Imperialism In Africa

Words: 1219
Pages: 5

Before the white men, African tribes lived their day to day lives through hunting and gathering, just like their ancestors for thousands of years before them. They were happy with how they lived their lives. Africa was an untouched and beautiful land until the Europeans became aware of what resources Africa could bring to them. There was a fight for who could become the most powerful and biggest empire the fastest. In the 1800’s, Europeans began carving up Africa like a pie, deciding which European country would get what. If a country saw a place they wanted, they went and made a treaty with an African ruler. This was the Scramble for Africa. Imperialism happens when stronger counties take over weaker countries. A stronger country may have motive to take over another weaker country for economic motives—and they were hungry for resources and wealth. The Congo was full of resources such as rubber, ivory, gold, and uranium. In 1884, Leopold II, the king of Belgium, found out that The Congo had valuable resources and wanted a piece of that African pie. Leopold II had one of his men go to The Congo and get the Chief to sign over the Congolese for practically nothing. They …show more content…
They were completely unaware of the horrors going on inside of the said “perfect colony”. There was a clerk named Edmund Morel who found suspicion in the fact that many things were coming in from the Congo, yet nothing was going back to the Congo. He knew something was wrong so he quit his job to study Leopold II and figure out what was going on inside the Congo. Morel was even able to get documents leaked to him from some of Leopold’s men. This was robbery on a grand scale and Morel disapproved. Every time Morel was close to exposing Leopold, Leopold was able to somehow keep it covered. Leopold even went as far as to invite some people to the Congo, only taking them to the nicest possible part of the