History
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To the contemporary visitor, Mayumba comes across as a sleepy backwater town, and the Park as an uninhabited tract of primary forest and untouched coast. However things were not always this way. The land has a long and checkered human history, and many parts that seem wild now, were once thriving villages and centers of commerce. The pre-European colonization human footprint is faint in tropical Africa, but we know from archeological evidence that the coast of Gabon was well populated during the Neolithic period between 5000 and 2000 years BP. Coastal dwellers have left us middens of oyster shells, and many discarded stone tools as proof of their occupancy of the land. The year of 1472 saw the first meeting of African and European in Gabon, followed by the successive and overlapping presence of Portuguese, French, Dutch, and English traders, explorers, and missionaries. The principal interest of the Europeans during this time was the Africans themselves, and the coast in the south of the Park, around Banda Point became a large and thriving slave trading site, with a human cargo from the south and the interior arriving for re-sale and loading onto slave ships bound for the Americas. |
The eventual abolition of slavery by Western nations did not end this practice in the area, and for many years afterwards salt produced on the coast was trekked into the interior and exchanged for slaves that typically worked for their owners in the plantations, and in any other task required. At this time, many European trading companies set up business in the Mayumba area, and it was not uncommon to come across French, and particularly English trading posts in camps along the Banio lagoon. The principal exports were timber, ivory and rubber. Missionaries came to save souls, and a French colonial administration eventually took responsibility for managing the area, and the country. During the early part of the 20th century, there was a telegraph link from Mayumba to Pointe Noire in Congo (the old rusting steel pylons can still be seen dotting the Park's southern savannas, and the post was carried between these two towns, and thus to all corners of the region by fast foot couriers. One of these gentlemen still lives in Mayumba and astonishes listeners with tales of how he made this 440km round trip several times a month for 17 years, sometime carrying mail, and at other times with a sack of coffee on his shoulders. A ruthless approach to managing the local population ensured that resistance to the administration was slight, and many of Mayumba's older residents tell of how their parents took to living in tiny camps hidden back from the Banio Lagoon, in order to avoid the regular patrols of the militia who rounded up residents for 15 day bouts of forced labor. The ‘fruits' of this labor included a stone road leading from Mayumba southwards towards the Congo . Remnants of the road can still be seen a few kilometers south of the town. |
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Reminders of the colonial administration can be found dotted around Mayumba town, including the crumbling house of the one-time governor for French Central Africa . The newly built government buildings on one of Mayumba's three central hills stand alongside the now decaying French Administration buildings and an old mango tree that was once used as a lookout post over Panga Bay. There are also several unusual graveyards in the area, including one near the Beninois fishing community at l'Office, bearing testimony to voyagers, missionaries and traders from America, Germany, and England who succumbed to malaria or were lost at sea. The most intact colonial architecture is the wonderful Catholic Mission of Sainte Esprit, which perches atop a small hill on the interior side of the lagoon, looking down upon the ferry crossing and the Safari Club Hotel. Established in 1888, it remains the best preserved mission of its kind in southern Gabon, and is still in use today. A boarding school for local children was established here that taught the tenets of the faith, literacy, and trade skills such as brick-making. The life was disciplined and demanding, but gave many local children a chance to move out into the wider community and eventually take prominent roles in society. Schoolchildren still attend classes here, and the charming Chapel still holds regular Mass. A visit is thoroughly recommended. |
In 1895 the Islamic holy man, teacher, poet and visionary, Sheikh Amadou Bamba, was exiled to Mayumba from French controlled Senegal for his ‘dangerous' views. He remained here for seven years, and continued his writing and spiritual contemplation before his followers managed to secure his return to Senegal. He died in 1927, but the movement that grew around him, the Mouride Brotherhood, now numbers over one million followers. To this day, pilgrimages are made to Mayumba to mark his stay in the settlement.
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