Imperfect, but Good.
It will be observed elsewhere in this volume that some of those who condemn the State’s system of government point to the Force Publique as the chief instrument by which the Administration encompasses the enslavement of the native population. There are glaring discrepancies in what such persons, either maliciously or in ignorance, represent as the police system which prevails in the State at the present time. There does not exist a police system anywhere in Europe or Africa which has not some inherent defect. To expect the highest discipline and the utmost control in a police body composed of the imperfectly civilised Negroes of Equatorial Africa is only one manifestation of that narrow, unintelligent outlook upon the subject over which certain persons are agitating themselves into suspicious frenzy. The report of M. Fuchs denotes that the State’s police system is founded upon high principles of justice, that discipline and order are being maintained without the abuse of power, and that, whatever individuals may have done to transgress in the sphere of their opportunity, no such extravagant charges of misgovernment as a few persons have made can be fixed upon a State with the police laws above indicated. A million square miles of savage territory are governed with 14,270 natives enrolled in the State’s military service. This is seven soldiers to about every 625 square miles. Does this not signify native respect for, and tranquillity in, the State? What civilised community maintains its authority with such a meagre force?
Steam Saw-Mill, Boma.
CHAPTER XV
BELGIAN CAMPAIGNS AGAINST THE ARABS
A Fight to the Death.
IT had long been foreseen, as an inevitable result of the advent of the Belgians in Central Africa, that a direct conflict between them and the Arabs, continued to the extinction of one or other of the belligerents, must sooner or later take place. The chief cause of the presence of the Belgians in the country being the suppression of slavery was in itself sufficient to assure this. As shown in the chapter dealing with that subject, the Belgian pioneers in establishing posts throughout the country were guided chiefly in their selection of sites by a desire to obstruct the natural routes of the slave-traders; and this, as we have seen, had the effect of frequently bringing Belgians and Arabs into collision.
After the Belgian operations on the Uelle and Lualaba, the Arabs became seriously alarmed. They perceived not only their nefarious method of livelihood at stake, but their very existence as a coherent fighting force was also threatened. In dread at this prospect, the Arabs resolved to precipitate matters, and took the offensive. It is not easy to see what other conclusion they could have reached, for the Belgians had now concerted practical measures which rendered their raids upon Negro villages no longer possible, while such Negro chiefs as had hitherto been amenable to Arab influence had been either alienated or killed off in fair fight. A tax on ivory, too, imposed by the Congo Government in 1891, though moderate in amount and perfectly just in its incidence, was bitterly resented by them. It was clear, therefore, that the only hope for the Arabs lay in recovering the country which the Belgians had wrested from them; and as with every day that passed their chances of doing this became more remote, they resolved to stake all that was left to them upon one desperate effort.
Camp of Bangalas, Stanleyville.