A young Congolese boxer, Samwa, and his older brother, Nourou, arrive in Brussels for the final of the Afro-European Middleweight Championship to fight against the Belgian title holder. Samwa trains heavily, despite some harsh conditions, under the authoritarian look of his brother. Until the day when the Belgian fight promoters, aware of the fact that the political situation gives the final a symbolical turn, order to Samwa to lose the fight. The day before the match, Samwa and Nourou watch Patrice Lumumba's independence's speech. Samwa decides not to give up but in this power's struggle, one of the brothers will betray the other one.

This true, astonishing story describes how King Leopold II of Belgium turned Congo into its private colony between 1885 and 1908. Under his control, Congo became a gulag labor camp of shocking brutality. Leopold posed as the protector of Africans fleeing Arab slave-traders but, in reality, he carved out an empire based on terror to harvest rubber.