In Belgium, the statues of King Leopold II fall

Text by: Sabine Cessou Follow | Sabine Cessou Follow

Vandalized and painted in blood red before the Black Lives Matter demonstration on Sunday, June 7, the statues bearing the image of King Leopold II (1835-1909), who had made the Congo his private property, began to fall the next day.

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The city hall of Antwerp had a statue of Leopold II burnt down then covered with red paint on June 9 , to renovate it in the museum of Middelheim. The reason invoked to unbolt this symbol of a colonial period which is controversial in Belgium, because it still represents a reason for pride for its "  civilizing mission  "? It is not due to any excuses for the colonial past, but to a question of "  public security  ", according to the spokesman for the town hall, led by the NVA, a party of Flemish nationalists opposed to immigration.

On the night of June 11-12, it was activists who unbolted another statue of Leopold II on the Square du Souverain in Auderghem, a town on the outskirts of Brussels. Facing the cameras of the French-speaking Belgian Radio and Television (RTBF), activists have said that "  the recent events in the United States remind us that racism is an important and global scourge. This colonial heritage sticks to our beings, to our interactions and to our ways of doing things in society. Its violence is embodied up to the names of our streets, to the choice of the statues that adorn our places  . ”

Didier Gosuin, the mayor of Auderghem, condemned this action. “  This is not how we do it in a democracy. This is not how history is put back on track. That there is a debate around History, the colonial past, the way in which the historical narrative is instilled in our generations, certainly, I agree and it must be opened, he continues. But not through activist channels. "

Nevertheless, the statues of Leopold II are covered in blood red paint across Belgian cities, in the same way that the statues of Christopher Columbus fall in the United States or those of Cécil John Rhodes in South Africa. A bust of King Baudouin, believed to be responsible for the assassination of Patrice Lumumba, the father of Congo’s independence, was also smeared in red in downtown Brussels. A "  decolonial practice  " for activists of this movement, who refute the term "  vandalism  ". These actions stand out as a form of street art with strong symbolism.

A debate within the royal family

The debate was, for once, to the heart of the royal family. Princess Esmeralda, great-grand-niece of Léopold II, pleaded from London for an official apology from Belgium on the subject of colonization. "  Obviously, the statues which are in public space and which are to the glory of the colonizers or the slave traders strike, injure an entire community ," she said, " I think it would require a great popular consultation. where everyone participates, racial minorities, everyone in the community, to decide what to do with it. Maybe put them in a museum, maybe put explanatory plaques, but there is a debate to be had, and this debate is really urgent.  "

Prince Laurent, younger brother of King Philippe, remains in a position of denial. According to him, “  Leopold II never went to the Congo himself. I do not see how the king could make people suffer on the spot  ”. He told Sudpresse: "  You must know that there were a lot of people who worked for Léopold II and these people really abused, but that is not why Léopold II abused.  "

This relativism is shocking on the side of the activists, who have been shouting for years about the recognition of the misdeeds of colonization. This resulted in widely documented atrocities and atrocities, starting with severed hands in rubber plantations, as a punishment for those who did not produce enough. Anthropologist Martin Vander Elst sums up the state of mind on the side of the decolonial movement: “  We keep the quiet force of deep historical transformations. The decolonization of Belgian society in all aspects of existence is irreversible.  "

A " wall of silence " now cracked

It took years of battle for the city of Brussels to agree to establishing a Lumumba square in 2018. As for the admonitions formulated in February 2019 by a group of United Nations experts concerning a "  wall of silence on the colonial past  " in Belgium, they did not move the lines. The experts had pleaded in vain for an apology from the Belgian state, believing that it would be a "  first step towards real reconciliation  ".

Today, the position of the royal family remains circumspect, to say the least, about the hated ancestor. She believes that historians do not agree on the responsibility of Leopold II, often described as "  the builder king  ". A part of the elders of the Belgian Congo, numerous in what was a settlement, firmly contend that colonization was a "  great adventure  " - the title of a book by the Belgian Royal Union for the overseas countries (Urome) sold in the shop of MuseumAfrica, the former Royal Museum for Central Africa in Tervuren.

The "  wall of silence  " prevails for decades in the royal family, which mentions on its site, for the year 1904: "  Following excesses committed by Europeans in Africa, the reputation of Leopold II and his work from beyond -mer are implicated. The king established an international commission of inquiry, which recognized the merits of royal action in the Congo, while pointing to abuses and shortcomings.  "

"  Decolonial mapping  "

A sign of changing times and of a strong generational shift, a petition launched by Noah, a 14-year-old adolescent, was signed by 65,000 people, to demand the removal of the statues. Today, part of the debate, rather stormy, relates to the need or not to remove the statues from public space. A way to whiten the past, as if there was nothing left to see, without any contextualization? The points of view remain very divided, including among the collectives of Afro-descendants and decolonials.

Will Belgian cities rename their streets, many of which bear the names of the former colonial generals? The artist Laura Nsengiyumva, architect by training, has been working for several years on a “  decolonial mapping  ” of these names in Brussels. She believes that there is an  eminently political "  time " for their withdrawal. The future will tell if this time has come.

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• Belgium
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