Mateene Kahombo

Mateene Kahombo was born in Mutongo (North Kivu) on 30 December 1936.
In 1963, he received his Bachelor degree in Languages and African Literature at the Université Lovanium in Kinshasa.
In 1966, he received his Master of Art in African Studies at the University of California Los Angeles.
In 1969, he received his doctorate in Linguistics at Université de Paris-Sorbonne.

From 1969 to 1971, he was a professor at the Université Lovanium, and from 1971 to 1972 at the Université nationale du Zaïre, Campus Lubumbashi.
From 1972 to 1996, he worked as a language specialist at the OUA: as director of the Bureau of Languages from 1972 to 1986; as chief of the African Language Policy division of OUA Secretariat in Addis-Abeba from 1986 to 1991; in the same position at the OUA-Celhto in Niamey, Niger from 1991 to 1996.
He returned to his country in 1997, to teach contrastive linguistics of english–french–bantu languages and stylistic analysis methods studies at the Université de Kinshasa.

He passed away in Kinshasa on 30 October 1998.

Reference: back cover (in French) of Mateene Kahombo, 1998, Kiswahili: Masomo ya Lingala kwa Kiswahili, Lingala: Matéya ma Kiswahíli na Lingála.