In 1958, he and a group of Katangese concerned about domination of their province by people from the neighbouring Kasaï region founded the Confederation of Tribal Associations of Katanga (CONAKAT), a regionalist political party.

Tshombe was later made Prime Minister of the Congo while Kimba joined the General Association of the Baluba of the Katanga (BALUBAKAT) party.

Kimba formed a government of national unity and spent the following weeks attempting to achieve rapprochement between the Congo and other African states.

However, his government failed to obtain a vote of confidence from Parliament, though Kasa-Vubu reappointed Kimba to the premiership in the face of determined opposition from Tshombe's supporters.

On 25 November Army Commander-in-Chief Joseph-Désiré Mobutu launched a coup removing both him and Kasa-Vubu from power and assumed control of the presidency.

Évariste Kimba was born on 16 July 1926 in the village of Nsaka, Bukama Territory, Katanga Province, Belgian Congo.

After receiving a basic primary and middle education Kimba, like his father, worked on the railroad, but continued his studies, taking night classes at St. Boniface Institute in sociology, law, and political economy.

[4] Kimba took up journalism in 1954 when he began writing for the Essor du Congo in Élisabethville,[5] a conservative, pro-colonial newspaper which covered Katangese affairs.

[2] In February 1957 Kimba and a group of other young Katangese concerned about domination of their province by people from the neighbouring Kasaï region met to discuss the political future of Katanga.

[8] In the spring of 1960 Walter Ganshof van der Meersch was appointed the Belgian Minister of African Affairs and sent to the Congo to oversee its transition to independence.

[15] In December, Kimba accompanied Tshombe to a conference with leaders of the national Congolese government in Brazzaville to discuss political reconciliation.

[19] In exchange for their liberation, the two men signed an agreement with the Congolese government declaring that representatives from Katangese constituencies would appear in the next session of Parliament.

[7] That year Tshombe was welcomed back into the country and made Prime Minister at the helm of a transitional government tasked with suppressing a leftist insurrection in the eastern Congo.

After this was largely accomplished, general elections took place in 1965 and Tshombe's new coalition organisation, the Convention Nationale Congolaise (CONACO) won a majority of the seats in Parliament.

[7] Shortly before Parliament was due to reopen, the strength of CONACO faltered, and an anti-Tshombe coalition, the Front Democratique Congolais (FDC), was formed.

[30] Kimba's government was more nationalistic than Tshombe's administration[31] and aimed to curb Western influence in Congolese affairs;[32] it was markedly less amicable towards Belgian interests.

[30] On 25 November, Army Commander-in-Chief Joseph-Désiré Mobutu, who had previously supported Kimba, launched a coup removing both him and Kasa-Vubu from power and assumed control of the presidency.

[39] In May 1966 Kimba and former government ministers Jérôme Anany, Emmanuel Bamba, and Alexandre Mahamba were arrested by Mobutu's security forces while attending a meeting with military officials.

[44] Some time after Kimba's death, the Avenue des Chutes in Lubumbashi (formerly Élisabethville) was officially renamed in his honour, though the street is still usually referred to by its original name.