Congolese National Movement

For him to make a real difference, he needed a position of power.

In October 1958, around 20 men gathered to set up a reformist political group, later named the Congolese National Movement, or the MNC.

Patrice Lumumba emerged from that meeting as its leader.

Now, he had the juice to work towards a democratic future for his country.

And so he was sort of this dashing anti-colonial figure who, um, was elegant and eloquent, and, um, a really remarkable figure on the scene.

His message struck a chord.

chord.What distinguished Lumumba and his party, the Congolese National Movement, was that it called for a strong, unified Congolese state.

Many other parties were based on a particular ethnicity or region and were calling for the primacy of that particular group.

He got involved in the Belgian Liberal Party.

And in 1958, Lumumba founded and led one of the most important political forces, the Congolese National Movement.

He now was, uh, a pan-Africanist and saying that what we need is a Congolese independence.

But also, also, and this is a detail that I personally love, and it's very important to the story, while he's leading a revolutionary movement, Lumumba's day job was working at a brewery.