Born: 15 August 1945, The Congo
Died: NA
Country most active: The Congo
Also known as: Wassis Hortense Léonie Abo
Congolese writer and activist Léonie Abo is best known for her role in the 1963-65 Kwilu rebellion.
The word Abo means “sorrow” or “mourning” in Bambunda, and was given to her after her mother died in childbirth. Growing up, she saw her adoptive father beating her adoptive mother with a stick, including breaking her arm. She entered into an arranged marriage with an abusive man when she was just 14 in 1959. Trained as a midwife, she was already supervising births by age 14. Less than three years later, her husband took her and a man he accused of being her lover to court in 1962, and she was jailed for a month. In 1963, she was lured to a rebel stronghold under the lie that her brother was ill and needed her, and initially held against her will. Pierre Mulele, leader of the rebellion, wanted her for her medical knowledge and skills. She subsequently married him, but was dismayed when he took a second wife and planned to take a third. After he was executed in 1968, she was imprisoned, and later lived in exile until the regime fell in 1997. The biography Abo: Une femme du Congo by Ludo Martens was published in 1995, and a documentary film was later released with the same title.