The Casement Report 12

The Casement Report 12

Indeed, it would be hard to say how the people now live or how they

occupy their own time. They did not complain so much of the weekly

enforced food supplies required of them, which would, indeed, seem to be

an unavoidable necessity of the situation, as to the unexpected calls

frequently made upon them. Neither rubber nor ivory is obtained in this

neighbourhood. The food supply and a certain amount of local labour is

all that is enforced. As woodcutters, station hands in the Government

post, canoe paddlers, workers on the telegraph route or in some other

public capacity, they are liable to frequent requisition.

 

The labour required did not seem to be excessive, but it would seem to

be irregularly called for, unequally distributed, and only poorly

remunerated, or sometimes not remunerated at all.

 

Complaints as to the manner of exacting service are much more frequent

than complaints as to the fact of service being required. If the local

official has to go on a sudden journey men are summoned on the instant

to paddle his canoe, and a refusal entails imprisonment or a beating. If

the Government plantation or the kitchen garden require weeding, a

soldier will be sent to call in the women from some of the neighbouring

towns. To the official this is a necessary public duty which he cannot

but impose, but to the women suddenly forced to leave their household

tasks and to tramp off, hoe in hand, baby on back, with possibly a

hungry and angry husband at home, the task is not a welcome one.

 

One of the weightier tasks imposed upon the neighbourhood during my stay

at Bolobo was the construction of a wooden pier at the Government beach

whereat Government vessels might come alongside.

 

I visited this incompleted structure several times, and estimated that

from 1,500 to 2,000 trees and saplings had already been used in its

partial construction. All of these were cut down and carried in by the

men of some of the neighbouring towns, and for this compulsory service

no remuneration had, up to that date, I was on all sides informed, been

made to any one of them. They were ordered, they said, to do it as a

public duty. The timber needed had to be sought at a considerable

distance, most of the trees had been carried some miles, and the task

was not altogether an agreeable one. The chief complaint I heard

directed against this work, however, was that the pier was being so

badly put up that when finished it would be quite useless, and all their

work would thus be thrown away. My own opinion of the structure was that

this criticism was well founded, and that the first annual rise of the

river would sweep most of the ill-laid timbers away.

 

The Bolobo people do not object so much to the regular food tax, just

because this is regular, and they can prepare and regularly meet it, as

to the sudden and unexpected labour tasks, such as canoe journeys, or

this more onerous pier building. They could, I perceived, trace no

connection between this hastily-conceived exaction on their time and

labour and a system of general contribution in the public interest,

which, to be readily admitted, should be clearly defined. Were a regular

annual tax levied in money, or some medium of barter exchange serving as

a legal currency, the people would in time be brought to see that a

payment of this kind evenly distributed and enforced was, indeed, a

public duty they were bound to acquit themselves of, and one their

Government was justified in strictly enforcing; but they do not assign

any such value to the unsystematic calls upon them which prevail to-day.

To be hastily summoned from their usual home avocations, or even from

their possibly habitual idleness, to perform one or other of the tasks

indicated above, and to get neither food nor pay for their exertions, as

is often the case, seems to these unprogressive people not a public

service they are called upon to perform in the public interest, but a

purely personal burden laid upon their bodies and their time by the

local agent of an organization which, to them, would seem to exist

chiefly for its own profit.

 

The weight of the kwanga required at Bolobo seemed to be less than that

enforced at F*, and I found that this variance existed throughout the

Upper Congo. At Bolobo the kwanga loaves supplied to the Government

post weighed each a little over 3 lb. That made for ordinary sale in the

public market just over 1 lb.: one of each that I weighed myself gave 3

lb. 2 oz. to the Government loaf, and 13 oz. to that made for general

consumption. The price paid in each case was the same--viz., one brass

rod.

 

At the village of H*, some 4 or 5 miles from the Government post, which

I visited, I found the village to number some forty adult males with

their families. This village has to supply weekly to the Government post

400 of these loaves (say 1,250 lb. weight of food) for which a payment

of 20 fr. (400 rods) is made. The people of H* told me that when short

of cassava from their own fields for the preparation of this supply,

they bought the root in the local market and had to pay for it in the

raw state just twice what they received for the prepared and cooked

product they delivered at the post. I had no means of verifying this

statement, but I was assured by many persons that it was strictly true.

In addition to supplying this food weekly, H* is liable to the usual

calls for canoe paddlers, day labourers at the Government station (male

and female), timber gatherers for the pier, and woodcutters at the local

wood-post of the Government steamers.

 

There was a good deal of sickness in this town, and in that beyond it at

the date of my visit. Sleeping sickness and, still more, small-pox. Both

diseases have done much to reduce the population. Emigration to the

French shore, once active, would seem now to have ceased. Efforts are

made locally, to improve the physical and sanitary condition of the

people, and improvements due to these efforts are becoming apparent, but

I was given to understand that progress is very slow.

 

The insufficiency of food generally observable in this part of the Congo

would seem to account for much sickness, and probably for the mental

depression of the natives I so often observed, itself a frequent cause

of disease. The Chief of the Government post at G* during a part of my

stay there told me that he thought the district was quite exhausted, and

that it must be ever increasingly difficult to obtain food from it for

the public requirements of the local administration.

 

Some 40 miles above Bolobo a large “camp d’instruction,” with from 600

to 800 native recruits and a staff of several European officers is

established at a place called Yumbi. I had, to my regret, no opportunity

of visiting this camp, although I met one of its officers who very

kindly invited me there, promising a hearty welcome. He informed me that

native food supplies were fairly plentiful in the neighbourhood of this

camp, and that the principal rations of the soldiers consisted of

hippopotamus meat, the Congo in that neighbourhood affording a seemingly

inexhaustible supply of these creatures.

 

In front of the house of one of the natives in a village, I saw some

seventy hippopotamus skulls. The animals, I was told, had all been

killed by one man. Many are speared, and some are shot by the native

hunters with cap-guns. A somewhat considerable trade in these weapons

appears to have been done until recently by the Government Agents in the

district, and I found several of the Bolobo young men with guns of this

description which they had bought at different times from the local

official, generally paying for them with ivory tusks. The sale of these

arms by Representatives of the Congo Government would seem to have

ceased somewhat more than a year ago, since which date the holders of

the guns have been exposed to some trouble in order to obtain licences.

Dealing in or holding guns of this description would seem to be

regulated by clearly drawn up Regulations, which, however, do not seem

to have been observed until last year. A tax of 20 fr. is now levied on

the issue of a licence to bear arms, which the law renders obligatory on

every gun holder, but this tax is also collected in an irregular manner.

 

I learned while at Bolobo that a large influx from the I* district

(which comprises the “Domaine de la Couronne”) had lately taken place

into the country behind G*. The nearest Settlement of these emigrants

was said to be about 20 to 25 miles from G*, and I determined to visit

this place. I spent three days on this journey, visited two large

villages in the interior belonging to the K* tribe, wherein I found that

fully half the population now consisted of refugees belonging to the L*

tribe who had formerly dwelt near I*. I saw and questioned several

groups of these people, whom I found to be industrious blacksmiths and

brass-workers. These people consisted of old and young men, women, and

children. They had fled from their country and sought an asylum with

their friends the K* during the last four years. The distance they had

travelled in their flight they put at about six or seven days’

march--which I should estimate at from 120 to 150 miles of walking.

They went on to declare, when asked why they had fled, that they had

endured such ill-treatment at the hands of the Government officials and

the Government soldiers in their own country that life had become

intolerable, that nothing had remained for them at home but to be killed

for failure to bring in a certain amount of rubber or to die from

starvation or exposure in their attempts to satisfy the demands made

upon them. The statements made to me by these people were of such a

nature that I could not believe them to be true. The fact remained,

however, that they had certainly abandoned their homes and all that they

possessed, had travelled a long distance, and now preferred a species of

mild servitude among the K* to remaining in their own country. I took

careful note of the statements made to me by these people, which will be

found in the transcript attached (Inclosure 1).[12] I subsequently found

when at M* some days later, other L*, who confirmed the truth of the

statements made to me at N*.

 

On reaching Bolobo in September I obtained information amply confirming

the statements made to me. My own further inquiries at M* are embodied

in the accompanying document (Inclosure 1).[13]

 

Leaving Bolobo on the 23rd July, I passed on up river in a small

steam-launch I had been fortunate enough to secure for my private use.

We touched at several points on the French shore, and on the 25th July

reached Lukolela, where I spent two days. This district had, when I

visited it in 1887, numbered fully 5,000 people; to-day the population

is given, after a careful enumeration, at less than 600. The reasons

given me for their decline in numbers were similar to those furnished

elsewhere, viz., sleeping-sickness, general ill-health, insufficiency of

food, and the methods employed to obtain labour from them by local

officials and the exactions levied on them. The Lukolela district

furnishes a small supply of rubber, which is required by the Local

Government posts to be brought in at fixed periods as a general

contribution. Food--“kwanga” and fish--are also required of the

riverside dwellers. The towns I visited were very ill-kept and

tumble-down, and bore no comparison, either in the class of

dwelling-houses now adopted or in the extent of cultivated ground around

them, to the condition in which these people formerly dwelt.

 

Several reasons for the increase of sickness and the great falling-off

in the population of the district were stated by the local missionary,

who has resided for many years at Lukolela, in two letters which he

recently addressed to the Governor-General of the Congo State. A copy of

these letters was handed to me by the writer--the Rev. John

Whitehead--on my calling in at Lukolela on my way down river on the 12th

September. I had no opportunity of verifying, by personal observation,

the statements made by Mr. Whitehead in his letter, for my stay at

Lukolela was only one of a few hours. I have, however, no right to doubt

Mr. Whitehead’s veracity, and he declared himself prepared to accept

full responsibility for the statements his letter contained. A copy of

these letters is appended (Inclosure 2).[14]

 

The Government post at Lukolela I did not visit, but viewed from the

river it presents a charming aspect; well-built houses, surrounded by

plantations of coffee-trees, extend for some distance along the shore.

 

From Lukolela I proceeded to O*, which I purposed visiting. O*, with its

two adjoining villages, when I had last seen them in the autumn of 1887,

had presented a scene of the greatest animation. The population of the

three towns then numbered some 4,000 to 5,000 people--O* alone, it was

estimated, containing at least 3,000. Scores of men had put off in

canoes to greet us with invitations that we should spend the night in

their village. On steaming into O*, I found that this village had

entirely disappeared, and that its place was occupied by a large “camp

d’instruction,” where some 800 native recruits, brought from various

parts of the Congo State, are drilled into soldierhood by a Commandant

and a staff of seven or eight European officers and non-commissioned officers.