EXCLUSIVE! This interview is a HELL-O! exclusive, by our Economics correspondent Rat on the Beam, with eminent local businessman and entrepreneur, Leopold Viktor.
RB: Good afternoon, your Majesty. Could you please state your full name and occupation for the record?
LV: Good afternoon, Madam. My full name is Leopold Lodewijk Filips Maria Victor, I am currently employed as King of the Belgians and an independent businessman.
RB: How did you come to occupy the throne of Belgium?
LV: I was crowned on the death of my father, King Leopold 1 in 1865, as my elder brother Louis died in infancy. I also have a younger brother, Phillipe, and a sister, Carlotta.
RB: You told us you were also an independent businessman. Can you tell us a little about your other business interests?
LV: I have a very successful import-export concern operating in the Congo Free State, in Central Africa; our main commodities are ivory and rubber, but we also deal in millet and occasionally diamonds and gold as well.
RB: In fact, is it not true that you actually are the sole owner of the Congo Free State?
LV: The documentation and deeds bear my name, yes, but I am really just a figurehead – the business is funded by public monies from the Belgian National Treasury. It is very important for a country’s stability and global importance that we invest in as much colonial expansion as is possible.
RB: There have been reports that your business profits have been acquired through slavery and forced labour.
LV: What the public have to understand is that the Central Congo is poor, a very backward country, and our expansion into this territory provides excellent economic and social opportunities for the indigenous peoples of that region. Obviously there are casualties and wastage whenever a project of this nature and size is undertaken, this cannot be avoided.
RB: One of your foremen was recently criticized by the British Consul for shooting, in cold blood, over 120 Congolese people in a rubber-gathering expedition last year. What was your reaction to this report?
LV: The foreman in question has now been recalled to Belgium. The number of deaths was grossly exaggerated. It is important to remember that these people are very volatile, there is always tribal war going on, life is very cheap to them. Some also died of tropical diseases such as malaria and tsetse-fly. The author of the report, Roger Casement, was merely basing his report on personal opinion, not hard facts – in my view this report is nothing more than xenophobic sensationalism. If there were any substance to it at all, your Queen Victoria would have acted on it long ago.
RB: Is it true that you are involved in a personal relationship with Caroline Lacroix?
LV: No comment.
RB: Is it true that you are also a close friend of Mary Jeffries, in London?
LV: Miss Jeffries is a very old friend of the family, and I have visited her house when I have been to London on business once or twice.
RB: How do you like to occupy your spare time?
LV: I am very interested in architecture and have designed several major public buildings. I particularly like large glasshouses and botanical gardens, in fact you may have seen one of my projects - the Jubelpark in Brussels. This was built for public benefit using profits from my businesses in the Congo.
RB: How would you like to be remembered?
LV: As a family man, businessman, builder and strong King and Emperor.
RB: Your Majesty, thank you for your time.
LV: Thank you. You are a very attractive lady. Are you married?
Historical notes
King Leopold II (April 9, 1835 – December 17, 1909) was the controversial King of Belgium from 1865 until his death. His sister Carlotta went on to become Empress of Mexico. He is remembered as being the founder and sole owner of the Congo Free State, created using Belgian public funds, which was basically run as a private dictatorship. The country was ravaged and asset-stripped for rubber and ivory which involved the forced labour, mutilation and slavery of millions of Congolese, including women and children. Estimates of the final death toll were impossible to calculate as no records were kept, but were estimated as being anywhere between 3 – 15 million.
The Casement Report of 1904 mentioned above led to the arrest and punishment of white officials who had been responsible for the killings during a rubber-collecting expedition in 1903. Queen Victoria, also mentioned above, was a full blood cousin of Leopold.
Caroline Lacroix was a Brussels prostitute who married the King just days before he died in 1909. Technically speaking the marriage was invalid under Belgian law as it was only the religious ceremony, and not accompanied by the obligatory civil marriage service as well. She had previously borne the King two sons, Lucien and Phillipe, in 1906 and 1907.
Mary Jeffries was a Madam and brothel-keeper with a house called Rose Cottage near Hampstead Heath. Her specialties were flagellation and domination; Leopold was reported to be a frequent client at the house.
Leopold II is sometimes called the Builder King as he did actually fund many public projects, parks and botanical gardens in Brussels, Antwerp and Ostend, using profits from his Congo exploits. One of these extravagant buildings is now the Royal Museum for Central Africa in Tervuren. The Belgian Congo later became Zaire, gaining independence from Belgium in 1961; the capital, Kinshasa, was formerly called Leopoldville.
Leopold was extremely unpopular by the end of his reign (he was booed during his burial parade) but his successor, his nephew Albert 1, was popular and very much loved by his subjects until his untimely death from a climbing accident in 1934.
Resources
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Leopold_II
Adam Hochschild: King Leopold’s Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa, Mariner Books, 1998.
Forestier and Omond: Belgium – A History, A & C Black, 1915
Cameron & Kristensen, We Live in Belgium and Luxembourg, Wayland, 1986
RB: Good afternoon, your Majesty. Could you please state your full name and occupation for the record?
LV: Good afternoon, Madam. My full name is Leopold Lodewijk Filips Maria Victor, I am currently employed as King of the Belgians and an independent businessman.
RB: How did you come to occupy the throne of Belgium?
LV: I was crowned on the death of my father, King Leopold 1 in 1865, as my elder brother Louis died in infancy. I also have a younger brother, Phillipe, and a sister, Carlotta.
RB: You told us you were also an independent businessman. Can you tell us a little about your other business interests?
LV: I have a very successful import-export concern operating in the Congo Free State, in Central Africa; our main commodities are ivory and rubber, but we also deal in millet and occasionally diamonds and gold as well.
RB: In fact, is it not true that you actually are the sole owner of the Congo Free State?
LV: The documentation and deeds bear my name, yes, but I am really just a figurehead – the business is funded by public monies from the Belgian National Treasury. It is very important for a country’s stability and global importance that we invest in as much colonial expansion as is possible.
RB: There have been reports that your business profits have been acquired through slavery and forced labour.
LV: What the public have to understand is that the Central Congo is poor, a very backward country, and our expansion into this territory provides excellent economic and social opportunities for the indigenous peoples of that region. Obviously there are casualties and wastage whenever a project of this nature and size is undertaken, this cannot be avoided.
RB: One of your foremen was recently criticized by the British Consul for shooting, in cold blood, over 120 Congolese people in a rubber-gathering expedition last year. What was your reaction to this report?
LV: The foreman in question has now been recalled to Belgium. The number of deaths was grossly exaggerated. It is important to remember that these people are very volatile, there is always tribal war going on, life is very cheap to them. Some also died of tropical diseases such as malaria and tsetse-fly. The author of the report, Roger Casement, was merely basing his report on personal opinion, not hard facts – in my view this report is nothing more than xenophobic sensationalism. If there were any substance to it at all, your Queen Victoria would have acted on it long ago.
RB: Is it true that you are involved in a personal relationship with Caroline Lacroix?
LV: No comment.
RB: Is it true that you are also a close friend of Mary Jeffries, in London?
LV: Miss Jeffries is a very old friend of the family, and I have visited her house when I have been to London on business once or twice.
RB: How do you like to occupy your spare time?
LV: I am very interested in architecture and have designed several major public buildings. I particularly like large glasshouses and botanical gardens, in fact you may have seen one of my projects - the Jubelpark in Brussels. This was built for public benefit using profits from my businesses in the Congo.
RB: How would you like to be remembered?
LV: As a family man, businessman, builder and strong King and Emperor.
RB: Your Majesty, thank you for your time.
LV: Thank you. You are a very attractive lady. Are you married?
Historical notes
King Leopold II (April 9, 1835 – December 17, 1909) was the controversial King of Belgium from 1865 until his death. His sister Carlotta went on to become Empress of Mexico. He is remembered as being the founder and sole owner of the Congo Free State, created using Belgian public funds, which was basically run as a private dictatorship. The country was ravaged and asset-stripped for rubber and ivory which involved the forced labour, mutilation and slavery of millions of Congolese, including women and children. Estimates of the final death toll were impossible to calculate as no records were kept, but were estimated as being anywhere between 3 – 15 million.
The Casement Report of 1904 mentioned above led to the arrest and punishment of white officials who had been responsible for the killings during a rubber-collecting expedition in 1903. Queen Victoria, also mentioned above, was a full blood cousin of Leopold.
Caroline Lacroix was a Brussels prostitute who married the King just days before he died in 1909. Technically speaking the marriage was invalid under Belgian law as it was only the religious ceremony, and not accompanied by the obligatory civil marriage service as well. She had previously borne the King two sons, Lucien and Phillipe, in 1906 and 1907.
Mary Jeffries was a Madam and brothel-keeper with a house called Rose Cottage near Hampstead Heath. Her specialties were flagellation and domination; Leopold was reported to be a frequent client at the house.
Leopold II is sometimes called the Builder King as he did actually fund many public projects, parks and botanical gardens in Brussels, Antwerp and Ostend, using profits from his Congo exploits. One of these extravagant buildings is now the Royal Museum for Central Africa in Tervuren. The Belgian Congo later became Zaire, gaining independence from Belgium in 1961; the capital, Kinshasa, was formerly called Leopoldville.
Leopold was extremely unpopular by the end of his reign (he was booed during his burial parade) but his successor, his nephew Albert 1, was popular and very much loved by his subjects until his untimely death from a climbing accident in 1934.
Resources
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Leopold_II
Adam Hochschild: King Leopold’s Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa, Mariner Books, 1998.
Forestier and Omond: Belgium – A History, A & C Black, 1915
Cameron & Kristensen, We Live in Belgium and Luxembourg, Wayland, 1986
3 comments:
ROTFLMAO
glad you liked it - got a picture on it now! You have really got me started on something here - I think I must have missed my true vocation in life....
LOL - I used it in my class this afternoon as an example. That was the one that Bill came to...ahem.
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