Who was Pierre de Brazza? How did the city in the Republic of the Congo get its name? When was Brazzaville founded? Brazza returned to Europe in 1878, after three years of studying Central Africa. Come in 1879, he was already on the second expedition. This expedition coincided with another, more famous research mission led by the legendary Henry Morton Stanley (who uttered the famous phrase “Dr. Livingston, I suppose”). Stanley was hired by King Leopold of Belgium, a man who had previously tried to hire Brazz for the mission. Brazza rejected him because he was a French officer. He did not have permission to serve Belgium.
What gave this second expedition to the new Congo meant the revelation that Leopold had created fake charity groups - the International African Association, the Upper Congo Research Committee, the Congo International Association. These were pure smoke screens to accomplish Leopold’s task of completely dominating and systematically extracting the natural resources of the Congo. Brazil found it, and it created a moral purpose for his mission: to demand that the area under the French flag spare Africans from the tyranny of Leopold.
The main plan of Brazzy was to defeat Stanley in the Congo River so that the latter could not qualify for both banks for Leopold. Brazza’s goal was to reach the Malebeau Basin (at the time called Stanley Pool), where the Congo River swells in the lake basin. There he planted a French flag and established a settlement. Thanks to his good relations with the indigenous tribes and with the help of the ex-slaves he freed, Brazza had a very good chance to defeat the larger and better funded Stanley expedition.
In this race in the Congo, Brazil’s excellent reputation and relations with Africans would give him a final advantage over Stanley, who was tasked with building roads and telegraph lines. In addition, the method of coercion Stanley under the gun was not as effective as patience and understanding of Brazza. Long before Brazz reached the territory of King Makoko (which was the land on the right bank of the Congo), the king sent a subordinate chief to guide them. After a hard two-day journey in the sun, baked savanna, Brazza approached the shores of the great Congo River.
When Brazz met the native king Makoko, the king had already heard of the “great white chief of Houwei.” For many days the king placed the guest with food, drinks and gifts. In the king Makoko Brazza will find a lifelong friend. Based on this respectable relationship, Makoko Cave Bratsa permission to permit land for France. The kingdom of Makoko will become a protectorate. Brace managed to occupy the right bank of the Congo before the arrival of Stanley.
Brazza and his men continued along the Congo River, planning to create a French station. When they reached Pula Stanley, in the village of Bateke called Ntamo, Brazza raised the French flag over his newly founded settlement. After creating a trading station, Brazza left his subordinates and went back to France to register his contract with Makoko. Within 3 years, this modest village would be renamed Brazzaville, and the modern capital of more than a million inhabitants will develop from this modest village. Congo-Brazzaville will be one of the most progressive countries in Africa today, under the leadership of President Denis Sassou Nguesso.
