Reviewed by: African Testimony in the Movement for Congo Reform: The burden of proof by Robert Burroughs Angus Mitchell African Testimony in the Movement for Congo Reform: The burden of proof By Robert Burroughs. Oxford: Routledge, 2019. Who has the right to speak? It is a question posed in different ways by some of the great postcolonial theorists, notably Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak in Can the Subaltern Speak?, Edward Said in Permission to Narrate and in the eponymous I, Rigoberto Menchú. History has been slow to interrogate the complexities of witnessing and the politics and dynamics of evidence. With this volume, literary historian Robert Burroughs dissects the intricacies of atrocity testimony in the movement for Congo reform. He strips away much of the imperial and racist mystification in search of African voices speaking out against savage colonial capitalism. Part of the impetus for this book extends from a reaction to the endlessly recycled and misrepresentational Heart-of-Darkness narratives and the popular history authored by Adam Hochschild, King Leopold's Ghost (1998), that revived public interest in the unfathomable tragedy committed in the name of European civilization. Hochschild claimed the Congo Reform Association (C.R.A.) as "the first great international human rights movement of the twentieth century." He replicated a tale "in which progressively-minded westerners, acting on behalf of oppressed others, intervene against the retrograde methods of a debased colonialism" (159). Burroughs reads this as a deeply Eurocentric perspective and weighted down by imperialist presumptions. Where is the African witness in all such claims to humanitarian triumphalism, he wonders? The meaning of testimony lies not in the testimony itself but in the relationship between the narration, transcription, textual production, dissemination and archiving. In this process, words are exposed to often severe acts of mediation, manipulation and interpretative mutilation. Even when African testimony was recorded, it was still confined within the culture of colonialism and the very interrogative paradigm that is being challenged. As Burroughs recognises, the representation of atrocities is hewn from a dialogue in which "those invested with imperial power asked questions, solicited responses, set the terms of debate, acquired, amended, discarded interlocutors' words" (10) without any explanation. Editorial control was always wielded by western mediators. Generally, the language structuring understanding is still infused with nineteenth-century racist logic. In retrieving an African perspective, the asymmetrical relations in power, the variances in knowledge systems and those clear instances of epistemological repression must be considered. Burroughs looks initially at the period from 1890 to 1903 when violence started to escalate as rubber was extracted under increasingly oppressive conditions. Here he has measured criticism for E.D. Morel, the indefatigable campaigner, whose energy and determination organized understanding of Congo reform first in Britain and then in Europe. Morel wrote a precocious number of pamphlets and books in between editing a weekly newspaper (The West African Mail) exposing the criminality of King Leopold II's regime. He did as much as anyone to shape public understanding and he came to exert considerable influence over the British Foreign Office. But Morel was also remarkably sparing in his use of African testimony. Much of Morel's knowledge on the spot was provided by Roger Casement, Britain's consular representative. Burroughs recognises that Casement's investigation into the upper Congo in 1903 initiated a new approach to humanitarian reporting. It was informed with empathy and a self-reflexive criticism, both innovative to the methodology of investigation. However, Casement's gaze was still confined within the paradigm of the reasoning of a consular official. Burroughs provides an incisive interrogation of the evidence from witnesses who told Casement stories. He gives real context to Frank Teva Clark and other African missionaries, guides, interpreters and interviewees who underpinned the consul's denunciation of the violence of the Congo Free State. He shows how the evidence collected allowed Casement to construct a convincing "communal voice" that spoke for an entire community. At Ikoko, on the banks of Lake Mantumba, Casement interviewed five young females who told deeply harrowing stories of their witnessing of murder. Their words were translated by Lena Clark, a young and a very able African linguist. What Burroughs draws out is the complex layering of...
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Jan 1, 2021
Moses Kamau Muchemi + 1
Open Access