African Entrepreneurship Record

Chapter 78: Chapter 74: ”Rectification” Movement

In response to Ernst’s directive.

Starting from April 3, 1867, after several meetings by the East African colonial government officials, a one-year ”cleansing” campaign was decided to be implemented.

The literal meaning already reveals that the so-called ”cleansing” targets the indigenous within the colony, organizing and purging the unstable elements in East Africa.

And these unstable elements are the local indigenous and tribes.

To mobilize the entire manpower of the East African colony to complete this operation, the colonial government directly assigned tasks to each immigrant station according to region.

Each station carried its own provisions to besiege the indigenous and tribes around the villages and towns.

...

Kagongo Town is a town under Kigoma, in the area of Soron Lake (Lake Tanganyika).

Today, Kagongo Town posted the announcement of the ”cleansing” campaign issued by the East African colonial government on the bulletin board in the village.

The immigrants knew the purpose of the bulletin board, whenever there is a major move, the colonial government posts the corresponding policies and directives here.

All official documents of the colony are written in German, as the highest educated group in the East African colony, the German mercenaries, have undisputed authority with their primary education.

Only the students of the Heixinggen Military Academy and the African management personnel dispatched by the Heixinggen Consortium have relatively higher education.

But they also consider themselves Germans at heart, classifying themselves along with the mercenary team as one kind of people.

In short, in the East African colony, the German-speaking group is a unified group and belongs to the ruling class.

Even Chinese immigrants and immigrants from the Austrian Empire, as long as they speak German, will be arranged in important positions and seen as one of their own.

The simple economic structure of the East African colony means that the personnel composing the various levels of governmental agencies do not need strong abilities.

The simple economic structure and the straightforward collective management model of the colony also only allow a crude set of legal operations mode.

After all, besides agriculture, the colony almost has no other industries, everyone operates according to company indicators, works at sunrise, and rests at sunset, with no surplus entertainment industry.

Under the simple lifestyle, economic crimes have no market in the current East African colony, the immigrants are honest peasants and stringent retired soldiers, with no soil for ”anti-intellectual” ideologies to survive.

Kagongo Town government, bulletin board.

In the morning, government staff displayed freshly issued German documents in the wooden bulletin board.

Unlike usual, the announcer did not appear to lecture on the new policy contents.

Several immigrants gathered under the bulletin board, discussing the contents above.

”Old Liu, what’s written up here?”

”You ask me, I ask who? I only recognize the words ’village’, ’gun’, and ’expel’ above. I guess it must be a fight, nine times out of ten.”

Old Liu knows these few words, thanks to their high-frequency use in the East African colony, especially as new immigrants all undergo a short period of military training.

That is, during military training, instructors will teach some simple and necessary vocabulary.

While the immigrants were still guessing what was written above.

A soldier dressed in colonial military attire walked to the bulletin board, picked up the bugle pinned to his waist, and started to play.

”Wuuu... Wuuu... Wuuu...”

Other townspeople also began to gather near the bulletin board following the rallying call of the East African colony, the discussion grew, and the area under the bulletin board became a hubbub of voices.

Before long, the mayor and the civil and military officials of Kagongo Town arrived together, soldiers began setting up the meeting venue.

A small wooden platform was temporarily set up, soldiers invited the mayor and others on stage to speak.

The mayor of Kagongo Town, Go Xin Kusi, strode onto the stage with his big belly and began interpreting the latest orders from the colonial government.

The military officer, Carson Block (a student of the Heixinggen Military Academy) held a megaphone responsible for translation.

”Townspeople, just yesterday, we received instructions from our superiors in the East African colonial government.”

The audience below was silent, everyone listened attentively to the mayor’s speech, as matters in the bulletin board usually closely relate to themselves.

”To strengthen the security management level of the colony, preventing the savages (the official term used by the East African colonial government for indigenous people) from causing damage and threats to the production and life of the colony.”

”Every village and town under the jurisdiction of the colonial government should conduct a cleansing, to arrest, besiege, and destroy the savages and their tribes within their jurisdiction.”

The crowd started whispering among themselves.

”This means they are going to hit the indigenous hard again!”

”Definitely, otherwise, where did we get land to farm, wasn’t it all taken?”

”What do you mean taken! The indigenous here don’t live off farming, these are barren lands, we came here to cultivate them, and the land hasn’t been named, isn’t it who cultivates it, owns it?”

”Exactly, those indigenous have no use for this land, hunting can be done anywhere, this land meant for growing crops is not for raising lions, leopards, and jackals.”

The immigrants feel no burden psychologically, the discussion of right and wrong is too distant for the farmers scraping a living on this land, filling their stomachs is much more tangible than any righteousness or morality.

They all come from feudal countries and countries transitioning towards industrial ones, their mindset naturally remains in the feudal era’s peasant mentality.

On the vast lands of the East African colony, although Black people are the native residents, the first government in East Africa was indeed the colonial government.

And only the government can grant the nature of landownership, don’t believe it? Look at the indigenous, they only know to live on this land, their concept of the land’s nature is limited to where they can hunt and where they can gather fruits.

The immigrants have land ownership concepts, all lands in East Africa belong to the private property of the Heixinggen Consortium.

And the status of immigrants lies between peasant slaves and industrial workers, with no power to choose but their basic human rights are guaranteed by law.

Although the East African colony has no courts or judicial bodies, the default implementation of Prussian law exists, just without concrete execution.

Rule by the people and rule of law coexist, which is the current situation in the East African colony, similar to Liu Bang’s ”three Chapters of law” with the people, or Rome’s Twelve Tables.

There is a specific yet ambiguous boundary.

...

The mayor continued: ”To respond to the government’s call, our Kagongo Town must also organize manpower to besiege Kagongo Town and its surroundings.”

With the issuance of this order, Kagongo Town and its subordinate villages conscripted over a thousand temporary soldiers, equipped them with weapons, to cooperate with the government of Kigoma and its subordinate villages to carry out the ”cleansing” campaign in the entire area of Soron Lake.

For a time, gunshots rang out throughout the Soron Lake area and the East African colony, turning the entire place into a battlefield.