No Child Deserves To Be Kidnapped And Abandoned Like This

After some 10 million African people were mutilated and slaughtered in the Congo by European hands, Belgium inherited the nation in 1908.

Bridging the two nations would call for the ban of relations and marriage between whites and Blacks.

This rule was soon broken.

According to author Assumani Budagwa, white male settlers often visited local villages between 1959 and 1962. Frequently, they abused their power by demanding the local chiefs provide them with women to service their every desire.

Those selected tended to be the chief’s young daughters or a regular woman conquest. Others were raped.

These oft-forced unions produced métis, or mixed-race children.

As more and more métis began popping up, fear trickled into Belgium. “Will they grow up and demand rights? Revolt?” Belgium asked. “Will our ‘white superiority’ be diluted by their existence?”

The solution to their fears was cold and simple: steal the métis from their mothers and hide them in Catholic-run institutions.

But as the Belgian Congo neared independence, the Catholic church laid out a disgusting plan to further separate these kids from their African roots. They snatched up thousands and shipped them to Belgium.

Once there, some went to foster care - some to homes for delinquent children. All, however, were denied citizenship, disallowed from being African or European.

Now, for the first time, Belgium is taking responsibility for its colonial past. But with so much other violence they enacted, one has to wonder: is an apology even close to enough?