Lumumba's Distressed Wife | Appealed To UN for the Return of Her Missing Husband | Jan 1960

Thursday, January 19th 1961.

Reuters Text from 1961:

Mrs Pauline Opanga Lumumba, wife of the deposed Congolese Premier Patrice Lumumba-was seen in a highly distressed condition January 19 (in front of a) hut in the native quarter of Leopoldville (later Kinshasa). She had just returned from her appeal to the United Nations for the return of her husband. Seated with her was her two-year-old son Roland Gilbert.

But she - and the wives of Lumumba's fellow prisoners Maurice Mpolo and Joseph Okito-were given no firm promise by UN authorities, and had to return home. Mrs Lumumba-who had also requested to visit her husband, said: "We spoke to a man and asked him to help get our husbands back because we have no money."

Mr Lumumba was transferred Jan 18 from imprisonment at Camp hardy at Thysville to a Katanga prison. In a statement Jan 19 mr Tshombe, self-styled President of Katanga Province, refused to indicate where Mr Lumumba was. He also denied he had been beaten by his soldiers.

Source: Reuters News Archive.

Note:

It was later established that Patrice Lumumba had been murdered by a Belgian commanded firing squad on January 17th 1961.