Antoine Gizenga was born on 5 October 1925 in the small village of Mbanze in present day Kwilu province in what was then the Belgian Congo.

[2] Inspired by the nationalist and Pan-Africanist ideas of Patrice Lumumba, the co-founder of the Mouvement National Congolais, Gizenga helped to organize the Parti Solidaire Africain (which was openly left leaning).

[3] In September, President Joseph Kasa-Vubu dismissed Lumumba and Gizenga from their positions for the former's decision to involve the Soviet Union in the Congo Crisis.

[3] Gizenga's government persisted for half the year and garnered diplomatic recognition from the Soviet Union, China, and Egypt, though it received no logistical support.

[2] In August, Gizenga agreed to rejoin the regular Congolese government as deputy prime minister, now under the leadership of Cyrille Adoula.

[2] In January 1962 the Congolese Assembly demanded that Gizenga return to Léopoldville to hear charges levied against him for leading a rebel government.

Gizenga then attempted to arrest Armée Nationale Congolaise Commander-in-Chief Victor Lundula and a UN official, both of whom were in Stanleyville to investigate the Kindu atrocity.

[6] Gizenga turned down an offer of UN protection and was eventually imprisoned on the island Bula Mbemba which lies in the mouth of the Congo River.

[4] In July 1964 Tshombe became prime minister and, as part of an attempted political reconciliation, ordered Gizenga's release.

[2] Over the next couple of years Gizenga traveled to Egypt, Guinea, Mali, and Ghana to solicit support for the fractured and crumbling anti-Mobutu movement.

In 1973 he briefly joined Laurent-Désiré Kabila's pro-China rebel group in eastern Zaire (as The Congo was then called), thereby losing Soviet support.

[9] According to the provisional election results of 20 August, he came in third place with 13.06 percent of the vote, after Joseph Kabila (Laurent-Désiré's son) and Jean-Pierre Bemba.

Reacting to the news, the opposition Movement for the Liberation of Congo (MLC) said that Gizenga's "resignation constitutes an admission of failure and negligence from a government which, after nearly two years, left the country in a general state of crisis".