Reign
Once in power, Pedro worked to strengthen his position, first by using the presence of Portuguese priests to arm his closest followers as Knights of the Order of Christ, and to arrange for the burial of several long dead high ranking Kongo. He also managed to re-concentrate population in São Salvador and rebuild the capital.
Pedro benefited from the transformation of Kongo's economy in the mid-nineteenth century, in which the so-called legitimate trade replace the export slave trade as Kongo's primary foreign trade. Kongo exported peanuts, ivory and other exotic products to European traders, both Portuguese from Luanda in the colony of Angola, and French, Dutch and English merchants who had been based at Boma, on the Congo River. Pedro managed to win the loyalty of the petty local rulers who controlled that route, and they accepted knighthoods in exchange. He then welcomed factors of the various houses to the capital of São Salvador.
However the new trade links which helped Pedro to gain financial stability and make São Salvador a major commercial center also had its cost. The transformation of the Kongo economy, in common with that of other parts of Central Africa was in the grips of a "trade revolution" which often put formerly weak local rulers in powerful positions. Pedro faced a major challenge on this front from Garcia Bwaka Matu, whose town of Makuta to the east of São Salvador had become an important trading hub. Bwaka Matu controlled trade and often denied Pedro access to lucrative markets and posed a serious threat from the early 1870s until Bwaka Matu's death in 1881.
Although Pedro had been placed in power by the Portuguese and had accepted vassalage and they in turn had left a garrison in São Salvador, in 1870 the Portuguese decided to withdraw from São Salvador, leaving Pedro in full command. Pedro had already proven to be a problematic vassal, for in the 1860s he had supported rulers in the Dembo area (along the Angolan border, who opposed Portugal.
He was succeeded by his son Alvaro XIV Agua Rosada
Read more about this topic: Peter V Of Kongo
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