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Sizarail
Sizarail was a railway company formed by foreign investors that briefly operated the railway network in Zaire between 1996 and 1997. It took over from the state-owned operator in an attempt to revive the railway, which had virtually ceased to operate despite being a critical source of revenue from mineral exports. Operations quickly improved, and the company earned a small profit in the first year. However, advancing rebel forces closed it down and re-nationalized the railway. Creation In the 1990s the mining company Gécamines almost ceased to produce copper, while the state-owned SNCZ railway network ceased to function. In 1995 prime minister Léon Kengo wa Dondo allowed foreign investment in some of the railway lines in an attempt to revive them. Sizarail was formed in response. It was 51% owned by a joint venture between the state-owned South African company Spoornet and Transurb of Belgium, with 49% held by the state mining companies Gécamines and Societé Minière de Bak ...
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Comazar
Comazar is a company that operates railways in Africa. Its stock is majority owned by the French investment group Bolloré. Comazar was founded by Eric Peiffer and Patrick Claes in conjunction with Transnet (Spoornet) and Transurb Consult (a Belgian Railways subsidiary) in 1995. The headquarters are in Johannesburg. Related organizations Comazar owns stock in and operates the following privately held railways: * Camrail - Cameroon - 20 year concession from 1999. * Madarail - Madagascar * Sitarail Railways - Côte d'Ivoire and Burkina Faso * Ethiopian Railways - 25 year concession from 2006. Comazar is also a ten percent partner in Rift Valley Railways. Previous concessions In addition, the company has operated railways in these countries in the past: * Sizarail - Democratic Republic of the Congo - The company obtained a 5-year mandate, starting in 1996, to run the country's rail. Comazar started a commuter rail service in Lubumbashi that carried 2 mm passengers ...
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Zaire
Zaire (, ), officially the Republic of Zaire (french: République du Zaïre, link=no, ), was a Congolese state from 1971 to 1997 in Central Africa that was previously and is now again known as the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Zaire was, by area, the third-largest country in Africa (after Sudan and Algeria), and the 11th-largest country in the world. With a population of over 23 million inhabitants, Zaire was the most-populous officially Francophone country in Africa, as well as one of the most populous in Africa. The country was a one-party totalitarian military dictatorship, run by Mobutu Sese Seko and his ruling Popular Movement of the Revolution party. Zaire was established following Mobutu's seizure of power in a military coup in 1965, following five years of political upheaval following independence from Belgium known as the Congo Crisis. Zaire had a strongly centralist constitution, and foreign assets were nationalized. The period is sometimes referre ...
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Kalemie
Kalemie, formerly Albertville or Albertstad, is a town on the western shore of Lake Tanganyika in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The town is next to the outflow of the Lukuga River from Lake Tanganyika to the Lualaba River. History From 1886 to 1891, the Society of Missionaries of Africa had founded catholic missions at the north and south ends of Lake Tanganyika. Léopold Louis Joubert, a French soldier and armed auxiliary, was dispatched by Archbishop Charles Lavigerie's Society of Missionaries of Africa to protect the missionaries. The missionaries abandoned three of the new stations due to attacks by Tippu Tip and Rumaliza. By 1891 the Arab slave traders had control of the entire western shore of the lake, apart from the region defended by Joubert around ''Mpala'' and ''St Louis de Mrumbi''. The anti-slavery expedition under Captain Alphonse Jacques—financed by the Belgian Anti-Slavery Society—came to the relief of Joubert on 30 October 1891. When the Jacques ...
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Railway Companies Of The Democratic Republic Of The Congo
Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport that transfers passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, which are incorporated in tracks. In contrast to road transport, where the vehicles run on a prepared flat surface, rail vehicles (rolling stock) are directionally guided by the tracks on which they run. Tracks usually consist of steel rails, installed on sleepers (ties) set in ballast, on which the rolling stock, usually fitted with metal wheels, moves. Other variations are also possible, such as "slab track", in which the rails are fastened to a concrete foundation resting on a prepared subsurface. Rolling stock in a rail transport system generally encounters lower frictional resistance than rubber-tyred road vehicles, so passenger and freight cars (carriages and wagons) can be coupled into longer trains. The operation is carried out by a railway company, providing transport between train stations or freight customer facilit ...
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Rail Transport In The Democratic Republic Of The Congo
Rail transport is provided in the Democratic Republic of the Congo by the ''Société Nationale des Chemins de Fer du Congo'' (SNCC), the Société commerciale des transports et des ports (SCTP) ''(previously Office National des Transports (Congo), Office National des Transports'' (ONATRA) until 2011), and the ''Office des Chemins de fer des Ueles'' (CFU). The national system is mostly operated by the Société Nationale des Chemins de Fer du Congo, SNCC. Not all rail lines link up, but are generally connected by river transport. The rail systems are listed below. Routes *Matadi-Kinshasa Railway, Matadi-Kinshasa Railway (believed operational in 2022): From Matadi to Kinshasa via Songolo, Kimpese and Kasangulu. 366 km, gauge. A 2019 timetable states one passenger train per week. Operated by SCTP (ex Office National des Transports (Congo), ONATRA). Beyond Matadi the line continues to oil terminals at Ango-Ango, Ango Ango (7 km). At Mwala Kinsende there is a branch to ...
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Société Nationale Des Chemins De Fer Du Congo
Lactalis is a French multinational dairy products corporation, owned by the Besnier family and based in Laval, Mayenne, France. The company's former name was Besnier SA. Lactalis is the largest dairy products group in the world, and is the second largest food products group in France, behind Danone. It owns brands such as Parmalat, Président, Siggi's Dairy, Skånemejerier, Rachel's Organic, and Stonyfield Farm. History André Besnier started a small cheesemaking company in 1933 and launched its ''Président'' brand of Camembert in 1968. In 1990, it acquired Group Bridel (2,300 employees, 10 factories, fourth-largest French dairy group) with a presence in 60 countries. In 1992, it acquired United States cheese company Sorrento. In 1999, ''la société Besnier'' became ''le groupe Lactalis'' owned by Belgian holding company BSA International SA. In 2006, they bought Italian group Galbani, and in 2008, bought Swiss cheesemaker Baer. They bought Italian group Parmalat in a ...
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Gabon
Gabon (; ; snq, Ngabu), officially the Gabonese Republic (french: République gabonaise), is a country on the west coast of Central Africa. Located on the equator, it is bordered by Equatorial Guinea to the northwest, Cameroon to the north, the Republic of the Congo on the east and south, and the Gulf of Guinea to the west. It has an area of nearly and its population is estimated at million people. There are coastal plains, mountains (the Cristal Mountains and the Chaillu Massif in the centre), and a savanna in the east. Since its independence from France in 1960, the sovereign state of Gabon has had three presidents. In the 1990s, it introduced a multi-party system and a democratic constitution that aimed for a more transparent electoral process and reformed some governmental institutions. With petroleum and foreign private investment, it has the fourth highest HDI in the region (after Mauritius, Seychelles and South Africa) and the fifth highest GDP per capita ( ...
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Kinshasa
Kinshasa (; ; ln, Kinsásá), formerly Léopoldville ( nl, Leopoldstad), is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, largest city of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Once a site of fishing and trading villages situated along the Congo River, Kinshasa is now one of the world's fastest growing megacity, megacities. The city of Kinshasa is also one of the DRC's Provinces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, 26 provinces. Because the administrative boundaries of the city-province cover a vast area, over 90 percent of the city-province's land is rural in nature, and the urban area occupies a small but expanding section on the western side. Kinshasa is Africa's third-largest metropolitan area after Cairo and Lagos. It is also the world's largest nominally Francophone urban area, with French being the language of government, education, media, public services and high-end commerce in the city, while Lingala is used as a ''lingua fr ...
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Mobutu Sese Seko
Mobutu Sese Seko Kuku Ngbendu Wa Za Banga (; born Joseph-Désiré Mobutu; 14 October 1930 – 7 September 1997) was a Congolese politician and military officer who was the president of Zaire from 1965 to 1997 (known as the Democratic Republic of the Congo from 1965 to 1971). He also served as Chairman of the Organisation of African Unity from 1967 to 1968. During the Congo Crisis, Mobutu, serving as Chief of Staff of the Army and supported by Belgium and the United States, deposed the democratically elected government of left-wing nationalist Patrice Lumumba in 1960. Mobutu installed a government that arranged for Lumumba's execution in 1961, and continued to lead the country's armed forces until he took power directly in a second coup in 1965. To consolidate his power, he established the Popular Movement of the Revolution as the sole legal political party in 1967, changed the Congo's name to ''Zaire'' in 1971, and his own name to Mobutu Sese Seko in 1972. Mobutu claimed th ...
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Laurent-Désiré Kabila
Laurent-Désiré Kabila () (27 November 1939 – 18 January 2001) or simply Laurent Kabila ( US: ), was a Congolese revolutionary and politician who was the third President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo from 1997 until his assassination in 2001. A longtime opponent of Mobutu Sese Seko, he led the Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Congo (ADFLC), a Rwandan and Ugandan-sponsored rebel group that invaded Zaire and overthrew Mobutu during the First Congo War from 1996 to 1997. Having now become the new president of the country, whose name was changed back to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kabila found himself in a delicate position as a puppet of his foreign backers. The following year, he ordered the departure of all foreign troops from the country to prevent a potential coup, leading to the Second Congo War in which his former Rwandan and Ugandan allies began sponsoring several rebel groups to overthrow him including the Rally for Congolese Dem ...
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Alliance Des Forces Démocratiques Pour La Libération Du Congo
The Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Congo-Zaire (ADFLC; french: Alliance des Forces Démocratiques pour la Libération du Congo-Zaïre; AFDL) was a coalition of Rwandan, Ugandan, Burundian, and Congolese dissidents, disgruntled minority groups, and nations that toppled Mobutu Sese Seko and brought Laurent-Désiré Kabila to power in the First Congo War. Although the group was successful in overthrowing Mobutu, the alliance fell apart after Kabila did not agree to be dictated by his foreign backers, Rwanda and Uganda, which marked the beginning of the Second Congo War in 1998. Background By the middle of 1996, the situation in eastern Zaire was simmering with tension. Following the Rwandan genocide in 1994, hundreds of thousands of ethnic Hutus had fled across the border into Zaire where they settled in large refugee camps. Many of those responsible for the genocide, the former Rwandan Armed Forces (FAR) and ''interahamwe'' militia, used the anonymity offere ...
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Ilebo
Ilebo, formerly known as Port-Francqui, is a town in Kasai province in the Democratic Republic of Congo, lying at the highest navigable point of the Kasaï River. It is an important transport hub for ferries to Kinshasa and trains to Lubumbashi. Overview Ilebo was founded in the 17th century as a trading center and residence of the local rulers. It flourished in the 19th century, and was prior to the arrival of the Belgians the largest settlement in the Central Congo with an estimated population of 5000 people. Ilebo was connected to other settlements via the river and several sand roads that were passable by porters. In 1901 the Belgian colonial administration renamed Ilebo Port-Francqui. The city rapidly grew under the Belgian colonial administration, especially after the railway line to Lubumbashi was opened. There were plans to extend the railway line to Kinshasa, and the construction of a bridge over the Kasai river began in 1935, but was stopped after the unfinished b ...
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