Catalog
1000 Francs 'Moise Tshombé'
| Issuer | Banque Nationale du Katanga |
|---|---|
| Year | 1960 |
| Type | Standard circulation banknote |
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|---|---|
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| Reverse description | The reverse presents an oval guilloche vignette at left enclosing a circular modern building rendered in blue intaglio, counterbalanced by a rectangular guilloche panel at right containing the denomination numeral '1000'. The bank title 'BANQUE NATIONALE DU KATANGA' is printed across the upper right, with 'MILLE FRANCS' and 'PAYABLES À VUE' inscribed in the lower portion. |
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| Variants | P#10a - issued note P#10r - remainder without serial #, date and |
| Comments |
The Banque Nationale du Katanga was itself an act of political defiance — established within weeks of Katanga's unilateral secession from the newly independent Congo in July 1960, under Moïse Tshombé's leadership and with significant backing from Union Minière du Haut Katanga, the Belgian mining conglomerate that had every financial reason to keep Katanga's copper revenues outside Léopoldville's reach. Thomas De La Rue's involvement gave the currency an immediate veneer of institutional legitimacy that the breakaway state badly needed.
The secession collapsed in January 1963 under UN military pressure, making the entire note series short-lived. Survival rates vary considerably across denominations, with higher values seeing less everyday handling.