It was over several months I was moderating a WhatsApp group for people heading south down through the West African coast for a Facebook group. Totally in my own time, using my knowledge and obviously unpaid I tried to assist other travellers through the minefield of red tape through West Africa.
What evolved I couldn't have made up, had nightmares about or lived through.
In early October, a world-travelled German couple settled down for the night in their pick-up camper on the outskirts of Boma, DRC, unfortunately next to a cemetary. They were rudely disturbed by 4 masked men brandishing machetes and rudimentary flaming torches, banging on the side of the vehicle and apparently threatening to set the fuel tank alight! The owner went out and used pepper spray which caught two of them and a 3rd apparently ran away, sadly the owner was murdered that night.
The aftermath was horrendous, despite not being on the ground but trying to support and coordinate the situation from home, it chilled me to the bone. However, it created a friendship with people I've never met who were instrumental in helping the widow of the murdered traveller. They had already met the couple several years ago in Venezuela and managed to catch up with them in West Africa. The night the murder took place in Boma, they were in a nearby town, fortunately.
The body was taken to the morgue but the situation with the perpetrators had escalated. A woman had been raped the same day, under the alleged threat of 'the same treatment as the white man' if she didn't concede. Meanwhile the widow and friends, none of whom spoke fluent French were waiting in a hotel in Boma for consular assistance, opposite the police station where the main suspect was being held. See more in this French blog post: Assassins du touriste allemand aux arrêts
The German Embassy in Kinshasa were in contact but German public holidays were obviously of more importance as 'Unity Day' celebrations meant that they couldn't make it to Boma. They had said they were going to travel to Boma but late in the afternoon of that day, they announced they weren't coming. Luckily the widow and friends weren't aware that there was an Embassy party going on in Kinshasa where rumours ruled; the murderer was a soldier, the Embassy was going to organise the shipment of the vehicle back to Europe (I'd already contacted shipping companies in Matadi and the couple had organised it all on the ground). When the widow called the Embassy to ask about progress getting herself home the answer was 'We are not a travel agency' it was all nonsense!
After almost a week, these wonderful new friends who had organised everything, dispatched the widow on a flight from Boma to Kinshasa to connect onto a flight home to her family in Germany. The vehicle was ready to be shipped to Belgium (although due to German import tax it's now somewhere in the Atlantic heading for the USA) and the body was finally released by the Mayor who didn't want any trouble and was probably trying to cover things up. A lot of this was also thanks to a wonderful Dutch man in South Africa with Congolese contacts, so a lot of noise was made in the higher echelons of the DRC government. Luckily the widow left DRC with an expired visa but yet again this gentleman stepped in and sent a lawyer to the airport in case she had more dramas to live through!
Just over a month later, his widow is back in Germany trying to put her life back together after over 30 years of marriage but is determined to continue travelling, she's a brave lady! The couple that helped her I'm dying to meet, amazing people who sent me a birthday video last month which had me in tears; we keep in regular contact via WhatsApp! Although I'm rather jealous, they met up with the Dutch man in South Africa for a coffee earlier this week and will be flying home tomorrow ...
Nothing ever prepares you for travel in Africa! However, this was a very unfortunate one-off incident in the western part of DRC which is generally safe ... It's often better to be surrounded by walls at night in regions like this, but so many others who have driven through have camped similarly!
I wish my new friends bon voyage on their flight home tomorrow and hope one day we can meet!!!
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