Congo

Relief

The country is fringed by a narrow coastal plain 40 miles (64 kilometres) wide, which stretches for about 100 miles between Gabon and Cabinda. The plain rises gradually from the sea to the Mayombé Massif, a low mountain range that parallels the coast. The Mayombé peaks are quite sharp and are separated by deep river gorges. At the southern end of the range, Mount Foungouti attains 3,051 feet (930 metres). The northern peaks are lower; among them, Mount Moguindou rises to 2,132 feet (650 metres).

East of the Mayombé Massif lies the Niari valley, a 125-mile-wide depression. Toward the north the terrain rises gradually to the Chaillu Massif, which reaches elevations between 1,600 and 2,300 feet on the Gabon border; toward the south the depression rises to the Cataractes Plateau. The valley is an important passage route between the inland plateaus and the coast.

Beyond the Niari valley is a series of plateaus about 1,600 feet above sea level, separated by the deeply eroded valleys of tributaries of the Congo River. The Bembe Plateau lies between the Niari valley and the Chaillu Massif, while the Batéké Plateau stretches northward along the Congo River from Brazzaville to Mpouya.

The northeast is composed of the western reaches of the Congo basin; from the western mountains and plateaus a vast 60,000-square-mile plain slopes eastward to the Congo River. Cut by numerous Congo tributaries, the plain is swampy and floods annually.

Drainage and soils

The Congo River basin and its drainage network. [Credit: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.]

The coastal watershed is formed by the Kouilou River, which flows southwestward for about 450 miles from its source in the plateau region to Kayes, where it empties into the Atlantic. Through the Niari valley to Makabana, where it joins the Louessé River to form the Kouilou proper, it is called the Niari River. The stream is broken by numerous waterfalls, and the banks are irregular. The mouth is blocked to navigation by sandspits formed by the strong Benguela Current.

About two-thirds of the country is covered with coarse-grained soils that contain sand and gravel. Lateritic soils, with a high proportion of iron and aluminum sesquioxides, characterize low-lying areas. Because of the hot and humid climate, organic matter is decomposed by rapid bacterial action before it can accumulate into humus; moreover, topsoil is washed away by the heavy rains. In the savanna regions, the fertile alluvial soils are threatened with erosion by wind as well as rain. A diverse pattern of coarse- and fine-grained soils covers the plateaus and hills.

Climate

The tropical climate is characterized by heavy rainfall and high temperatures and humidity. The Equator passes across the country just north of Liranga. In the north the dry season extends from November through March and the rainy season from April through October, whereas in the south the contrary is true. On both sides of the Equator, however, local climates with two dry and two wet seasons may be found.

Annual rainfall is abundant throughout the country, but seasonal and regional variations are important. Precipitation averages more than 48 inches (1,200 millimetres) annually and often surpasses 80 inches.

Temperatures are relatively stable with little variation between seasons. Much greater variation occurs between day and night, when the difference between the high and low readings averages about 27° F (15° C). Over most of the country, annual average temperatures range between 68° and 81° F (20° and 27° C), although in the south the cooling effect of the Benguela Current may produce readings as low as 54° F (12° C). The average daily humidity is about 80 percent.

Plant and animal life

Nearly two-thirds of the country is covered with tropical rainforest. The dense growth of African oak, red cedar, walnut, softwood okoume, or gaboon mahogany, and hardwood limba (Terminalia superba) provides an evergreen canopy over the sparse undergrowth of leafy plants and vines. The coast and the swampy areas contain coconut palms, mangrove forests, and tall grasses and reeds. The plateau areas and the Niari valley are covered with grasses and widely spaced broad-leaved trees.

The forests contain several varieties of monkey, chimpanzee, gorilla, elephant, okapi, wild boar, and buffalo. Wildlife in the savanna regions includes several varieties of antelope, jackal, wild dog, hyena, and cheetah. On the plateaus, rhinoceroses and giraffes are numerous, but lions are scarce. Birdlife includes the predatory eagle, hawk, and owl, the scavenging vulture, and the wading heron.

Freshwater fish include perch, catfish, sunfish, and mudskippers. Crocodiles live throughout the Congo River. The numerous snakes include such poisonous varieties as cobra, green mamba, and puff adder, as well as species of python. Among the insects, the most dangerous are the tsetse fly, which causes sleeping sickness in human beings and a similar disease, called nagana, in cattle, and the mosquito, which carries malaria and yellow fever.

Settlement patterns

The country's four main regions developed around the historical concentrations of the main ethnic clusters. The southern region between Brazzaville and the coast is inhabited by the Kongo peoples. Also in the south, the Teke inhabit the Batéké Plateau region. In the north, the Ubangi groups inhabit the Congo River basin to the west of Mossaka, while the Binga Pygmies and the Sanga are scattered through the northern Congo basin. Precolonial trade between north and south stimulated both cooperation and competition, while French favouritism toward the peoples of the southwest enhanced interregional rivalries. Massive internal migration and urbanization following independence has, however, attenuated such conflicts.

Settlement of the Congo landscape is very uneven. The southwestern quarter of the country is home to 70 percent of the population. In the north and northeast, population is sparse. Congo is also highly urbanized by African standards; a majority of the population lives in cities, and because the urban growth rate far exceeds that of the country as a whole, urbanization continues to intensify. Since this growth has been chiefly the result of internal migration, most rural communities have ties to the larger national community and economy of the cities.

The major cities are Brazzaville, Pointe-Noire on the Atlantic coast, Nkayi (formerly Jacob) in the Niari valley, and Loubomo (formerly Dolisie) in the Mayombé region. Colonial creations by and large, the cities reflect French influence: a central administrative and commercial core is surrounded by residential areas. Before independence there was a marked difference between the spacious, planned European neighbourhoods and the less regimented, more populous African parts of town. Since 1960, however, greater social and economic mobility in the African population, attempts at urban renewal, and massive rural-to-urban migration have blurred these distinctions.

Ethnic and linguistic composition

About half of the Congo's inhabitants belong to the Kongo peoples, whose major subgroups include the Sundi, Kongo, Lali, Kougni, Bembe, Kamba, Dondo, Vili, and Yombe. The Ubangi people include the Makoua, Kouyou, Mboshi, Likouala, Ngala, and Bonga. The Teke and the Sanga, or Gabonese Bantu, are also divided into various subgroups. The Binga Pygmies live in small bands, usually as clients of surrounding peoples. Most of the Europeans in the Congo are French who live in the main cities. There are also small populations of foreign Africans, Portuguese, and Chinese.

Except for the Pygmies, all the indigenous peoples speak their own Bantu languages. Intergroup communication and trade fostered the development of two trade languages, Lingala and Monokutuba. Lingala is spoken north of Brazzaville, and Monokutuba is common in the area between the capital and the coast. French is the official language and the medium of school instruction at all levels, as well as the language of the African upper class and the European community.

Religion

About half of the population practices classical African religions. The Christian community is composed of about two-thirds Roman Catholics and one-third Protestants, including members of the Evangelical Church of the Congo. There are also independent African churches: the Church of Jesus Christ on Earth by the Prophet Simon Kimbangu, the largest independent church in Africa, is a member of the World Council of Churches. Other independent churches include the Matsouana Church and the Bougist Church. Most of the small Muslim community is made up of foreigners who reside in Brazzaville or Pointe-Noire.

Demographic trends

Like many African countries, Congo has a fast-growing, relatively young population. Earlier in the 20th century, however, the country was part of the low fertility belt, a region stretching from Gabon to Uganda where many societies experienced little or no population growth. Life expectancy, among the lowest on the continent prior to 1950, has improved steadily in the last half of the 20th century and is now about average for mainland sub-Saharan Africa. Urban in-migration has long been an important demographic trend. During the colonial era, the new colonial cities, and Brazzaville in particular, attracted African migrants. Congo is today among the most urban countries of sub-Saharan Africa.

Resources

Important resources include petroleum and natural gas. Large reserves of potash (potassium chloride) are found at Tchitondi (Holle), 30 miles northeast of Pointe-Noire. Iron ore is found in the south and in the western Sangha basin. Minor deposits of gold and diamonds are located in the Kouilou valley, and there are copper and lead deposits west of Brazzaville. Oil reserves are found in the coastal zone. There are also deposits of zinc, tin, uranium, bauxite, and titanium (a metallic element used in alloys).

Forests of both softwoods and hardwoods cover nearly two-thirds of the country. The rivers and lakes are home to important fish resources. Power resources consist of petroleum, wood, charcoal, and the hydroelectric potential of Congo's rivers, which generate nearly all of the country's electricity.

Agriculture, forestry, and fishing

For the most part, agriculture is subsistence in nature and occupies about three-fifths of the work force. Poor soil and the lack of fertilizers produce low yields; the country is not self-sufficient in food production. Most of the cultivated land is in family holdings that are too small for mechanized farming; international development strategies, which are shaped by reliance on large-scale production, have yet to devise plans to reach such small-scale cultivators. In the savanna, land is cleared by burning, and women work the fields with hand tools. Cassava (manioc) is the basic food crop everywhere but in the south, where bananas and plantains are prevalent. Rice is grown in the Niari valley and in the north around Djambala. The diet is supplemented with yams, taros, sweet potatoes, corn (maize), peanuts (groundnuts), and fruit. Livestock consists of sheep, goats, pigs, and poultry. The government has sponsored the raising of cattle since the introduction in the 1960s of n'dama cattle—a breed resistant to the tsetse fly.

The major cash crops are cacao, coffee, peanuts, palm kernels, tobacco, and sugarcane. All are grown in modest amounts. Other cash crops include rice, bananas, and cotton. Commercial agriculture, including cattle ranching, is concentrated in the Niari valley.

Forestry products accounted for more than 60 percent of the total exports in the late 1960s. Twenty years later, petroleum made up more than 90 percent of exports. Although forest reserves are extensive, inadequate transportation and flood conditions limit exploitation in the north; hence forestry operations are concentrated in the south. Congo is the world's largest producer of limba and (after Gabon) the second largest producer of okoume. Products include logs, sawn wood, and veneers. Forestry was largely under French control until the 1960s, when African participation began to increase.

Commercial marine fishing is conducted off Pointe-Noire. The catch includes tuna, bass, soles, and sardines. Freshwater fishing on the rivers, lakes, and swamps is largely a subsistence activity.

Industry

Potash is mined, and petroleum is the most important export. Copper, zinc, lead, and iron ore are also extracted on a small scale.

The small manufacturing sector is hampered by limited domestic markets, dependence upon foreign investment, and the lack of skilled labour. Most factories are located in Brazzaville, Pointe-Noire, Kayes, Loubomo, and cities in the Niari valley. Products include processed foods, beverages, cigarettes, textiles and clothing, footwear, processed wood and paper, chemicals, cement and bricks, glassware, and metal goods such as nails and metal furniture. The first petroleum refinery went into operation in 1976 at Pointe-Noire. Handicrafts produced by individual artisans include carvings, pottery, needlework, tiles, and bricks.

Transportation

The road system is most developed in the south. Major routes link Brazzaville with Pointe-Noire and Loubomo with the Gabon border. Many roads are impassable during the rainy season.

Railways are also concentrated in the south. The major Congo-Ocean Railway line runs for about 320 miles from Brazzaville west through Nkayi and Loubomo to Pointe-Noire. There is also a 175-mile branch line from Favre north to Mbinda on the Gabon border. These railways offer important transshipment services for neighbouring countries, contributing significant revenues. They are also important to mining and industrial development, for most industrial towns are located along them.

Water transportation has long linked Congo, Chad, and the Central African Republic. The rivers, however, are often broken by rapids and are subject to seasonal variations in flow. Brazzaville is the most important inland port. Linked to Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo, by ferry, it is there also that passengers and freight traveling downriver from Bangui, in the Central African Republic, are transshipped overland by rail to the ocean port of Pointe-Noire. This seaport is the major transshipment centre for these three countries as well as western Cameroon.

Government

Under the constitution of 2002, Congo is a republic. The executive branch of the government is represented by the president, who is popularly elected to a seven-year term and serves as both chief of state and head of government. The president appoints the Council of Ministers. The legislative branch is bicameral and consists of the Senate and the National Assembly; members are elected to serve six-year and five-year terms, respectively. Congo's judicial system includes the Supreme Court, Courts of Appeal, and the Constitutional Court. For administrative purposes, Congo is divided into 11 départements and six communes. Brazzaville, the capital of Congo, has status as both a commune and a department.

Since becoming a multiparty state in 1990, Congo has had more than 100 political parties. Among the most active are the Democratic and Patriotic Forces (FDP), the Congolese Movement for Democracy and Integral Development (MCDDI), the Pan-African Union for Social Development (UPADS), Rally for Democracy and Social Progress (RDPS), the Union for Democracy and Republic (UDR), and the Union of Democratic Forces (UFD).

Education

Education is free and compulsory for students between the ages of 6 and 16. The six-year primary education course includes instruction in agriculture, manual skills, and domestic science. On the secondary level courses are offered in vocational training, academic and technical training, general education, and teacher training. Institutions of higher learning include the Marien Ngouabi University in Brazzaville and colleges and centres for specialized and technical learning. Congo enjoys a literacy rate much higher than most countries in sub-Saharan Africa.

Health and welfare

The most common health problems are respiratory diseases, malaria, tuberculosis, and intestinal parasites—all preventable maladies. Other diseases include trypanosomiasis (sleeping sickness), yellow fever, leprosy, yaws, and AIDS. Disease control is difficult because most water sources are polluted and sanitation is poor, even in the cities. The country's two largest hospitals are in Brazzaville and Pointe-Noire. Other health facilities include regional health centres, infirmaries, dispensaries, maternal and child-care centres, and private clinics. Mobile health units combat communicable diseases in remote areas.

Welfare services provided by the government, the labour union, and employers are largely limited to wage earners in the formal sector and their families. Benefits include old-age pensions, life insurance, worker's compensation, and family-allowance payments. Government-sponsored social workers operate among the poor.

Early history

Human habitation of the Congo basin came relatively late in the Sangoan era (100,000 to 40,000 &BP;), perhaps because of the dense forest. The people who used the large-core, bifacial Sangoan tools probably subsisted by food gathering and digging up roots; they were not hunters. Refined versions of this tradition continued through the Lupemban (40,000 to 25,000 &BP;) and Tshitolian eras. Only late in the first millennium did agriculture emerge in the savanna adjacent to the lower Congo River.

The early inhabitants were farmer-trappers, fishing peoples, and Pygmy hunters. People lived in households including kin and unrelated individuals; at the centre of the household was a “big man,” who represented the group. Mobility—of individuals, groups, goods, and ideas—figured prominently and created a common social environment. Such intercommunication is evident from the closely related Bantu languages of the region. Speakers of the Eastern (Ubangian) languages lived in the north but maintained ties with their forest neighbours.

Larger-scale societies emerged between &AD; 1000 and 1500; they were based on clans whose members lived in different villages, village clusters with chiefs, and small forest principalities. Chiefdoms on the southern fringes became more complex; three kingdoms eventually developed: Loango, at the mouth of the Kouilou River on the Atlantic coast; Kongo, which had its beginnings in the first millennium, in the far southwest; and Tio, which grew out of small chiefdoms on the plains north of Malebo (Stanley) Pool. Rulers derived power from control over spirit cults, but trade eventually became a second pillar of power.

In 1483 the Portuguese landed in Kongo. Initially, relations between the Kongolese and Portuguese rulers were good. Characterized by the exchange of representatives and the sojourn of Kongolese students in Portugal, this period was a harbinger of late 20th-century technical assistance. Unfortunately, the need of Portuguese planters on São Tomé for slaves undermined this amicable arrangement by the 1530s.

Between 1600 and 1800, the slave trade expanded. Local leaders challenged state control. Among the Tio the western chiefs became more autonomous. Contact with Europeans also introduced New World food crops. Corn (maize) and cassava allowed greater population densities. This, along with the emergence of a “market” for foodstuffs, led to greater use of slaves, intensified women's work, and changed the sexual division of labour.

The colonial era

By the early 19th century the Congo River had become a major avenue of commerce between the coast and the interior. Henry Morton Stanley, a British journalist, explored the river in 1877, but France acquired jurisdiction in 1880 when Pierre Savorgnan de Brazza signed a treaty with the Tio ruler. The formal proclamation of the colony of French Congo came in 1891. Early French efforts to exploit their possession led to ruthless treatment of the local people, and Brazza returned in 1905 to lead an inquiry. In 1910 the French joined Congo with neighbouring colonies as the federation of French Equatorial Africa, with its capital at Brazzaville.

The French were preoccupied with acquiring labour. Forced labour, head taxes, compulsory production of cash crops, and draconian labour contracts forced Africans to build infrastructure and to participate in the colonial economy. No project was more costly in African lives than the Congo-Ocean Railway, built between 1921 and 1934 from Pointe-Noire to Brazzaville; between 15,000 and 20,000 Africans died.

In 1940 Congo rallied to the Free French forces. Charles de Gaulle, Governor-General Félix Eboué, and African leaders held a conference in Brazzaville in 1944 to announce more liberal policies. In 1946 Congo became an overseas territory of France with representatives in the French Parliament and an elected Territorial Assembly. Ten years later, the loi cadre (enabling act) endowed the colony with an elected government. Congo became a republic within the French Community in 1958 and acquired complete political independence in August 1960.

Congo since independence

Two major parties existed at independence: the African Socialist Movement (Mouvement Socialiste Africain; MSA) and the Democratic Union for the Defense of African Interests (Union Démocratique pour la Défense des Intérêts Africains; UDDIA). The two parties pitted the north against the south, an opposition that stemmed from the privileged place occupied by the southern Kongo and Vili in the colonial era. The two parties also had different political philosophies. The MSA favoured a powerful state and a partially publicly owned economy; the UDDIA advocated private ownership and close ties with France. UDDIA leader Fulbert Youlou formed the first parliamentary government in 1958; in 1959 he became premier and president.

Corruption, incompetence, mass disapproval, general strikes, and lack of French support led to Youlou's ouster in 1963. His successor, Alphonse Massamba-Débat, shifted policies to the left, notably by founding the National Revolutionary Movement (Mouvement National de la Révolution; MNR) as the sole party. The country sought assistance from the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China and voted with the more radical African states in world forums. Regionally, Congo extended concrete support and offered a geographic base for the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), the Marxist movement that won independence for that country. Congo also offered asylum to the Patrice Lumumba followers who fled the neighbouring Democratic Republic of the Congo (from 1971 to 1997 called Zaire) and plotted for a return to power there.

Regionalism and policy failures led the military to replace Massamba-Débat with Major Marien Ngouabi in 1968. Ngouabi maintained a socialist line, renaming the country the People's Republic of the Congo on December 31, 1969; the Congolese Labour Party (PCT) replaced the MNR at the same time. Ngouabi was a northerner, and his regime shifted control of the country away from the south. Such moves created opposition among workers and students in the highly politicized environment of Brazzaville and other southern urban centres. Ngouabi was assassinated in March 1977. His successor, the more conservative Colonel Joachim Yhombi-Opango, soon clashed with the PCT, and Colonel Denis Sassou-Nguesso replaced Yhombi-Opango in 1979.

Although Sassou-Nguesso represented the more militant wing of the PCT—and immediately introduced a new constitution intended as a first step toward building a Marxist-Leninist society—he improved relations with the Western nations and with France. The regime's political language became more moderate, but the inefficient state enterprises created by earlier socialist policies remained in place in the early 1980s. They had been subsidized by petroleum production, but the drop in oil and other raw material prices led to economic crisis. The external debt surpassed $1.5 billion in 1985, and debt service consumed 45 percent of state revenue. Negotiations with the International Monetary Fund the following year led to an agreement to help the national economy in exchange for cuts in public spending and the state bureaucracy. At the end of the 1980s, however, the debt had tripled in size and the economic crisis continued.

Dennis D. Cordell

In 1991 a new constitution was drafted, which included dropping the word “People's” from the country's official name; it was adopted by referendum in March 1992. Pascal Lissouba succeeded Sassou-Nguesso following elections that August. A period of shaky parliamentary government ensued, which ended when Sassou-Nguesso led a successful insurrection against the government in 1997 and reinstated himself as president late in the year. A devastating civil war raged for the next two years, in which forces loyal to the ousted Lissouba battled government troops for control of the country. A truce was signed between the warring parties in late 1999 in an attempt to reopen a national dialogue. Additional talks held in early 2000 were positive, and by the end of the year the government was able to focus on drafting a new constitution and planning for the country's future.

The new constitution was promulgated in January 2002 and Sassou-Nguesso was reelected president in March; around the same time, rebels resumed fighting in southern Congo. Legislative elections were held soon after, although they were marred by violence and allegations of fraud. The violence and fighting continued throughout the summer, primarily in the southern part of the country, and finally ceased when a peace agreement was reached in early 2003. Congo's newfound peace provided stability and cultivated the opportunity for progress, and the country enjoyed an improved economic and political climate.

Ed.