili, bantu language imported from the east.  Leteta became his servant or domestic, he was still not called Ngongo.  The latter renounced forever returning to Kilembue or Kalemba. 

 Leteta was well-behaved and appreciated by Mutshipule, who put him in touch with his manager Tshungu.  The latter put his reputation on the line in entrusting him with porters, a gun and ammunition for defense, if needed.  Lueteta our Leteta revealed himself as highly skilled and very capable.  He defeated all the chiefs of Manyema, except Ngongo l’Okole who was recognized by his terrible exploits.  Mwanza Kasongo Leteta refused at all costs to admit to such a superiority!  In effect, he charged Omeonga and his best soldiers to arrest him where he was hiding on a small island in the Lomami River and to bring him willingly or forcefully.  Leteta who wanted to mark his victory all along the Lomami resolved to take the name of his most feared adversary and forbid him to every use it again!  From this moment on, Mwanza Kasongo Leteta became” Ngongo Leteta”.  His childhood names disappeared. In 1905,Tippo Tip or Mutshipule wrote before he died in his autobiography” Ngongo Ruweteta”..He gave no explanation.But in his translation, Professor F.Bontinck writes that Ngongo Ruweteta (Ngongo Lutete) was silly or a stupid man.!This is the opposite of what Dr.Hinde wrote about Ngongo’s ability  in his book above-mentioned..  For the Atetela, Ngongo Leteta meant Ngongo “the traveller”, as he was often on the move for his unexpected raids on behalf of his Arab masters in the Manyema and Kasai from 1884 to 1892.  In fact, he kept the same name when Mutshipule promoted him Sovereign or Great Chief of the Batetela ( Atetela) and Asonge in 1889  His ancient enemy Lumpungu of Kabinda and Mpanya Mutombo, of the village situated at three days by canoe( according to Dr Hinde or one day according to Francis Dhanis), that is less than 230 Km upstream from the post of Lusambo on the Sankuru, became his vassals.

 In addition, some speculate that the name Ngongo is Osonge and not Otetela.  In our opinion, it is totally aberrant to use this criteria in deciding whether Ngongo is from the Ukusu tribe or Osonge.  In effect, this name like that of Kasongo, Mwanza, Manya,Mudimbe,Kibonge, Mulenda,Mundala, Shamba, Lupungu, Musongela, Kumbi,  Wembo, and many other are proper family names that one finds in other tribes or ethnic groups in the DRC.  The only nuance is that Ngongo adopted it or acquired it by force of arms from the traditional or customary chief Ngongo l’Okole, which erased his ancestry in the XIX century.  Furthermore, some Akusu (Atetela) and Asonge call themselves Kitenge, Ngandu, Ngongo, Mwembo, Manya, Malela, Panya, Mulosa,Mudimbi, Musese, Samba, etc..., but Leteta is a name uniquely Otetela.  It has a meaning devoid of depreciative or pejorative implications like “Lutete.” seen in Father Ronsmans Stanislas’ articles published from North Sankuru in Aequatoria prior to his fellow citizen Boellaert!

 There is a tribe in Equatorial Province called Ngombe, like the group Ngombe downstream from the Lomami in the Sankuru, and a community in the former province of Leopoldville that is called Ngombe Lutete.  This perhaps means something else for the Bakongo (sic) Akongo, and nothing for the rest of us.  In addition, a street in the middle of Kinshasa was christened by the Belgian colonial government Ngongo Lutete in memory of the Great Chief of the Batetela that they had executed.  We think that there are many others in our country and they should be converted to Ngongo Leteta one day.  To bring this matter to a close, we note that a former Congolese minister of information or of foreign affairs was called Umbadi Lutete.  This was his own name and we will not discuss it; but it is entirely a name from the Bas-Congo Province, whose relatives are in Angola and in Congo- Brazzaville for historical reasons that we know.

 Given that the village of Kilembue or Kalemba continue to be heterogeneous, there have certainly been intermarriages over the years.  It goes without saying that the Asonge and Atetela or Akusu in the Manyema always practiced a patrilineal system like their brothers in the Sankuru.  In other terms, children belonged to the father, to his clan or village.  The name of the newborn came first of all from the father’s side, not the mother’s.  Thus, for those who contend that Ngongo Leteta was Ukusu (Otetela) of the Ahina group, it was his mother who was Osonge in the village in these parts, but neither Hinde nor Okito have suggested that!  On other hand, to those who contend that Ngongo Leteta was Osonge in the village, as an example some of the political science graduates in the past at UNAZA, Lubumbashi campus, it is the mother who was Ukusu (Otetela) at Kilembue or Kalemba.  If our memory is good, our graduates have not alluded to this.  Thus, the inquiry remains open.  It remains the case that the late Senator Okito gave the impression in his story that Ngongo Leteta was the offspring of Ahina parents, consequently Akusu.  The Asonge say Ngongo Lutete instead of Ngongo Leteta.  The misspelling of the name was common from 1884 to 1893.  The first European station chiefs had used this old spelling in their information registries and political reports, with many researchers who came after them in each former State post, specifically Lusambo, Ngandu, Kasongo, Katako-Kombe, Kabinda, Lubefu, Boma, etc... Have copied it for their publications whether in Africa or in their countries of origin.  This is why one finds Ngongo Lutete everywhere instead of Ngongo Leteta.  We doubt that the owner of the name protested in his era.  Furthermore, historians indicate that when faced with a written or authentic document, one must not alter or modify it.

 In his capital of about 15000 people with palisades topped with the skulls of his enemies at Ngandu, Ngongo Leteta had 300 wives and a dozen Moslem women with whom he had free relations after the death of their husbands and with the consent of the commander of the Arab zone Lieutenant (later Baron )Dhanis after the campaign.  He offered one of his most beautiful women, Bibi Lukala to Commander Cyriaque Gillain (Bwana Kabalo or Tshombe Bululu, future. General Staff of the Belgian Army during World War I, according to the late senator Okito).  From all of his wives, Ngongo Leteta had only seven children officially recognized.  The four boys were called Nzige, Lupungu, Kitenge and Mauka and the three girls Muleko, Malofu, and Mashaka.  He sent the oldest Nzige and one of his daughters to an Arab school in Nyangwe, he designated Lupungu as his successor and entrusted him to the Europeans after his submission in September 1892, Kitenge was sent to the colonial school in Boma and finally Mauka who was too young remained at the court.  We have no record for the last two daughters.  As one may note, the names of Ngongo Leteta’s children have no connection to him.  The oldest received an Arab name, Lupungu was named for the chief of the Asonge Lumpungu of Kabinda, an old vassal of Ngongo and his close collaborator in the battle against the Arabs as well as the whites.  Kitenge is also the name of Chief Kitenge la Ngandu on whose lands Ngongo built his capital after his first residence at Imbiadi in the Malela in Manyema.  We know of no explanation for Mauka or Mabuka whose village is 6 Km from the State post of Katako-Kombe on the road in this district to Kindu. 

Baron Dhanis took Ngongo Leteta for Ukusu.  The same is true for his close associates, notably Dr. Hinde whom he dispatched in great haste to Ngandu to prevent the execution of Ngongo Leteta but unfortunately arrived 48 hours afterwards and too late!  To ensure State security and the safety of his people, Lieutenant Scheerlinck ordered the 600 members of Ngongo’s body guard to leave for Lusambo, but before leaving Ngandu, they shot into the population, with some dead and wounded.  They bore malice toward the whites and promised to come back to avenge the death of their leader.

 When they arrived in Lusambo, the authorities feared that they would make common cause with the population, as the city was considered near their region.  They decided to banish them to Luluabourg, 217 Km away.  They were incorporated into the Force Publique as regular soldiers under the command of Pelzer, originally of St. Trudon in Belgium.  Previously, the Force Publique had failed to suppress a rebellion among the Kaniok.  Pelzer promised Ngongo’s men that this time if we beat the rebels, they would have women, blankets, a lot to eat, etc... The sharpshooter Kandolo managed to kill the rebel chief Kalenda and routed the population.  Returning to Luluabourg, none of the promises were kept.  Pelzer redoubled his severity with regard to the soldiers.  He was killed 4 July 1895.  After pillaging the town, the rebels of Ngongo went southeast to Ngandu, killing white officers along the way, as they had promised.

 Commander Cyriaque Gillain, who arrived six days (ten according to Dr. Hinde) after Ngongo’s execution, installed Lupungu on the throne of his father.  He efficiently lead the inquiry for Commander Dhanis.  The latter wrote to Governor-General Theophile Wahis in Boma that Scheelinck and Duchene acted out of fear; they were despicable beings.  He regretted greatly not being able to return to Belgium at the same time as Scheerlinck to expose his conduct to the court’s martial.   His act was unqualifiable, for which no name was too bad.  In brief, he was an unworthy officer who ceded to who knows what motive and killed our faithful ally Ngongo Lutete (as he always called him).  As soon as this news became known, almost all of our allies defected to the Arabs,he concluded. 

According to Dr. Hinde, the situation had become calm with little Lupungu in charge, but Okito indicates that this did not last more than a year.  In fact, when the whites learned that the soldiers at Luluabourg wanted to reinforce his power, some (Officier Augustin or Bwana Kisu Makadi) were killed at the combat of Boboyi,12 Km from the state post of Ngandu, others destroyed the ammunition depository, fled by swimming with him on the right bank of the Lomami and as there was a revolt at his mother’s place in Malela, they abandoned him and sent him into exile with 40 Atetela (Akusu) to Stanleyville.  They called on Lupaka (sic) Luhaka (Ngongo Leteta’s number two man) who immediately took the name Ngongo Luhaka to be the legitimate successor of Ngongo Leteta.  He was compelled to leave Ngandu to establish himself north of Lunya river, 8 Km south from the actual state post at Katako-Kombe. The new village became known as Shinga I as opposed to current Shinga II built since 1944. 

 Baron Dhanis went with the eldest son of Ngongo, Nzige, for education in Belgium.  Kitenge followed him, but after 6 years, the Secretary of State wrote that these children should be returned to Congo on account of their bad behavior.  He did everything to separate them from power in the colony, but the local government at Boma continued to plead their case, as seen in the letter of Governor General Baron Wahis.  “Nevertheless, I must declare that in all fairness the children of Ngongo have to the right of succession, for the co-operation of Ngongo Leteta so badly repaid has permitted us to obtain the Manyema and that without his co-operation the campaign in Manyema would not have taken place.  The State has the duty to divide the succession of Ngongo Leteta between his children or to give these children salaried employment in the Lualaba District or elsewhere.”  These children called themselves Akusu or Atetela.  They wanted to live among the Asambala, particularly at Katako-Kombe where most of the chiefs mentioned above were scattered among the inhabitants of the forest where lately the State required them to collect wild rubber.  In 1902, State inspector Malfeyt implored Dhanis from Stanleyville to do something so that the little Lupungu could hope to return eventually to his country.It should also be noted that at this point,Lupungu no longer had enough money and was begging assistance from Father Gabriel at the Catholic mission.  Mr.Malfeyt determined that Luhaka who had succeeded him in 1895 was a dirty animal (still an ugly expression) who made raids like the Arabs never made.  And, in the Lualaba District one defends this character...  Dhanis who was already in Europe never became successful!!  When the state post of Katako-Kombe was founded in May 1904 by officer H. De Cort (Bwana Toto) on the plateau of Numbeleki and the left bank of the Lokenye l’umeso or Okit’omoko, he recognized Ngongo Luhaka at the head of the great chiefs of the Asambala, lately Batambatamba in the Sankuru.  Luhaka supported his sub-chief Katako Ka Kombe for the name of State post, for historical reasons cited above.  Sub-chief Lutundula (Kilinda) endorsed the children of Ngongo Leteta and remained in the opposition with his successors during the colonial period.  In fact, in 1934, the main administrator of the Bahamba Territory, with capital of Katako-Kombe, Mr. Arthur Donckerwolcke (Bwana Nyoka) threatened him with banishment(to exile him to Kasongo,capital of Manyema district of which Bahamba territory was part of at that time) if he did not submit to Luhaka.  The latter defended himself that it was in the interest of whites to make Ngongo Leteta disappear because he had been imprisoned.  If he had been freed, he would have become mad, or at least furious, and he would have required the destruction of the state post at Ngandu and to follow him to his confidant Katako in the woods.  Once he reached adulthood, Mauka, the youngest son of Ngongo Leteta became a village chief under the tutelage of Luhaka.  It was not until 1954 that Mr. Louis de Jaegher, Provincial Commissioner of the Kasai, was able to arrange with the administrator of the territory of Katako-Kombe to give a political gift of 3000 Francs each month to Lupungu, in exchange for a promise to renounce his political ambitions for directing the sector of the Basambala.  He returned from his long exile in Stanleyville to live in the old village of Opeleli (Tongo), not far from the post of Katako-Kombe on the road to Kindu, but his brother Adolphe Kitenge (the most intellectual in the family) remained in the Province of Leopoldville where he was a civil servant and never received authorization to come to the Sankuru.  Lupungu visited each time his little brother Chief Mauka and his still living sisters at this time.Luntundula (Mutshembe) who succeeded his father after his death on 18 June 1936 was his best friend and a notorious opponent against Hemery Pene Sengha (Luhaka III) , Ngongo Luhaka’s grandson,Chief of the Asambala  1945-64.. ..

 In conclusion, we have initiated this debate on the website: www.sankurufoundation.org, not to flabbergast the general readership of the Sankuru Forum, but to research the truth of an old problem, that predates our generation.  In effect, Ngongo Leteta was born and lived in the XIX century, but since the tragic end of his life due to an error immediately recognized by the Commander of the Arab Zone Francis Dhanis and his closest associates, notably Dr. Hinde, Cyriaque Gillain, Ponthier and others, this execution has left a troublesome impression on black (that is Akusu or Atetela) chiefs since 1893.  Ngongo Leteta has become a legendary figure not only in the Manyema, but also in the Sankuru.  He is the subject of storytellers around the night fire or in the moonlight in our villages.   He is an ancestral hero for the Asonge.  As seen above, his name evolved from Muanza Kasongo at birth to that of Ngongo Leteta at his ascension as Great Chief of the Batetela (Atetela) and Asonge in 1889.  He is certainly supreme, but his ascendancy was hazardous.  No one considered him to be real tyrant.  He was feared because of his affection for Asonge fetishes. 

 We have wanted to engage in a frank and sincere dialog so that we could share the results of our lectures, our interviews and the knowledge that we have obtained.  We have not hesitated at the very least to provide bibliographic references in the course of this article.  While sympathizing with the current generation which is, perhaps, badly informed about Ngongo Leteta, we are prepared to receive constructive criticism, useful suggestions and information, specifically all knowledge that may resolve the question, specifically whether Ngongo Leteta is Otetela or Osonge, as of the beginning of the XXI century.

 At the beginning, whatever books that we read or different versions resulting from the oral tradition passed from one generation to the next, our point of view is that opinion is divided on the identity of Ngongo Leteta in the XIX century.  In effect, in the provincial and legislative elections in May 1960, Mr. Alois Kabangi, born at Lusambo, was elected National Deputy by the Asonge from the territory of Senteryi (currently Tshofa) and of Kabinda with a plurality of more than 12,000 votes, because he appealed to the unity of the warrior chiefs Ngongo Leteta, Lumpungu and Panya Mutombo.  Along the same lines, six other provincial counselors including Mr. Dominique Manono of the MNC-Lumumba were elected, for the electorate supported in said territories le Mouvement pour l‘Unite Basonge (M.B.U).  This party claimed that their chiefs had routed the Arabs, just as Mr. Lumumba wanted to deliver them from the Belgians.  It was Manono, one of the three members of the Provincial Executive College, presided over by Mr Leopold. Henroteaux, the last Provincial Governor of the Kasai during the last phase of the Lulua-Baluba battle, who was elected the first president of the Provincial Assemby in Luluabourg.  In June 1963, when he was elected First President of Lomami Province, he declared to Professor Crawford Young of the University of Wisconsin in his capital at Kabinda that the Asonge people are conscious of their linkage to Ngongo Leteta as their ancestral hero, but that the Akusu or Atelela claim him as their son.  Thus, the debate remains open, that is, that we are not in any way forcing it.

 Why is this Black Supreme Chief Ngongo Leteta continued to be spoken of ill of?  When one casts a glance at the Christian religion, one sees for example that Herod I was the king of the Jews (37-4 B.C.).  He imposed his rule, which he withheld from the Romans, with a brutal energy.  The Gospels attribute to him until now the Massacre of the Innocents, that is the killing of all children less than two years old in Bethlehem, which he ordered because he feared the rivalry of a messiah.  Despite this cruelty, he was not executed and this has not stopped Jews (Israelites) or Israelis from calling him Herod I, the Great in the annals of their history.  It is well time to banish such assignations for the Great Chief of the Atetela and the Asonge at the end of the XIX century.  Whoever was taught since the beginning of the XX century in our two big intellectual centers, that is, Tshumbe St. Marie (1910) and Wembo Nyama (1914), has grown with the impression that Ngongo Leteta was an utterly evil man (Untu a kolo).  If his children specifically  Lupungu had returned to power instead of his vassal Luhaka whom the Europeans imposed, he would have governed the Sankuru a hundred times worse than his mad father!

Ngongo Leteta introduced the gun, gunpowder, and bullets to the Sankuru, indeed some cultivations that the Arabs introduced to the Manyema notably rice, guava, sweet potato, corn, etc...  Before the conquest of the Asambala and the Arabs, the people of the savana fed themselves mostly with millet (ma di’asami or senge), in the north it was uyuku( from cassava roots) and near the border with the equator, for instance at Lomela near the asi Ikela (lotoko from cassava roots).  Their arms were bows and arrows and poisoned spears for hunting and for defending their communities or villages.  It was Ngongo Leteta who recruited these populations and made them into fearless warriors, first under the Arabs and for one year under the Congo Free State of Leopold II, that is from 1892 until his execution in 1893.  Being rancorous, these soldiers and other tribes specifically the Asonge, Aluba, etc... belonging to his organization revolted under the designation BATETELA in 1895, 1897 and 1900.  In effect, the State felt that its security was compromised and repression occurred in an exemplary way everywhere that the mutineers sought refuge. 

QUESTION:

Ngongo Leteta, was he Osonge or Otetela?  What do you think after this debate?

—Professor Antoine Roger Dimandja
Email: profdimandja@yahoo.fr