Lusaka. Lubumbashi. These two cities are only 550 KM apart from each other. Kindred spirits. Resource boomtowns, both more organized than the rest of their countries, both brimming with tons of development. This is a Southern African/Copperbeltish derby.
Which is the better city
/2 Lusaka is home to 2.7+ million people and is one of the fastest growing cities in Africa. Neglected while a part of a colonial federation with Zimbabwe + Malawi, the city has boomed since independence. Its an overstatement perhaps, but many adore the city's hospitality.
3/ Lubumbashi hosts 2.5+ million people and is the Congo you don't see on TV. Relatively prosperous, peaceful, and modernizing, with a continentally famed football team to boot in TP Mazembe(5X CAF champions). The city is host to a thriving resource economy.
4/ Lusaka from the 1960s through 1980s for many Southern Africans meant freedom. On the border of numerous white ruled states, Kaunda's Lusaka opened the door to activists, freedom fighters, and rebels. The Lusaka manifesto issued there was decades ahead of its time.
5/ Lubumbashi was initially set up by Belgian settlers in the early 20th century, who established vast copper mines there that would make Congo the talk f the world's resource community. Lubumbashi would in time emerge to represent the hub of Katanga in Congo.
6/ Lusaka at this point is not only the economic engine of Zambia but also in many ways its cosmopolitan heart. Due to the broader One Zambia, One Nation agenda, there has overtimes emerged specific citywide slang/form of speaking that is truly a Lusakan creation.
7/ Lubumbashi Pics
8/ Lusaka Pics
9/ Lubumbashi Streetscape
Sleepy roads, nicely organized, the traditional Congolese beats on this video lulled me into a pleasant nap.
10/ Lusaka Streetscape
African Boomtown! Energy on the streets, pleasant highrises emerging, traffic congestion at numerous points. Growing pains of a city emerging.
11/ Vote Lusaka if you want a taste of Nairobi thirty years ago, and a city growing quickly out of a former sleepiness towards becoming one of the continent's major hubs.
Vote Lubumbashi if you want a taste of the grandeur of Congolese culture with stability and modernization.
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