Actions As Prime Minister
A few days after Congo gained its independence, Lumumba made the fateful decision to raise the pay of all government employees except for the army. Many units of the army also had strong objections toward the uniformly Belgian officers; General Janssens, the army head, told them their lot would not change after independence, and they rebelled in protest. The rebellions quickly spread throughout the country, leading to a general breakdown in law and order. Although the trouble was highly localized, the country seemed to be overrun by gangs of soldiers and looters, causing a media sensation, particularly over Europeans fleeing the country.
The province of Katanga declared independence under regional premier Moïse Tshombe on 11 July 1960 with support from the Belgian government and mining companies such as Union Minière. Despite the arrival of UN troops, unrest continued. Since the United Nations refused to help suppress the rebellion in Katanga, Lumumba sought Soviet aid in the form of arms, food, medical supplies, trucks, and planes to help move troops to Katanga. Lumumba's decisive actions alarmed his colleagues and President Kasa-Vubu, who preferred a more moderate political approach.
Read more about this topic: Patrice Lumumba
Famous quotes containing the words prime minister, actions, prime and/or minister:
“Sometimes it takes years to really grasp what has happened to your life. What do you do after you are world-famous and nineteen or twenty and you have sat with prime ministers, kings and queens, the Pope? What do you do after that? Do you go back home and take a job? What do you do to keep your sanity? You come back to the real world.”
—Wilma Rudolph (1940–1994)
“The actions of each dancer were scrutinized with great care and any little mistake noted and remembered. The strain upon a dancer was consequently so great that when a fine dancer died soon after a feast it was said, “The peoples’ looks have killed him.””
—Merle Colby, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“Ay, look: high heaven and earth ail from the prime foundation;
All thoughts to rive the heart are here, and all are vain:
Horror and scorn and hate and fear and indignation—
Oh, why did I awake? When shall I sleep again?”
—A.E. (Alfred Edward)
“Before any woman is a wife, a sister or a mother she is a human being. We ask nothing as women but everything as human beings.”
—Ida C. Hultin, U.S. minister and suffragist. As quoted in History of Woman Suffrage, vol. 4, ch. 17, by Susan B. Anthony and Ida Husted Harper (1902)