A Malachite Genesis

Diamonds, copper, cobalt, uranium, … Name it, and Congo is likely to have it. The country, shrugging off civil war, regains its rank of second biggest producer of copper. Congo produces 2 thirds of the world’s cobalt today. Yes, that metal, for lithium batteries et alii. The metal of the 21^st century. 

Katanga was already such a lifeline for copper and uranium during WWII that all eyes turned on it. And so it became a familiar battleground for US, USSR, China, as well as Europe’s interests. And the graveyard of many, starting with a UN Secretary. 

No Shinkolobwe mine, no Hiroshima. That creates motivation.

The treasures buried beneath the Heart of Darkness were nothing new to the locals. The Congolese extracted malachite from open pits or even mines since prehistory in Dikuluwe, Kambove. Some of these names are more familiar to you now, I guess? It was a 1892 geological expedition that raised the attention of the Belgian King, private owner of Congo. And it ushered the decline of the sinister, medieval, rubber industry, replacing it with copper, diamonds, tungsten and cobalt. 

Improvement? Well, as the conflicting Wikipedia entries show, this “progress” is open to interpretation, to say the least. 

But it all went quickly. One of the biggest seam – copper and cobalt out of malachite – was sampled in 1907, discovered by Union Minière du Haut Katanga (UMHK) in 1911, and exploited as fast as the machines could be powered up. My great-grandfather Dulière, chief electrician, fed the engines. His son, François, fed the furnaces by finding the seams, the mineral layers.

The local name of the mine is Kalukuluku. Its given name is l’Étoile du Congo, or Star Mine of Congo. It is the Lubumbashi mine. 

Even at the start, the L’bashi mine required a myriad of record-breaking, epoch-making machines. My grandfather documented its development at length. Pictures of blast furnaces compete with traditional huts, steam turbines with waterfalls, and the gargantuan buildings of the factory processing plants creeping up rolling landscapes. As if he wanted to remember beloved landscapes levelled, scenic hills scored of any vegetation, and savage waters tamed into drains. Kambove, Kakontwe, the Lufira…. 

François, a soul torn between irreconcilable loves. Wood and Metal. Nature and Industry.

The photo albums until the 30s are evenly split between the two. Maybe exactly because of this fundamental dichotomy,  and the need to capture the awe of it all. The awe of machines, of waterfalls and antelopes. The awe of Africa awakening, in every aspect, from the most primeval to the most modern. 

My grandfather was part of the birth of a giant among mining operations, the very monster that hastened the destruction of the world he venerated. 

Maybe that is why he took so many pictures.

~

Final note : The Lubumbashi plant still sits on an estimated 13 million ton of copper and cobalt ore, today. It is now managed by Chemaf. 

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Here are some mining photos. Many more on Facebook, Instagram and TikTok

Interesting fact: we found Malachite while renovating the house in Claviers, at the door entrance buried under the old tiles. African superstition?