Chapter 66 Education

In 1887, after nearly three years of all-out efforts, the railway from Matadi to Kinshasa in the Congo River Basin was finally completed, which also meant that Congo could finally enter the normal development stage.

Through this strategic railway, Congo's natural resources and European and American goods can finally circulate between each other.

Thanks to the Berlin Conference in 1884, countries allowed the Congo Commission to levy a 10% import and export tariff. Constantine spent a lot of energy over the years and invested in the Congo region, and finally ushered in the first return of 150,000 pounds.

It was previously agreed with Banning that 5% of Congo's finances were the income from the royal family's accumulated huge investments over the years, and 10% would be allocated to the Greek Royal Education Foundation to develop Greece's education.

Without money, everything is difficult. Previously, because Constantine strongly advocated that the royal family invest in the Congo River Basin and obtain colonies, the royal family's funds of more than 10 million francs over the years have been successively invested in the early development of the Congo colony, which has made Constantine's hands tight.

Except for some projects with strategic value, such as Tesla's AC system, Constantine has always avoided other things involving large expenses.

This has put Constantine under a lot of pressure.

Good things take time, and after years of hard work, he finally has the first profit.

Looking at the two checks handed over by Schmidt, the Greek Royal Education Foundation, which has been well prepared, can finally vigorously promote compulsory education.

Among the reasons why Constantine attaches importance to the promotion of compulsory education, education can improve the quality of the people, which is only one of the factors.

Another reason is the particularity of the Balkan Peninsula.

This land located at the junction of the three continents of Europe, Asia and Africa has been ruled by major empires due to its important strategic location, including the Alexander Empire (the first empire spanning the Asian, European and African continents), the ancient Roman Empire, the Eastern Roman Empire, and finally the Ottoman Empire.

In the long history, the territory of the Balkan Peninsula has been part of a certain empire for most of the time.

The empires that have ruled this land in successive dynasties are almost all multi-ethnic and even multi-religious.

For example, the ancient Roman Empire (including the Eastern Roman Empire) ruled over Latins, Jews, Greeks, Slavs, Germans, Armenians, Egyptians, Gauls and other ethnic groups.

The Ottoman Empire also had a large number of ethnic groups, as for religion, there were Judaism, Islam, Christianity, and different sects of each religion.

It is precisely this special geographical location and history that made the Balkan Peninsula a mixed nation and chaotic religious beliefs.

Due to the long-term rule of the multi-ethnic empire, the empire naturally needed to weaken the self-identity of each ethnic group in order to maintain the stability of its rule. For example, the ancient Rome (Eastern Rome) supported Christianity, and the Ottoman Turkey promoted Islam.

Therefore, in the Balkan Peninsula, ethnic integration is almost going on all the time.

For example, in the 7th to 11th centuries, in the eyes of the Muslims in the Arabian Peninsula, those who believed in the Orthodox Church were Romans, and they did not distinguish between Greeks, Slavs or Germans.

In addition, the mountainous geographical conditions of the Balkan Peninsula isolate the ground and fragment it, making it more inconvenient for people living on this land to communicate.

Those residents living in remote mountains use their own dialects to communicate with each other in their daily lives. They are illiterate and have no written language at all.

Think about it, Ottoman Turkey did not have its own writing system, and Arabic was still used for official or missionary work.

The assimilation ability is even weaker.

Ideographic characters, such as Chinese characters, even if the pronunciation is different, but the corresponding Chinese characters are the same, it is generally believed that they speak the same language.

For example, Cantonese, Minnan dialect and northern dialects have very different pronunciations, but everyone still thinks that this is the same language.

But phonetic characters are different. If people pronounce differently, strictly speaking, they are not the same language.

The combined effect of various factors has led to a considerable number of people in the Balkan Peninsula who do not know what ethnic group they are.

In the long-term rule of the multi-ethnic empire, some people have lost their sense of national identity.

Therefore, in the Balkan Peninsula, except for those people with extremely obvious ethnic characteristics, such as those who speak Slavic or Greek, and will say very confidently that they are Greek or Slavs, many people cannot clearly identify their own ethnicity.

In this special case, if such a person receives compulsory Greek education, he will be a Greek from then on.

For example, in Macedonia, due to long-term cohabitation, MSL, Bulgarians, Serbs, Greeks, Jews, and Armenians are mixed together. Moreover, it is difficult to distinguish between Bulgarians and Serbs because they are all Slavs.

However, if a child is exposed to Greek education since childhood, he will naturally be close to Greece.

This is why Constantine attaches importance to compulsory education. Under the chaotic ethnic distribution of the Balkan Peninsula, compulsory education is not just education, and its special influence on the local area cannot be ignored.

Wherever Greek compulsory education is promoted, there will be more "Greeks" in that place.

Koledis and Ikios walked into the conference room together.

Koledis had been working in the bank before and was a financial practitioner, while Ikios was the president of the University of Athens and had experience in education.

These two were the two executive members of the Royal Education Foundation of Greece selected by Constantine.

"I invited you two here today to tell you a good news. Congo has allocated the first batch of funds from the foundation, and your work can begin," Constantine said to the two with joy.

"I want to hear about your plan to promote compulsory education in Greece"

"Mr. Duke, if it is convenient, can you first tell us how much money this is? After all, we need to live within our means," Koledis pushed the black-framed glasses on his nose and asked.

"The first fund is 100,000 pounds"

"I think we should first give priority to promoting education in some towns. As we all know, Greek farmers are not very willing to send their children to school, and this 100,000 pounds is not enough. We can only promote it in towns with higher feasibility, and when the funds are relatively sufficient later, we will promote it to rural areas with backward infrastructure. In this way, the efficiency of popularizing compulsory education is relatively guaranteed," Ikios calmly expressed his opinion.

"The initial investment in teaching facilities is a huge sum of money, such as building teaching buildings, but fortunately it is not a recurring expenditure. Therefore, this money can only partially solve the education problem of school-age children in urban areas," said Kolladis.