Rudolf Douala Manga Bell

Who is Rudolf Douala Manga Bell?

Rudolf Douala Manga Bell was king (paramount chief) of the Bonanjo clan of the Duala people, an ethnic group centered on the port city of Douala on Cameroon's coast. He inherited leadership from a lineage that included his grandfather, King Bell, who had signed the 1884 treaty placing Duala territory under German protection at the start of the German colonial period. Educated partly in Germany, Manga Bell initially cooperated with the colonial administration, but relations broke down after 1910 when the German governor proposed forcibly relocating the Duala population away from the Wouri riverfront to build segregated European residential and rail zones. Manga Bell organized formal protests and petitions to the German authorities and the Reichstag, arguing that the relocation plan violated the 1884 protection treaty and Duala land rights. The German administration responded by accusing him of treason and of conspiring with rival colonial powers. He was arrested, tried by a German court in Douala, and executed by hanging on 8 August 1914, shortly after the outbreak of the First World War. He is remembered in Cameroon as an early martyr of anti-colonial resistance and a defender of indigenous land rights.

Sources: Africanews, "Rudolf Douala Manga Bell: A play of the Cameroonian king who defied German tyranny" (2021) · Black Central Europe, "Rudolf Duala Manga Bell (c. 1873-1914)" · ToleranzRäume, "Rudolf Manga Bell"