Monument Léopold II
King Leopold II died in 1909, and as for many Kings of the Belgians, the Belgian authorities took the initiative, in 1914, to erect a statue in his honor. To do this, the Belgian State collected more than 625,000 Belgian francs. On 31 May 1914, the Belgian official journal and the press launched an appeal for anyone who wanted to contribute to erecting the statue. The initiative was successful, in which even Leopold’s successor, King Albert I, himself took part and responded to the appeal along with some citizens.
The statue’s construction, however, was delayed due to the First World War and it is necessary to wait until the end of the war for the work to be redesigned by the sculptor Thomas Vinçotte with the help of the architect François Malfait and the Union Minière du Haut-Katanga which, for its part, provided the raw material. The bronze statue was cast by the Compagnie des Bronzes de Bruxelles and was inaugurated on 15 November 1926, the feast day of the Dynasty, but also the patronal feast of Leopold II. This ceremony was marked by the presence of the entire Belgian Royal Family and the authorities who came in procession to the scene.
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