| Katanga Business | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Directed by | Thierry Michel |
| Written by | Thierry Michel |
| Narrated by | Jacques Dubuisson |
| Cinematography | Michel Téchy |
| Edited by | Marie Quinton |
| Music by | Marc Hérouet |
Production companies | Les Films de la Passerelle Les Films d'Ici |
Release date |
|
Running time | 120 minutes |
| Country | Belgium |
| Languages | French English Dutch |
Katanga Business is a 2009 film by Belgian director Thierry Michel that explores the mining industry in Katanga Province, Democratic Republic of the Congo.
The province of Katanga in the south east of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has huge mineral riches including uranium, zinc, copper and cobalt. These were exploited in colonial times by the Union Minière du Haut Katanga, which was nationalized in 1966 by President Mobutu Sese Seko. Mobutu lavished wealth on his clan, but the mines were soon abandoned, forcing the miners into illegal artisanal workings. More recently new investors have bought into the industry including Indians and Chinese. [1]
The film surveys the industrial and artisanal mining industry in Katanga Province. The film explores the murky dealings between the state-owned Gécamines, foreign mining companies such as First Quantum Minerals and individuals like George Forrest, Indian and Chinese investors and state officials. It questions who benefits from the mining operations. [2] Katanga Business highlights the charismatic governor of the province, the populist Moses Katumbi. [3] It shows the great wealth of the province and the abject poverty of the miners. [4]
Thierry Michel had produced works on the DRC over a period of seventeen years before making Katanga Business. Earlier works were Zaire, le cycle du serpent (1992), Les Derniers Colons (1995), Mobutu roi du Zaïre (1999) and Congo River, Beyond Darkness (2005). [1] [5] Taken together his films provide a unique overview of the social, economic and political life of the country. He made the television documentary film Katanga, la guerre du cuivre (Katanga, the copper war) earlier in 2009, the basis for the film. [2] A book was published with the same title including text and photographs by Thierry Michel. [6]
Michel's Congolese assistant director Guy Kabeya Muya received death threats for having worked on the film. The filmmaker Monique Mbeka Phoba quickly mobilized an international campaign to ensure that the Congolese authorities extended their protection. [7]
A reviewer in Le Monde said of the film that Thierry Michel is not trying to make an indictment, that he approaches the subject with "eyes wide open", and that the film is "bursting with life, in which one will find, as easily as copper in Kolwezi, reason for hope". [8] Another reviewer criticized the decision to let the images and people in the film tell the story, as in a drama, rather than providing explanations of causes and effects. As a result, the film therefore is mostly a simple depiction of the impact of globalization and neo-colonialism. [4] The film was nominated for a Magritte Award in the category of Best Documentary in 2011. [9]
The economy of the Democratic Republic of the Congo has declined drastically around the 1980s, despite being home to vast potential in natural resources and mineral wealth; their gross domestic product is $48.994 billion as of 2019.
Katanga was one of the four large provinces created in the Belgian Congo in 1914. It was one of the eleven provinces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo between 1966 and 2015, when it was split into the Tanganyika, Haut-Lomami, Lualaba, and Haut-Katanga provinces. Between 1971 and 1997, its official name was Shaba Province.
The Democratic Republic of the Congo, informally Congo-Kinshasa, DR Congo, the DRC, the DROC, or the Congo, and formerly and also colloquially Zaire, is a country in Central Africa. The DRC is located in sub-Saharan Africa, bordered to the northwest by the Republic of the Congo, to the north by the Central African Republic, to the northeast by South Sudan, to the east by Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi, and by Tanzania, to the south and southeast by Zambia, to the southwest by Angola, and to the west by the South Atlantic Ocean and the Cabinda exclave of Angola.
Lubumbashi is the third-largest city in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, located in the country's southeasternmost part, along the border with Zambia. The capital and principal city of the Haut-Katanga Province, Lubumbashi is the center of mining in the region, acting as a hub for many of the country's largest mining companies. No definite population figures are available, but the population of the city's urban area is estimated to be around 2,584,000 in 2021.
Mbuji-Mayi serves as the capital city of Kasai-Oriental Province in the south-central Democratic Republic of Congo. It is the second largest city in the country, following the capital Kinshasa but ahead of Lubumbashi, Kisangani and Kananga, though the exact population is not known. Estimates ranged from a 2010 CIA World Factbook estimated population of 1,480,000 to as many as 3,500,000 estimated by the United Nations in 2008.
The Union Minière du Haut-Katanga was a Belgian mining company which controlled and operated the mining industry in the copperbelt region in the modern-day Democratic Republic of the Congo between 1906 and 1966.
The prime minister of the Democratic Republic of the Congo is the head of government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The Constitution of the Third Republic grants the Prime Minister a significant amount of power.
The Congolese National Liberation Front is a political party funded by rebels of Katangese origin and composed of ex-members of the Katangese Gendarmerie. It was active mainly in Angola and Zaire during the 1970s.
Moïse Katumbi Chapwe is a Congolese businessman and politician. He was Governor of Katanga Province, located in the southern part of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, from 2007 to September 2015. He was a member of the People's Party for Reconstruction and Democracy (PPRD) until September 2015. He has been described by The Economist as "probably the second most powerful man in the Democratic Republic of Congo after the president, Joseph Kabila". Jeune Afrique named him "African of the Year" in 2015.
The People's Republic of China (PRC) and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) have had peaceful diplomatic relations, and growing economic relations, since 1971. Relations between the two countries go back to 1887, when representatives of the Congo Free State established contacts with the court of the Qing dynasty then ruling China. The first treaty between the two powers was signed in 1898. The Free State became a Belgian colony in 1908, but when it gained its independence in 1960 it established formal relations with the Republic of China (ROC), which had replaced the Qing in 1912 but was relegated to the island of Taiwan, a former Japanese colony, after 1949. Over the next decade, Congolese recognition was switched several times between the ROC and the PRC before it settled finally on the latter in 1971. At the time, the Congo was known as Zaire. In the 21st century, Chinese investment in the DRC and Congolese exports to China have grown rapidly. The DRC joined the Belt and Road Initiative in 2021.
Canada–Democratic Republic of the Congo relations refers to the bilateral relationship between Canada and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Canada has an embassy in Kinshasa and D.R. Congo has an embassy in Ottawa.
Copper mining in the Democratic Republic of the Congo mainly takes place in the Copper Belt of the southern Katanga Province of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Dan Gertler is an Israeli billionaire businessman in natural resources and the founder and president of the DGI group of companies. He has diamond and copper mining interests in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), and has invested in iron ore, gold, cobalt, oil, agriculture, and banking. He may also hold citizenship of that country. As of 2022 his fortune was estimated at $1.2 billion by Forbes.
Sodimico is a state-owned mining company in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).
Cinema of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) originated with educational and propaganda films during the colonial era of the Belgian Congo. Development of a local film industry after the Democratic Republic of the Congo became independent in 1960 was handicapped by constant civil war.
Guy Kabeya Muya is a filmmaker from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. He was co-director with Monique Mbeka Phoba of the 2007 documentary Entre la coupe et l'élection.
Entre la coupe et l'élection is a 2008 documentary film co-directed by Monique Mbeka Phoba and Guy Kabeya Muya. It tells of Zaire's football team at the 1974 FIFA World Cup and what happened to the players afterwards.
Thierry Michel is a Belgian film director, mostly making social and political documentaries. His office and company Les films de la passerelle is located in Liège, where he works with the producer Christine Pireaux. Over a twenty-year period he has made a series of documentaries on different aspects of Zaire . Taken together his films provide a unique overview of the social, economic and political life of the country.
L'Affaire Chebeya is a documentary directed by Thierry Michel that was released in February 2012. The award-winning film explores the assassination of a human rights activist in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and the subsequent trial.
The following lists events that happened during 2006 in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.