First Prime Minister of the Independent Republic of Congo. He founded the Congolese National Movement (MNC). Lumumba pointed out that the Congo would not be able to throw off its colonial shackles unless its people united. The Belgian colonial power naturally protested, as the trans-national corporations that dominated over one of the world's regions abounding in raw materials was at stake. When in 1959 the popular revolts and demands for independence became ever more unequivocal in defiance of the colonialists' unbridled rule of terror, Belgium had to modify its policy. Demonstrations and strikes in its colony, which it was no longer able to smash, plus a broad international wave of solidarity forced it to the negotiating table. Irrespective of his renewed arrest the colonial authorities did not succeed in silencing Lumumba. Due to sustained protests they head to release their fiercest and most persistent opponent. During parliamentary elections in May 1960, the MNC, which was under his leadership, became the country's strongest party. Lumumba became the new government's prime minister and following the country's independence on 30 June 1960 took a marked anti-imperialist line. The young republic in the heart of Africa where, in Lumumba's view, political independence was not to be an end in itself but the prerequisite for thorough social and economic changes and which wanted to pursue a non-aligned foreign policy, immediatly brought the domestic and foreign reactionaires into the arena, who, finally, under the guidance of the CIA translated their long-cherished plans into bitter reality. Patrice Lumumba had become the victim of an insidious imperialist plot. The pioneer of African unity died after being torture on the nights from 17 to 18, January 1961, in Elisabethville. The promising country was turned into a neocolonial state.