The theft of the bust of the author of cult comics was associated with the “act of decolonization”

Finding Hergé’s missing bust would be a fitting task for Tintin, the fearless Belgian boy reporter, and his versatile, intuitive dog Snowball.

Throughout Brussels, birthplace of Hergé, creator of the comics of the same name, there are constant reminders of one of Belgium’s most famous exports. A giant image of the character clinging to a steam locomotive from Tintin in America adorns one of the city’s Eurostar station exits, while a mural of Tintin, his sailor friend Captain Haddock and Snowy covers the front of a house just over a mile away. .

But less than 10 days ago, Hergé’s bust, located in a quiet residential area away from the tourist trails, disappeared, leading to speculation that the monument was the victim of a growing decolonization movement.

It was later revealed that the mayor of the local municipality of Etterbeek decided to remove the sculpture of the cartoonist, whose real name was Georges Remy, after the glass box that covered it for safety was severely damaged.

Hergé created Tintin as a serial comic in the 1920s in Le Petit Vingtième, the youth supplement of the weekly Catholic newspaper Le Vingtième Siècle, The Observer recalls.

After the success of the first story, Tintin in the Land of the Soviets, Hergé was asked to send a boy reporter to the Belgian Congo (later Zaire and now the Democratic Republic of the Congo), a Central African colony that was then controlled by Brussels.

In the original 1931 comic Tintin in the Congo, a character was teaching a group of children about “their homeland” Belgium.

In 2012, a Brussels court rejected a legitimate attempt by a Congolese political science student at a Belgian university to have the book banned.

Bienvenue Mbutu Mondondo, who has campaigned for years to have the book removed from Belgian shops, has claimed that the comic depicts locals, including a scene where a black woman bows down to Tintin, exclaiming: “The white man is very big. White mister is big juju!”. The plaintiff considers such images to be “ignorant and offensive.”

It was not until the turn of the century, with the publication of The Ghost of King Leopold: A History of Greed, Terror and Heroism in Colonial Africa, in 1998 by American historian Adam Hochschild that Belgium began to seriously challenge its colonial legacy in the Congo.

Belgian King Leopold II declared the Congo his personal colony in 1885. In the following two decades, an estimated 10 million Congolese were either killed or worked to death, while women were systematically raped. Leopold’s private army robbed the country of its natural resources, making him – and Belgium – rich in the process.

Before his death, Hergé said that he regretted the way he portrayed the Congo, but denied that it was dictated by racist views, but simply reflected the way Africa was portrayed in Europe in the 1920s.

The mayor of Etterbeck says the dispute over Belgium’s relationship with its former colony has nothing to do with the damage done to Te Square, where a waist-high plinth now stands alone next to a convenience store and a condom vending machine.

“The mayor doesn’t think it’s related to colonialism,” his spokeswoman said. “He really thinks it was because of the value of the bust. The black market pays a lot of money for such things,” she said, noting that the statue is made of bronze.

Etterbeek city officials said they are deeply proud of Hergé, who was born in the municipality and lived there for 20 years.

“Hergé is extremely important to Etterbeck. He was born here, he grew up here and he is a Belgian icon and author of one of the most famous comics. There are a lot of comic book writers working in Etterbeck today and it’s important for us to show that it’s a good place for culture. We are really investing in the culture here and in artists like him,” the spokeswoman said.

Asked if the plinth would be changed to make it inaccessible to future would-be thugs, she said the mayor was adamant that it should remain visible to everyone, including children.

“He really wants to return it to the same place. It is a symbol of the area and was originally installed there in consultation with the family.”