[3] Walter Robyns and Jean Ghesquière, the botanists who first formally described the species, named it after the Belgian Congo, now called the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where the specimen they examined was collected in the town of Kisantu near the Inkisi River.

The male flowers are on 4-5 millimeter long pedicels that are positioned at leaf axils on branches.

The petals are narrowly elliptical, 6 by 3 millimeters and covered in brownish silky hairs.

Male flowers have numerous, small, rectangular stamens that are 0.5 millimeters long and consist of an anther without a stalk (filament).

The female flowers are on 6-10 millimeter long pedicels that are positioned on the trunk and at leaf axils on branches.

Female flowers have two rounded to slightly pointed sepals that are 2 millimeters wide with sparse, brown, soft hairs on their outer surface.

[4] Bioactive compounds extracted from its bark, including acetogenins, have been reported to be cytotoxic in tests with cultured human tumor cells.