Victor Lundula

Victor Richard Lundula or Lundula Okoko Ta Mongo[1][2] was a Congolese politician and soldier who served as the first Commander-in-Chief of the Armée Nationale Congolaise.

He was a civilian who had been a medical orderly in the Force Publique during the Burma campaign and was a tribal cousin of first Congolese Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba.[3] On 8 April 1953 he was promoted to second class senior nurse.[4]

Lundula was promoted in one leap from sergeant-major to major general on the formation of the ANC.[5] After the severe riots that followed (the beginning of the Congo Crisis), Lundula sought to intervene in several incidents, personally rescued some Europeans from harm and averted trouble wherever possible. In September 1960, when President Kasavubu deposed Lumumba as prime minister, Lundula was jailed for two months. At the end of November 1960 he was released and escaped to Stanleyville in the Eastern Province, and became Antoine Gizenga's military chief. In January 1962, Lundula imprisoned Gizenga in Stanleyville.

He died in the early 1980s.[6]

References
  1. Heinz, G.; Donnay, H. (1976). Lumumba Patrice: les cinquante derniers jours de sa vie (in French). Centre de recherche et d'information socio-politiques. p. 181.
  2. Tripnaux, Eric M. (1996). "A Nearly Well-Known Leopard" (PDF). The Medal Collector. The Orders and Medals Society of America. 47 (10): 42.
  3. Lefever, Spear and Scepter: Army, Police, and Politics in Tropical Africa
  4. Congo, Belgian (1954). Ambtelijk blad van den Belgische Congo (in French and Dutch). 47. Brussels. p. 352. OCLC 1777465.
  5. Sandra W. Meditz; Tim Merrill (October 1993). Library of Congress Country Study:Zaire. Washington DC. Retrieved April 2008. Check date values in: |access-date= (help)
  6. Kisangani, Emizet François; Bobb, F. Scott (2009). Historical Dictionary of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (3rd ed.). Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Pub. Group. p. 325. ISBN 9780810863255.
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