By Patrick Ilunga

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US-based basketball legend Dikembe Mutombo, who died on Monday, has a towering legacy of philanthropy in his home, Democratic Republic of Congo, where he sought to elevate his people out of poverty.

Mutombo was 2.18 metres tall and the National Basketball Association (NBA) said he was the greatest athlete in the DRC. 

For more than two years, he had been battling brain cancer, which finally took his life.

It was in October 2022 when the NBA shared the news that the former Congolese pivot was suffering from a tumour. He had then undergone “successful” surgery on October 15 in Atlanta, an NBA press release said.

Born in Kinshasa in 1966, Dikembe, a giant with a deep, raspy voice, made a name for himself and a reputation far from his homeland, in the NBA in the US, where he played for 18 years, from 1991 to 2009. 

During his illustrious career, he reached the finals twice -- in 2001 with the Philadelphia Sixers (losing to the Los Angeles Lakers) and in 2003 with the New Jersey Nets, now the Brooklyn Nets (losing to the San Antonio Spurs). 

He was made an NBA ambassador after his retirement in 2009, and was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2015, a worthy career and an undeniable success story, which was hailed on the floor of the UN Security Council meeting on September 30. 

But, beyond his professional sporting achievements, the world and especially the DRC, remembers his charitable side. 

Dikembe has invested heavily in the health and education sectors in DRC. 

From Hungary, where he heard the news of Dikembe’s death, President Félix Tshisekedi paid tribute to “a committed citizen, an example of success… a philanthropist at heart who carried high the flag of the DRC and worked for the general interest, particularly in the health and education sectors.”

A similar tribute was voiced by NBA commissioner Adam Silver, who wrote that Dikembe was "a humanitarian at his core."

“Dikembe Mutombo was simply larger than life. On the court, he was one of the greatest shot blockers and defensive players in the history of the NBA. Off the floor, he poured his heart and soul into helping others," Silver said in a press release announcing the death of the Congolese-American giant. 

Read: Shot-blocking great Dikembe Mutombo dies at 58, NBA says

In the DRC, the ace basketball player invested millions of dollars in the construction of a hospital and a modern school. Between 2004 and 2007, he invested $20 million in the Biamba Marie Mutombo Hospital, located on Boulevard Lumumba.

The facility bears the name of Dikembe's mother, who died "for lack of appropriate care," according to the sportsman. 

Seventeen years since its inauguration, the hospital, considered to be one of the best equipped in Central Africa, is built in Masina, a low-income area in east Kinshasa. Dikembe was the chairman of the board of directors. 

In 2021, Dikembe built a modern school in the village of Tshimbombo in the Lupatapata territory in central DRC's Kasai-Oriental region, his parents' home province. The school, which cost over $4 million, is named Institut Samuel Mutombo, after his late father.