Cyrille Adoula | |
|---|---|
 Adoula in 1963 | |
| 4thPrime Minister of Congo-Léopoldville | |
| In office 2 August 1961 – 30 June 1964 | |
| President | Joseph Kasa-Vubu |
| Deputy | Jason Sendwe Antoine Gizenga Jean Bolikango Christophe Gbenye Joseph Kasongo |
| Preceded by | Joseph Iléo |
| Succeeded by | Moise Tshombe |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 13 September 1921 |
| Died | 24 May 1978(1978-05-24) (aged 56) |
| Party | Mouvement National Congolais(1958–1959) Mouvement National Congolais-Kalonji(1959–1964) Rassemblement des démocrates congolaise(1964) |
Cyrille Adoula (13 September 1921 – 24 May 1978) was aCongolese trade unionist and politician. He was the prime minister of theRepublic of the Congo, from 2 August 1961 until 30 June 1964.
Cyrille Adoula was born to middle-classBangala parents on 13 September 1921 inLéopoldville,Belgian Congo.[1] He attended a Catholic primary school in his youth and received secondary education at St. Joseph's Institute, graduating after five years of studies in 1941.[2] That year he began working as a clerk for various commercial firms. He did this until 1952 when he accepted a senior position at theBelgian Congo Central Bank, becoming the first African to hold a significant post there. In 1948, he became a member of the Conseil pour le Travail et la Prevoyance Sociale Indigene.[a][3]
In 1954, Adoula joined theBelgian Socialist Party and subsequently became the representative for Action Socialiste in Léopoldville. He also enrolled in theFédération Générale du Travail de Belgique.[b] Once he became one of the top Congolese delegates in the association he resigned from his bank post and devoted his time to politics.[3] In 1957 he attended theInternational Labour Conference inGeneva as an adviser to the Belgian delegation. At a Fédération Générale conference in 1959 he successfully lobbied for the Congolese branch of the association to become independent, subsequently becoming secretary-general of the new federation's western chapter. In this capacity he traveled toWest Germany andIsrael to meet with other trade unionists and became a deputy committee member of the International Congress of Federated Trade Unions.[4] He also cultivated a relationship withAFL–CIO unionistIrving Brown.[5]
In October 1958 a group of Léopoldvilleévolués including Adoula,Patrice Lumumba,Gaston Diomi Ndongala andJoseph Iléo established theMouvement National Congolais (MNC). Diverse in membership, the party sought to peacefully achieve Congolese independence, promote the political education of the populace, and eliminate regionalism.[6] Adoula became party vice president.[7] While Lumumba became increasingly strident and nationalistic, Adoula remained relatively moderate. In 1959, he andAlbert Kalonji made an unsuccessful attempt to oust Lumumba from the party and formed their own faction, MNC-Kalonji.[3]
With the independence of theRepublic of the Congo in the summer of 1960, Adoula became asenator inParliament, representing the city ofCoquilhatville.[8] Though elected by the Équateur provincial assembly with the support of Parti de l'Unité Nationale,[c] he identified himself as an independent.[9][d] He requested that his membership of the International Congress of Federated Trade Unions be suspended so that he could devote his time to his new position. Nevertheless he remained well connected with trade unions and labour organisations.[4] In the Senate's first session on 17 June 1960, Adoula proposed a resolution which was unanimously adopted, calling for representatives of theUnion of South Africa to be barred from attending the Congo's independence celebrations due to the country'sApartheid policy.[12]Patrice Lumumba became Prime Minister and offered Adoula a ministerial position inhis government but the latter refused to accept it. Adoula expressed his dissatisfaction with the ultimate composition of the government and told Lumumba that he had erred in choosing to be Prime Minister of a cabinet, which faced heavy criticism from different circles.[13]
The Congo fell into disorder shortly after independence, as the army's mutiny and the secession of theKatanga Province underMoïse Tshombe created theCongo Crisis. Adoula increasingly distanced himself from Lumumba, but continuously lobbied that theUnited Nations Operation in the Congo use force to put down the rebellion in the proclaimedState of Katanga. PresidentJoseph Kasa-Vubu dismissed Lumumba in September 1960 and appointed Iléo to be his replacement, though Parliament refused to confirm him. Adoula briefly served as Iléo's minister of interior.[14] Lumumba was definitively removed from power and eventually killed in a coup by ColonelJoseph Mobutu, who forced a new government upon Kasa-Vubu. Adoula began attracting interest from the United StatesCentral Intelligence Agency (CIA) as a liberal, anti-communist alternative to Lumumba.[8]
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In early 1961, the United States began to push for an Adoula-led government.United States Secretary of StateDean Rusk directed CIA agents to ensure that Adoula would become the next Congolese prime minister.[15] The CIA acted in concert with other Western intelligence agencies in bribing Congolese parliamentarians to support Adoula.[7] On 1 August Adoula was appointedformateur of a new government by Kasa-Vubu. The following day he presented his government to Parliament with himself as Prime Minister. Like Lumumba had before him, Adoula also gave himself responsibility over thenational defence portfolio.[16] The government was delivered a vote of confidence in the Chamber, 121 votes to none with one abstention, and the Senate voiced its support viaacclamation.[17]
Adoula managed to balance his cabinet with many former Lumumba supporters.[8]Antoine Gizenga became deputy prime minister.[18] Still, as his tenure progressed, Adoula faced a growing amount of opposition from the nationalist elements of MNC-Lumumba and Gizenga's faction of theParti Solidaire Africain.[19] He also never garnered much popular support across the country.[20] As 1961 drew to a close, several Lumumba sympathisers withdrew from Adoula's government and Gizenga retired toStanleyville.[21] Gizenga'spersisting counter-government in the east represented the first major challenge to Adoula's authority.[19] In January 1962, Adoula was able to successfully arrest Gizenga. He subsequently removed the remaining Lumumba supporters from his government, thereby excluding the largest political force in the country from power.[21]
During hisinaugural address following hisinvestiture, Adoula had declared that his government would "take adequate measures permitting each region to administer itself according to its own profound aspirations". Legislative efforts to achieve the goal immediately began, but faced strong opposition from the Lumumbist bloc, which felt that the Katanga problem should be resolved before any discussion concerning the division of the provinces.[22]
On the international level, Adoula pursued a policy of neutrality.[23] On 4 September 1961 he attended the1st Summit of the Non-Aligned Movement inBelgrade that resulted in the foundation of theNon-Aligned Movement.[24] Following the end of the Katangese secession, he in earnest attempted to develop the Congo's foreign relations, particularly with other African states in aPan-African image. As part of this, he supported decolonisation in southern Africa.[25]
Adoula denouncedPortuguese rule in neighboringAngola, which won him favour from the Afro-Asian bloc of non-aligned states.[26] He actively supported theFrente Nacional de Libertação de Angola (FNLA) resistance group throughout his tenure and allowed it to maintain a base in the Congo near the southern border. This was in part attributed to his longstanding personal friendship with FNLA PresidentHolden Roberto; the two had previously been teammates for the Congolese football sideDaring Club Motema Pembe.[27] Adoula also had an interest in winning the support of Angolan refugees in Léopoldville, which grew in number after 1961.[28] Furthermore, he hoped to undermine the Portuguese colonial authorities, which were rumored to be supporting Tshombe's efforts in mid-1963 to dislodge his administration.[29] In November of that year his government forced one of the FNLA's chief rivals, theMovimento Popular de Libertação de Angola, to close its Léopoldville offices and drove its leadership out of the city.[30]
Under Adoula, the Congo joined thePan-African Freedom Movement for East and Central Africa.[31] He agreed to supply funds to various liberation movements in southern Africa and arranged for an office building dubbed the "House of African Nationalists" to be opened in Léopoldville for their use.[32] Despite this, the funds never proved forthcoming and the liberation movements struggled with logistics and organisation.[33]
Following the defeat of Katanga, Adoula organised a new "Government of Reconciliation" in April 1963.[34]
From Gizenga's arrest in early 1962 until Parliament's adjournment in September 1963, most of the dissent Adoula faced from the left came in the form of obstructionist activities in the legislative process. In October the radicalComité National de Libération (CNL) formed inBrazzaville with the goal of overthrowing Adoula's government. By December a CNL-instigated revolt had emerged inKwilu Province.[35] The largerSimba rebellion of 1964 saw much of the eastern Congo overrun by leftist guerrilla forces.[8] During the run-up to new elections in the summer, three new political coalitions in the country emerged. One of these was the Rassemblement des démocrates congolaise (RADECO), which consisted of 50 small organisations led by Jacques Massa.[36] Centrist in ideology, it failed to amass much popular support.[37] Adoula was elected as its president on 14 June.[36] Still unable to contain the leftist insurrections, Adoula was forced by Kasa-Vubu to resign.[8] He then voluntarily left the country.[38]
In a New Year's message at the beginning of 1965, Prime MinisterMoise Tshombe, Adoula's replacement, rejected conciliation with the rebels and called for their total defeat. Adoula dissented and put forth his own "African Plan" for the Congo in the weeklyJeune Afrique. He insisted that any long term solution for peace and stability required input from rebel leaders, emphasizing that since their defeat would require the use of European mercenaries, acting to suppress them would only increase the Congo's reliance on external forces. He also accused Tshombe of antagonizing opposition and called for the creation of a transitional government to oversee a settlement without him. Tshombe responded by blaming the conflict on Adoula, accusing him of weakening the central government andBalkanising the country by dividing the six original provinces into 22 new ones.[39]
In November 1965, Adoula returned to the Congo after Mobutu had seized power. He was accommodating of Mobutu's new regime and served as the CongoleseAmbassador to the United States andAmbassador to Belgium. In 1969 he became Foreign Minister.[8] He fell ill in May 1970. Mobutu took charge of the portfolio[40] and Adoula retired from politics.[8]
Adoula was known for his anti-clerical and socialist beliefs. He publicly advocated for a non-Marxist form of socialism and was a staunch anti-communist. In a 1957 interview withPrésence Africaine he stated:
Being a Socialist, I am for the transformation of the present society into one benefiting the entire collectivity. And for this, I conceive the collectivization of the means of production and the lower echelon workers of the latter. In order to attain this goal, I only see one means: the struggle of the classes, the permanent class struggle until this result is obtained.[41]
In 1978, Adoula suffered a heart attack and traveled to Lausanne, Switzerland, for treatment. He succumbed to his illness and died there on 24 May 1978.[42]
Adoula's son, Antoine Pierre-Emmanuel Adoula Monga, professionally known asDoudou Adoula, was born on 23 July 1965 in Kinshasa. Doudou became a prominent figure in Congolese music. He joined the bandZaïko Langa Langa in 1988 as an atalaku (a type of hype man or lead singer) and contributed significantly to the group's success during a 35-year tenure. Doudou was known for his dynamic stage presence and was instrumental in popularizing several hits, includingIci ça va... Fungola motema andJamais sans nous. He retired from active performance in 2023 due to health issues and died on 7 December 2024 in Brussels, Belgium, at the age of 59.[43]
In most written histories Adoula is described as a weak, ineffective prime minister and a lackey of the United States government.[5]
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by | Prime Minister of the Democratic Republic of the Congo 2 August 1961 – 30 June 1964 | Succeeded by |
| International | |
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| National | |
| Other | |
