TV program: “Congo-Ocean, a railway of blood” on Histoire TV, a dream turned into a nightmare

TV STORY – WEDNESDAY, JULY 2 AT 8:50 PM – DOCUMENTARY

When the Congo-Ocean line was inaugurated on July 10, 1934, it fulfilled France's dream of being able to transport the riches extracted in its colonies to mainland France. In the first archive images, a young white woman wearing a white hat poses, smiling, in unison with a colonization that then considered itself "civilizing." For director Catherine Bernstein, this railway symbolizes "the devastating power of the colonial system."

After several documentaries on the spoliation of Jewish property – Murder of a Milliner, in 2005, After the War, Restitutions , in 2015; on the Final Solution and life in the camps; or on the role of the SNCF during the Occupation , in 2019 – Catherine Bernstein continues to denounce the crimes of the past.

But this time on another continent, since she returns to the tragic construction, between 1921 and 1934, of the 512 kilometers of railway between Brazzaville and the port of Pointe-Noire which is said to have cost the lives of at least 17,000 Africans. Honored at the end of June with a "star" by the jury of SCAM (Civil Society of Multimedia Authors), her documentary is rebroadcast on Histoire TV.

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