Catalogue Number
NMLH.1994.168.624
Object Name
Poster
Title
OSPAAL day of Solidarity with the congo
Place
Congo
People
OSPAAAL
Events
Congolese Independence
Date
1960
Description
Screen-printed a3 poster - colourful and bright with red, black, white and green. There are red and black patterns on the background which form a face - one of the eyes in the face shows a hand with a knife cutting the chains of two hands tied together. On top of this facial design there is a printed figure holding a spear. The bottom of the poster says "Jornada de Solidaridad Con El Congo (L)/13 De Febrero - Day of Solidarity with the Congo (L) February 13 - Journee De Soldarite Avec Le Congo (L)/13 Fevrier." There is also a translation in Arabic.
This poster is calling for solidarity with Congo - this is most likely an anti-imperialist, pro-independence sentiment, as Congo was colonised by Belgium until 1960, and after this the country and its governance remained unstable. In 1996 the first Congo War started in which the country was impacted by the Rwandan Genocide and their military. The bottom right of the poster says "OSPAAAL" and shows a logo of the world with a gun. This poster was issued by OSPAAAL, the Organization of Solidarity with the People of Asia, Africa and Latin America. It was a Cuban political movement with the stated purpose of fighting globalisation, imperialism, neoliberalism and defending human rights. The OSPAAAL was founded in Havana in January 1966, after the Tricontinental Conference, a meeting of over 500 delegates and 200 observers from over 82 countries.
Acting as the "key bridge" to unite liberation struggles and movements in the three continents, OSPAAAL's main objective is the promotion of anti-imperialism and socialism.[1] The Organization of American States (OAS) called OSPAAAL "the most dangerous threat that international communism has yet made against the inter-American system". OSPAAAL's motto was "This great humanity has said: enough! And has started to move forward". Until 2019, it published the magazine Tricontinental as their main transnational communication tool. After the closing of OSPAAAL by the Cuban Government, the Tricontinental Institute for Social Research seeks to continue the heritage of the Tricontinental conference and the organization. They "stand, in the words of Franz Fanon, with the wretched of the earth to create a world of human beings."
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