A Decolonization Walk (Sheriff)
By Mohamed Sheriff.
During our Civ in London trip to Brussels, we took a tour where we learned about Belgium’s grim colonial past and the history of decolonization. I greatly appreciated the guide’s honesty and authenticity on the tour. Benjamin, our guide, went in depth about the city and country history without shying away from the negatives. I learned about Belgium’s forceful colonization over Congo which involved many murders of the natives, exploitation and forced migration. As the tour continued, we stopped at a statue of King Leopold II, who established a brutal colony in central Africa. The statue was located in a popular area of the city so many people, whether residents or tourists, have possibly seen it more than once. As I examined the statue, I noticed that there was red residue on it. Soon I learned that it had been vandalized with red paint, symbolizing blood, multiple times by activists. Each time the activist would strike it would simply be cleaned up by the city and this was a repeated event. The activists wanted the statue removed due to the notorious history attached to it, so a question was proposed to us, “ should the statue be removed”? One side can argue that it should be kept because it is a historic monument which respects the earlier Kings of the newly independent Belgium. However, the other party may say that this King of horrible morals, is being honored and praised regardless of the deeds he’s done and generational trauma that has been created. To add, there is a decent African population in Brussels who are reminded everyday of their country’s losses as they see this statue. This is a very complex question that can have numerous outcomes, but I can not answer this question because I simply do not have an answer.
