(ThyBlackMan.com) Because of the magnitude of what is happening in occupied Palestine, thousands and thousands of people rallied and marched in Washington, D.C. earlier this month in the largest pro-Palestine rally ever in the U.S. to call for an end to Zionist Israeli violence against the Palestinian people. It seems that more and more people are making connections regarding people oppressed globally to the oppression that they face domestically. The Palestinian people are facing a holocaust. It hasn’t gotten as much media coverage but Africans in the Democratic Republic of the Congo are also currently facing horrific conditions that could be characterized as a holocaust as well. One of the most well-known current Congolese public figures in the U.S. is current Memphis Grizzlies center Bismack Biyombo and he did something impressive last year to assist his people.
In March 2022, Bismack Biyombo, then a member of the Phoenix Suns, announced that he will donate his entire 2022 NBA salary towards building a hospital in his homeland of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. That salary was $1.3 million for the rest of that NBA season. He did so in memory of his late father. Biyombo’s father contracted COVID-19 back in July 2021 and Bismack flew home to take care of his ailing father. While he did recover from COVID-19, the elder Biyombo passed away later in August. Regarding the decision to build the hospital, Bismack Biyombo said, “What I told my agent was my salary for this year would be going to the construction of a hospital back home to give hope to the hopeless at home and those individuals who can not take their family members out,” Biyombo added. “I want to be able to give them better conditions so that they can somewhat have hope that their loved ones will be able to live and see another day.”
The current situation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, located in Central Africa, is even more dire. Almost seven million people have been internally displaced in the Democratic Republic of Congo as the war escalates between the M23 Rwandan backed rebel militia and the Congolese armed forces. It takes an historical analysis to understand what’s currently happening in the Congo. It’s important to know that the Central Intelligence Agency led effort to undermine the newly elected government of Patrice Lumumba as early as 1957 to ensure the capitalist countries maintained their unfettered access to Congolese uranium for atomic power in the Cold War. Any semblance of self-determination in African countries, especially those as resource-rich as the in the Democratic Republic of Congo, leads to neo-colonist interference to keep the people of that land from using their resources for the masses of their people.
It’s impressive that Bismack Biyombo has made a notable effort to assist his people with resources. Unfortunately, even if he gave away all the money he made as an NBA player, which is approximately $90 million over the course of his 12 year career, it will be hard to make a major difference for the Congolese people given the capitalist forces backing the theft of Congo’s resources is in the billions, possibly trillions of dollars. It will take Africans throughout the world as a collective and in organization to stop what is happening with Congo’s holocaust.
Staff Writer; Mark Hines