Education

In 1952, he started primary school at the Catholic Mission of Bosobolo (Mission catholique de Bosobolo).

As a young adult Dungia worked for a short while before continuing his studies. He then gets hired by the Advance for Home Funds (Maisons des Fonds d’avance) service. Unhappy with the job, Dungia returns to studying, enrolling at Lovanium University (université Lovanium), where he is admitted in the Trade section of the Economics Faculty.

Dungia then became professor of mathematics at the Lumumba Athenaeum (Athénée Lumumba) in the municipality of Limete in Kinshasa. Shortly after resuming studies in his second year at university, he obtained a scholarship from the European Common Market to study commercial engineering. In the fall of 1969–70, Dungia was admitted at the University of Louvain (UCLouvain).

In 1977, he graduated from commercial and financial sciences at the Saint-Louis Higher Institute of Commerce (Institut supérieur de Commerce Saint-Louis) in Brussels.

Intelligence services

Emmanuel Dungia, Israel 1985

In February 1978, Emmanuel Dungia left Belgium to return permanently to Zaïre where shortly after his return he was hired in the Finance administration department as an Inspector of Finance.

Dungia obtained his position in the intelligence services through acquaintances at the University of Leuven, who introduced him to Seti Yale,^[3] at the time the chief of the Zairian security service. Dungia reported that later that he realized that Seti's action might have been dictated by the need to collect some information on his rival in leadership around Mobutu, Honoré Ngbanda.^[4]

After training in the Zairian intelligence services for a month, Dungia was first assigned as assistant, then as the head of security at the Ndjili International Airport. In 1979, he was transferred to the central management research department (service d’études à la direction centrale).

Diplomatic assignments in Europe

Dungia was sent on diplomatic missions to Paris (1980–81), Brussels (1981–86) and the Vatican (1986–89). In 1989, he returned to Kinshasa working as a liaison security agent under the official title of diplomatic adviser to Foreign Minister Nguza Karl-I-Bond. However, since 1986 Dungia had grown uncomfortable with Mobutu's management system that he referred to as "criminal".

In April 1990, Mobutu's political regime evolved into a multi-party system. After the formation of the first transitional government, the Minister's Office of Nguza gives way to that of Mushobekwa Kalimba Wa Katana.^[5] However, Dungia refused to reinstate the security service as a result of the latter cabinet restructuring.

First exile and publications

Page couverture du livre La pieuvre tropicale. Les tentacules de Mobutu à Bruxelles

After having completed the manuscript of his book Mobutu et l’argent du Zaïre, which went on sale on 28 January 1992, he prepated himself for exile in Belgium. The book becomes an international success,^[6] but Dungia accused the director of l’Harmattan, the published, of systematically deceiving authors (especially Africans) on the number of works printed and sold. The book had been used by participants of the Conference on National Sovereignty (Conférence nationale souveraine).

In 1995, Dungia lived under police protection in Belgium with his children. In September of that year he accepted a job at a non-profit organization dealing with people with psychological problems, prisoners and aliens seeking a positive resolution of their immigration status in Belgium.

He also published The tropical octopus. The instruments of Mobutu (La pieuvre tropicale. Les tentacules de Mobutu), a lesser success than his first book.

Arrest and 2nd exile

On 19 February 2001, Dungia was arrested by the security department of the Presidential Guard on allegations of being involved in a plot to overthrow the new president Joseph Kabila. Eleven officers of the Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of Congo. He was transferred to Makala prison.^[8] On 13 September 2001, Dungia is "acquitted" by the Military Court due to international pressure.

With the assistance of the Voice of the voiceless (Voix des sans-voix), one of the non-governmental organizations that had supported the cause of the prisoners unjustly accused in the trial, Dungia attempted to make the ireegularities in the trial public, but the event was prohibited under threat by the Military Court. Dungia instead published the text of his statement in the paper La Tempête des Tropiques on September 28, 2001. The Congolese government tried to abduct him one night in the Protestant Center where he had settled with his wife upon his release from prison. In April 2002, he fled with his wife to Brazzaville.

Family background

Emmanuel Dungia was born Emmanuel Dedetemo. De de te mo translates literally into Ngbaka by doing to yourself. Figuratively, one interpretation would be: Take care of yourself without letting anyone influence you.

The name DUNGIA comes from NDUNGIA, from which the "N" letter was removed in 1957 when changes to make Congolese surnames uniform and legal were implemented by the colonial authority. Ndungia exists in the Ngbaka tribe, but is not commonly used and its significance is unknown. The Belgian colonial authority procedures were overturned by colonel Mobutu in 1967 when he introduced the concept of authentic Congolese nationalism or authentic Zairian revolution whose sole purpose was to erase the colonial history of the country.

Emmanuel Dungia was the father of 4 children.

In 1998 Dungia married for the second time but his wife would be fatally struck by sudden illness in November 2004, a few months after their return from Brazzaville.

Health and death

During his stay in South Africa between 1997 and 1998 Dungia was diagnosed with cancer that might have developed as early as 1995. It was thought to be a benign cancer that could be treated successfully. Without treatment he was expected to live only another 5 years.

Dungia had aversion, if not an extreme fright of hospitals and especially surgical rooms, and could not stand the sight of blood. As a consequence, he failed to follow his treatment as advised until 2005 when he was forced to return to Brussels for medical care that ultimately proved unsuccessful.

He died on 1 February 2006.