Episode 4: Africa’s Lost Year of Hope

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WBUR

True Crime, Missing, Mystery, Boston, Society & Culture

4.7 • 3.6K Ratings

🗓️ 14 February 2022

⏱️ 46 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In 1960, dubbed "The Year Of Africa", a pair of bold leaders fanned the flames of hope for a brighter future in the Belgian colony of Congo. But by the following year, that hope had been dashed by outside forces.

Using traditional griot storytelling, writer Brenton Zola transports us to a turning point in Congo's path to independence, and remembers the future that almost was.

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Transcript

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1:08.0	WBUR Podcast. Boston.
1:16.4	Sit back, close your eyes. Imagine a big city on a river overflowing with life.
1:29.2	A place where people are dancing, where music is just swirling through the air and the
1:34.5	forms of Congo jazz and trumpets where you have art lining the streets. It's just a place
1:42.2	that was ready to emerge from a dark history. This is Brenton Zola, a writer, thinker and
1:48.3	creator with deep Congolese roots. The place he's describing is no figment of the imagination.
1:54.6	It's Leopoldville. And in 1960, it was the capital of the Belgian colony of Congo. That
2:00.8	year was a turning point for the entire continent, a year of liberation.
2:05.6	The year 1960 was known as the year of Africa. And that is because 17 African nations actually
2:12.3	all declared their independence in one single year.
	...

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