Marie-Antoinette was an ethnic Ngbandi born in Banzyville (modern-day Mobayi-Mbongo) in the Équateur Province in c.1941, while the Congo was still under Belgian colonial rule.

She met and married Joseph-Désiré Mobutu, another Ngbandi, who was later on a non-commissioned officer in the Force Publique, during 1955 at the age of 14.

[1] That same year, she gave birth to their first son, Jean-Paul "Nyiwa".

[2][1] Marie Antoinette bore the most out of all of Mobutu's wives, a total of nine children: Marie-Antoinette died of heart failure on 22 October 1977 in Genolier, Switzerland, at the age of 36.

Her relatives relocated her remains from the chapel as it was destroyed a few years after Mobutu's burial.