5 Francs

The Banque du Congo Belge was granted its note-issuing monopoly in 1909, the same year Leopold II's personal fiefdom was transferred to the Belgian state following international outcry over atrocities in the rubber trade. Brass coinage for the colony was periodically struck in Belgium and shipped across, a logistical exercise complicated during the war years by Atlantic convoy losses and competing wartime demand on Belgian industrial capacity in exile.

The 1947 issue arrived in the immediate postwar reorganization of colonial currency, when Belgium was simultaneously rebuilding its domestic monetary system and reasserting administrative control over the Congo after wartime disruptions.