National University of Zaire

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National University of Zaire (UNAZA) was a public, national university in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It operated from 1971 to 1981, created by merging three existing universities and 17 technical colleges into one system. For a brief period it was known as the National University of the Congo (UNACO) before the country was renamed Zaire in October 1971. The reforms, part of Mobutu Sese Seko’s rule, gave the state more control over universities and aimed to cut ties with churches. UNAZA established three specialist campuses: Kinshasa for Medicine, Lubumbashi for Social Sciences, and Yangambi for Agriculture, with support from the Rockefeller Foundation and the Zairean government. The university faced problems, including promised funding not arriving, political interference, weak libraries and administrative support, and difficult transportation across the country. In 1981, UNAZA split back into the University of Kinshasa, the University of Kisangani, and the University of Lubumbashi. A central university press, the Presses universitaires du Zaïre (PUZ), was created in Kinshasa to publish works from the new institutions.