Festival sends pygmy musicians to live at the zoo

A TROUPE of pygmy musicians performing at a music festival in the Congo Republic were made to live at the zoo before being provided with accommodation in a local school.

The plight of the 22 pygmies, whose tents became an attraction for curious zoo visitors, provoked outrage among civil rights groups in Congo.

All the other musicians playing at the July 8-14 FESPAM festival in Brazzaville were provided with hotel rooms.

Pygmies, not all of whom are below average height, are believed to be the earliest inhabitants of Central Africa. They live in the forests of Congo, its larger neighbour the Democratic Republic of Congo, as well as in other countries such as Cameroon and Burundi.

Officials said they offered the accommodation on the forested zoo grounds so the 10 women, nine men and one baby would feel more at home.

Congo’s director of arts and culture Yvette Lebondzo said: “It’s not a case of discrimination. We lodged them in the park near running water and a forest simply because that will remind them of their usual surroundings — which is the forest.”

The pygmies, from Congo’s north-east Likouala forest region, had been gathering wood to prepare fires to cook their food, often with tourists snapping photos of them.

Congolese Justice and Human Rights Minister Aime Emmanuel Yocka ordered their relocation.

Pygmies often complain of being marginalised and treated with disrespect by governments in central Africa, while their jungle habitat is destroyed.

The term pygmy, introduced by European explorers, refers to various ethnic groups of central Africa whose adults are shorter than 1.5 metres.