Kinshasa, February 20st, 2023 (CPA).- The film « Simon Kimbangu » by director Ndungi Mambimbi alias Masumu Debrindet, is scheduled for this Tuesday, February 21st, 2023 at 3 pm in the auditorium of the Centre Wallonie-Bruxelles in Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of Congo, confirmed by Masumu Debrindet, on Monday to CPA.
« Through this feature film, I intend to preserve the memory, perpetuate our own history for future generations. This is the mission of the film « Simon Kimbangu », he said.
He continued: « It is a great joy for me. It is the crowning achievement of my artistic career to play the leading role in this film, but also as a director, to produce a faithful biography of Simon Kimbangu, as told to me by the leaders of the Kimbanguist Church ».
« I am somewhat revolted by the fact that in the Catholic schools where I studied, I was taught about extraordinary warriors but never about our realities. I grew up in Central Kongo, at a boarding school. The name Kimbangu was never mentioned, it was a fact. And when I found out, I said to myself that it was an injustice to let a whole story go by without talking about it, ». said director Masumu Debrindet, who plays the lead role of Simon Kimbangu.
Masumu Debrindet immortalizes the mission of Simon Kimbangu, who was considered as a troublemaker by the colonial power of the time because of his revolutionary movement to awaken the consciousness of the black people. In this film, Kimbangu’s story is told over two years, in 1920 and 1921, in Leopoldville (editor’s note: present-day Kinshasa), NKamba and other villages in the present-day province of Kongo-Central, under colonial rule.
At that time, Simon Kimbangu was unable to fulfil his divine and political mission revealed by God. He healed the sick, preached and was eventually sentenced to life imprisonment by his executioners. According to the speaker, history remembers Simon Kimbangu as the precursor of African independence. « It is important that people know this. My struggle is that the public has the true version of our history, » said Simon Kimbangu. CPA/
