Pope Launches New book on Exploitation of Africa

May 26, 2023279 views0

Pope Launches New book on Exploitation of Africa

2023-05-26T11:30:15+01:00

By Church News

The Vatican Publishing House has announced the release of a new book – written in Italian and entitled Hands off Africa! – collecting all the Pope’s speeches during the Democratic Republic of Congo trip, as well as those from his visit to South Sudan immediately afterwards.“Hands off Africa! Stop choking Africa: it is not a mine to be exploited, or a land to be plundered. May Africa be the protagonist of its own destiny!” said Pope Francis on his first day in the Democratic Republic of Congo earlier this year.Pope Francis also listened to the testimonies of war victims, and their stories, too, are included in the volume.The preface, meanwhile, is written by the Nigerian feminist author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, who said that the book “brings me a small sliver of hope for Congo, and for the beloved and broken-hearted continent that I call home.”In her preface, Adichie focuses in particular on the Pope’s trip to the DRC, “a country whose resources have long been exploited, a country exhausted by pillage and conflict, a country desperate to be made whole again.”The greatest tragedy of the situation, she says, is “not the internecine conflicts but the silence of the world”, which “speaks to the continued devaluing of African humanity by a world that nevertheless eagerly consumes African resources.” In this context, she says, Pope Francis’ visit to the DRC, and his “potent” messages there, read as “a necessary rebuke” to wealthy nations.The week-long visit, which Pope Francis referred to as a ‘Pilgrimage of Peace’, aimed at promoting reconciliation in the conflict-ridden countries, as well as promoting their independence from foreign interference.In the DRC, he met with government officials, bishops, and young people, saying that “political colonialism” of Africa has given way to “economic colonialism”, which he called “equally enslaving.”In South Sudan, meanwhile, he addressed feuding politicians, conflict between whom has devastated the country, stressing that “Now is the time to say: No more of this!”ALSO READ: Pope Francis Calls on Hungarians to “open doors” to Migrants