1000 Francs 'Moise Tshombé'

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.