DRC Elections 2011 Watch: 1) Riot cops nip in the bud UDPS demo and PPRD counter demo; 2) Dr. No: Aubin Minaku says Kabila’s cartel not party to the “ping-pong match between CENI and the opposition”; 3) MONUSCO weekly press briefing: Peacekeepers not planning to replace DRC police; 4) Tshisekedi once again visits war criminal suspect Bemba at Scheveningen Prison Complex in the Netherlands; and 5) Meeting of two dinosaurs in Brussels: Kengo and Tshisekedi

1) Riot cops nip in the bud UDPS demo and PPRD counter demo

MP Francis Kalombo (PPRD)

PPRD Youth Wing Leader

Organizer of the counterdemo

Thursday, September  29, at around 9 am (Kinshasa Time), UDPS demonstrators who had gathered around their headquarters on the 10th Street of the Limete quarter of Kingabwa Commune, set out for Lumumba Boulevard, the main thoroughfare running east-west from the N’djili Airport towards downtown Kinshasa. Led by UDPS secretary general Jacquemain Shabani, UDPS “combatants” were planning to march to CENI headquarters on Boulevard du 30 Juin for their umpteenth siege attempts of the national electoral commission offices. At the same time, PPRD youth wing members were marching along the 7th Street of Limete towards the 10th Street were they wanted to deliver a memorandum for appeased elections at the headquarters of UDPS.

Colonel Eddy Mukuna, battalion commander of the riot police of the Groupe Mobile d’Intervention of eastern Kinshasa, thwarted the plans of both groups. His men, using tear gas and nightsticks, quickly dispersed both groups. A number of demonstrators suffered from tear gas inhalation, including UDPS secretary general Jacquemain Shabani.  Col Mukuna said 4 UDPS “combatants” were nabbed.

MP Francis Kalombo (PPRD), from Kinshasa-Bandalungwa constituency and the head of PPRD youth wing, had vowed to send in his party’s counterdemonstrators each time UDPS would organize demonstrations.

The issue of the audit of the electoral register and access to CENI central server has hit a new snag. CENI wanted that this audit and access to its central server be made “in parity” between the opposition and the ruling majority. As it turns out, Kabila’s political cartel, the Majorité Présidentielle (MP), through its secretary general Aubin Minaku, refuses to participate in what it calls a “masquerade” and a “distraction” (see next section).

2) Dr. No: Aubin Minaku says Kabila's cartel not party to the “ping-pong match between CENI and the opposition”

Aubin Minaku, secretary general of Majorité Présidentielle (MP)

At his press briefing

Salon Rouge, Venus Hotel  

Kinshasa, Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Photo: John Bompengo/Radio Okapi

(Credits)

Tuesday, September 27, Aubin Minaku, the newly-minted secretary general of the Kabila’s cartel Majorité Présidentielle (MP), held a  press briefing at the Salon Rouge conference hall of Venus Hotel on Avenue de la Gombe, in the Gombe Commune of downtown Kinshasa. He was flanked by André Alain Atundu Liongo—influential political operative from Equateur Province, erstwhile Mobutu’s top spy, and current spokesman of MP—and Jean-Marie Longonia, CEO of the Congolese Press Agency (ACP), who  served as the “moderator” of the press briefing.

Minaku launched a multi-pronged assault on the opposition.

Without naming names, Minaku spilled vitriol out mainly against Etienne Tshisekedi and Vital Kamerhe who, he claimed, have opted for an "insurrectionary approach aimed at derailing the elections"; politicians "who make the rounds of embassies of [Western] countries...and maintain militias like the Interhamwe" in order to thwart elections! (Wow! This shows that Kabila's cartel has now appropriated the rumors alleging that Kamerhe is a Rwandan Hutu and spun it into the slogan: Kamerhe is one of the leaders of the Hutu terrorist militia FDLR. And from here to, "No wonder he'd been so vocal in his opposition to the Rwandan-Congolese joint military operations aimed at uprooting the FDLR," then the loop would be looped. This could backfire in the Kivus, where these joint military operations are so much unpopular.)

On political change called by the opposition, Minaku said:

“Change is an essential attribute in a democracy—if it is accompanied by an alternative proposition.  The Congolese opposition has unfortunately no alternative perspective. Apparently, it isn’t ready to lead, to assume power, to will, and to act for the people. As proof of this, their difficulties to agree on and to rally around a candidate and a common social program like us in the Majorité Présidentielle. The people, who are the impartial referee, are aware of this and will soon draw a conclusion from this.”

On the insistence of some opposition parties to audit CENI voters’ register and access its server, Aubin accused the opposition of: 1) rancor, as some of their companies didn't win contracts with CENI; and 2) an attempt at hacking the computer system of the national electoral commission:

 “Associates of companies that failed to win contracts with CENI, they had hoped, through this indirect action, to make money before the official launch of the campaign--without mentioning the outright possibility of sending in destructive viruses [to contaminate] the files of the server, or still, the latent or actual objective consisting in dilatory maneuvers aimed at avoiding the date of November 28, 2011.”

Adding: “It’s not at the end of a ping-pong match between CENI and the opposition that the MP would be drawn into the nonsense, without any understanding of the ins and outs.”

But pressed further, Aubin Minaku conceded that MP could participate in the audit if officially asked to do so by CENI.

3) MONUSCO weekly press briefing:  Peacekeepers not planning to replace DRC police  

Nana Rosine Ngangoue

MONUSCO Spokesperson

Facebook Photo

On Wednesday, September 28, MONUSCO spokesperson Nana Rosine Ngangoue—flanked by Lt. Col. Mamadou Gaye, MONUSCO military spokesman, and  Yvon Edoumou,  a spokesman of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA)—held the mission’s weekly briefing. 

One of the points in Ngangoue’s briefing dealt with the elections. She first detailed the logistics of the deployment of electoral kits. She further announced that a 3-day “electoral retreat” (September 28-30) was organized by the Integrated International Electoral Assistance (MONUSCO Electoral Division/PACE [Projet d’Appui au Cycle Electoral/Support Project for the Electoral Cycle]/UNDP).

Ngangoue also announced that MONUSCO Director of Electoral Division, Bouah Mathieu Bile, met on Tuesday with “members of a faction of Congolese political opposition” who wanted to submit, once again, their demands to CENI via MONUSCO:  audit of the electoral registers, alleged violation of the electoral law by the holding early political rallies, security of candidates, access to state medias, and the fact that the Supreme Court of Justice is dealing with elections’ disputes instead of the yet to be installed Constitutional Court. Ngangoue told the media that the Director of the Electoral Division of MONUSCO assured opposition representatives he will convey their concerns to CENI. 

According to L’Avenir, in the Q & A part of the press conference, one of MONUSCO’s spokespersons said that the UN peacekeepers’ mandate was to protect all the Congolese, and in so doing, they back Congolese security forces. Their role is not to replace the Congolese police. 

4) Tshisekedi once again visits war-criminal suspect Bemba at Scheveningen Prison Complex in the Netherlands

Aerial view of Scheveningen Prison Complex

(Credits)

On Wednesday, September 28, in yet another desperate move to forge political alliances around his candidacy, Etienne Tshisekedi visited another war criminal suspect in so many days at Scheveningen Prison Complex in the Netherlands. This time around, the Sphinx of Limete visited for the second time jail inmate Jean-Pierre Bemba.

Tshisekedi told Congolese expat journos that his intent in meeting Bemba was to rally his support for his presidential bid. Well, good look! Bemba’s own buddy and babysitter Adam Bombole is a presidential contender. And by filing to run for president as an independent, Bombole has caused MLC to be torn asunder. If Tshisekedi thinks that MLC party members would automatically vote en masse for him just because Bemba said so, he is in for a rude awakening. 

5) Meeting of two dinosaurs in Brussels:  Kengo and Tshisekedi

Etienne Tshisekedi and Léon Kengo wa Dondo

Brussels, Thursday, September 29, 2011

Video screen capture: Alex Engwete

A day after his fool’s errand at Scheveningen Prison Complex, Etienne Tshisekedi met rival presidential contender Léon Kengo wa Dondo in Brussels. 

Confronted by the Congolese expat journos after the meeting over the terrible habit of Congolese politicians to powwow abroad in order to find solutions to domestic disputes, Kengo vehemently denied he had any prior plans to hold a meeting with Tshisekedi in Brussels. Kengo said he was in the US when he was repeatedly contacted by phone by Tshisekedi’s aides who told him the UDPS leader wanted to meet him in Brussels. 

Kengo showed a bound copy of the print-out of the UDPS political governance project Tshisekedi gave him and said he’d study it, then discuss it with his “old brother and friend” when the latter returns to Kinshasa via South Africa from his trip to Canada.

Asked whether he would desist in favor of Tshisekedi, Kengo was non-committal at best. “First step: societal projects that have similarities,” Kengo said. “Second step, since these societal projects have similarities, then they should be molded into a common program. Then, find the ideal candidate who can carry this program in the interests of all parties [involved].”

Asked whether this meeting with Tshisekedi meant that he’s dropped Kamerhe, Kengo said: “Politics is an art form. An art of compromise. You don’t just drop people.”

Regarding the bickering between the opposition’s Fatima and Sultani groups (on this two groups, read section 3) Bipolar opposition: Fatima Group vs. Sultani Group), Kengo said:

“The [pro-Tshisekedi] Fatima Group precipitated things, without giving big political parties the time needed for discussions with their leaders. And having seen that the Fatima Group had made statements backing Etienne Tshisekedi, the Sultani Group  had also engaged a dialogue to come down to the same objective: a common candidate for a common program. Subsequently, MLC was designated as moderator. The MLC was still in its job of moderator, [when] some started submitting their candidacies. If you look at the chronological list [of the submission of candidacies], I’m the next to last. What I was waiting for was to see one common candidate. The others told me, well, if we have to discuss about all those who pretend to be candidates, we will have a crowd to discuss with. Let those who really want to participate in the discussion for a common candidate submit their candidacies, then the dialogue could start out.  By the way, when I filed my candidacy, I said, ‘Dialogue isn’t ruptured; it continues. If, those [of] who’d had the time to read me, would find those sentences [verbatim].”

Questioned by one journo over the wisdom of wasting the combined $500,000 in non-refundable deposits among the 10 presidential candidates vying to unseat Kabila only to come in the end to choosing one candidate, Kengo blamed this shortcoming on Tshisekedi sitting right next to him, who, as “elder in our tradition,” should have called from the get go all those concerned around him. 

Well, Radio-Trottoir, our unbeatable timeless grapevine, called Mobutu and his associates “dinosaurs,” not “elders.”  Uncannily, in his stinging and masterly written pamphlet against the Belgian King Leopold II over the atrocities then committed in the Congo entitled King Leopold’s Soliloquy, Mark Twain called King Leopold II a "dinosaur." And these two pathetic old geezers mulling their next move in what they consider as a poker game gave me the strange impression of watching, live, two dinosaurs dashing towards political extinction. 

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DRC Extreme Advocacy: Premiere of "Unwatchable--The Film": Hollywood dramatization of the rape of MAKISA in rural Kivu against the backdrop of rural England (Warning: Not for the Fainthearted)

DO NOT WATCH THE VIDEO BELOW BEFORE READING THIS INTRO

I stumbled upon the video below at ZDNet; an article by James Farrar entitled "Unwatchable: dial R for rape. How much does your handset really cost?"

The video is so graphic ZDNet only put a link to it. I couldn't upload the video I captured on Dailymotion or YouTube due to their stringent policies on "violence" and "pornography" (mark this last word, it will recur below). The only option I had was to directly upload it here.  

Excerpt from the article:

"Summary: Unwatchable is a graphic new film highlighting sexual violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo as a tactic in the control of minerals used for electronics manufacturing. It’s part of a campaign asking UK consumers to demand manufacturers control their supply chains and that governments introduce legislation to control the trade. 

Warning: this film contains sexual violence that some viewers and mobile manufacturers may find disturbing. 

 [...] 

The film was made with backing from Hollywood heavyweights such as film maker Michael Bonvillian whose credits include Lost and Cloverfield. It is based on the story of a DRC woman, Makisa, who was raped in front of her family while her husband was murdered & mutilated. The film is cleverly set in rural England to force UK consumers to more directly relate to the violence perpetrated daily in the DRC out of sight of the international media. Some will debate whether shock tactics such as this are effective but I’ll leave that debate to experts. Viewers of Unwatchable are asked to sign a petition to manufacturers asking them to guarantee that their supply chains are conflict free and the web provides real time analytics on the nu,ber of petitions generated for Apple, HP, Motorola, HTC and Nokia. The petition also calls for the EU and its member states to introduce legislation similar to the Dodd Franks act which requires supply chain ‘due diligence’ when sourcing from the DRC or Great Lakes and adjacent regions."

Oh, boy! As I was reading this I was thinking with trepidation of David Aronson of Congo Resources who's on a crusade against Dodd-Frank. I was anticipating the man would have already gone postal over this video.  But strangely, by the time I stopped at Congo Resources, not a peep has come out of Aronson. Intrigued, I went to his blogroll where, sure enough, on top of the list, I found the post entitled "Congo Advocacy Hits New Low" by Kate Cronin-Furman of the acclaimed blog Wronging Rights. 

Excerpt from Kate Cronin-Furman's post:

Sweet Jesus, people.  Sometimes, you think you've seen everything in the way of badvocacy and then along comes six minutes of rape porn masquerading as informed activism.

Yeah, you read that right.  The latest Congo-themed assault to my efforts at maintaining a healthy blood pressure is a short called "Unwatchable" (to which I'm omitting a link on account of intense disapproval) that reimagines the violence in the Eastern DRC as atrocities visited on wealthy British people.

Because clearly, the reason conflict persists in the region is that no one has been forced to think: "How would I feel if these were pretty blonde teenagers being gang-raped by soldiers?"  (And man is PETA going to be upset that they never thought to produce a video showing Pamela Anderson being skinned and turned into a coat...) 

The video is part of an independent conflict mineral campaign aimed at generating pressure on UK mobile phone manufacturers to stop using minerals sourced in the Congo.  It appears to be affiliated with Save the Congo, which ought to be embarrassed to be associated with this nonsense."

And after reading the above, if you still feel like watching the 6-minute short, then, be my guest (remember, "You must be over 18 to watch this movie"--with the deep voice of a man who's spent the past 40 years smoking Marlboro cigs):

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Places like the Congo: 1) Kabila in Cuba: “Jamás traicionaré al Congo!”; and 2) More dangerous to fly in Russia than in the Congo

1) Kabila in Cuba: “Jamás traicionaré al Congo!”

Joseph Kabila

Unveiling the bust of his father in Havana, Cuba

“Jamás traicionaré al Congo!” (Never betray Congo)

(Credits)

After his appearance at the UN General Assembly in New York, Kabila flew directly on official visit to Havana, Cuba, where he unveiled on Monday the bust of his father at the Parque de los Próceres Africanos [Park of African Heroes]. The other Congolese hero at the park is Patrice Emery Lumumba, whom Kabila also visited.

The bust bears a plaque on which are chiseled these words often repeated by Mzee Kabila: “Ne Jamais trahir le Congo!,” translated into the Spanish as “Jamás traicionaré al Congo.”

Quoting Granma, the organ of the Cuban Communist Party:

“Victor Dreke, president of the Cuban-African Friendship Association, recalled that on April 24, 1965 Cubans entered the Congo under the command of Che,  thus marking the beginning of the participation of the young revolutionary Cuba in the process of decolonizing Africa and consolidating  its independence from European powers.”

Kabila also laid a wreath at the Pantheon of the Internationalists at Havana Colon Cemetery where are encased the niches of the remains of Cuban soldiers who died in African campaigns.

Said Kabila:

“Here rest the mortal remains of those who took part in combats for the freedom of Africa… We have shared something more than our struggle, we have also shared our blood.”

Africa is most definitely a very ungrateful place: without the Cuban expeditionary contingent in Angola that defeated the South African Defence Force, the independence of Namibia would have dragged on for several more bloody years and Angola might not be enjoying its economic boom today. And yet, nothing is given back to the country that had its soldiers killed on African soil. On the contrary, Cuba continues to give to Africa!

The DRC should have taken its cue from Cuba. Though choking in the stranglehold of a crippling embargo, Cuba stands out as a model of sustainable small-plot agriculture, pilots’ training, education, and affordable health-care system—training each year thousands of physicians. About a hundred or so of these doctors are deployed in the Congo.

Dr. Ernesto “Che” Guevara de la Serna aka “Commandante Tatu”

Hewa-Bora guerilla Camp, Eastern DRC

1965

 2) More dangerous to fly in Russia than in the Congo

Mangled wreckage of the Yak-42 jet that carried Lokomotiv Yaroslavl hockey team

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Near Yaroslavl airport, Russia

Photo: AFP/Russia Emergency Ministry

(Credits)

Though I heard about this crash when it occurred early this month, I was only directed to the following uncanny detail given by The Moscow Times late last night during a phone conversation with a friend:

“In the worst sports-related disaster in decades, one of Russia's best ice hockey teams, Lokomotiv Yaroslavl, was decimated Wednesday in a plane crash that killed at least 43 people.

The crash also sealed Russia's position as the most dangerous place to travel by plane in 2011, with the country surpassing even the Democratic Republic of Congo in the number of aircraft-related fatalities.”

Wow!!!

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DRC Elections 2011 Watch: 1) Presidential hopeful François Nicéphore Kakese Malela blasts Kabila and the Congolese Peaceful Elections Forum in... Addis Ababa; 2) MONUSCO Force Commander Gen Chander Prakash lays down elections’ security contingency plan; 3) Catholic Bishops Conference to mobilize 30,000 election observers countrywide; and 4) Questions about Rwandan citizenship of Vital Kamerhe dog presidential hopeful again

1) Presidential hopeful François Nicéphore Kakese Malela blasts Kabila and the Congolese Peaceful Elections Forum in... Addis Ababa

Presidential candidate François Nicéphore Kakese Malela 

Chairman, Union pour le Réveil et le Développement du Congo (URDC) 

(Credits)

At a press briefing held on Sunday, September 25, Presidential candidate François Nicéphore Kakese Malela took a swipe at Kabila for saying in his address at the UN General Assembly on September 22 that “peace and security reign in the entirety of my country.”

Kakese pointed out that on the same day that the president was making his comments in New York, a deadly bank robbery was occurring in Kalemie, in Katanga (according to a Xinhua news agency wire, the robbers at TMB bank killed 2 people, including a cop, critically wounded several bystanders, and made off with an undisclosed amount of cash); and atrocities continued to be perpetrated in the east of a country that has turned into the “kingdom of violence.” He went on to say that the Raïs should cease boasting of “theoretical plans,” adding that “a government that has its population reeling from domestic and external insecurity, from food insecurity, [a government that plunges its people] into darkness [for lack of electricity supply] and unemployement cannot continue to defend [its record] with empty speeches.”


Kakese also took issue with the two-day forum on peaceful elections in the DRC sponsored by the AU and organized by the Ethiopian Institute of Peace and Security Studies (IPSS) scheduled to be held in Addis Ababa from September 26 to 27. Congolese representatives of political parties and civil society are attending the meeting. Radio Okapi reports that, according to Kinshasa AU President’s Special Representative Emmanuel Mendoume Nze, the forum is supposed to come up with a memorandum, to be signed by the Congolese delegations, which will ensure the “good conduct” of all in the upcoming elections.

Kakese called this trip to Addis Ababa useless and wasteful “tourism” that showed the “infantilism” of the Congolese political class incapable of finding solutions at home.

At an earlier press briefing, Kakese called for presidential debates prior to the elections.

President Joseph Kabila Kabange

Delivering his address at the UN General Assembly

New York, September 22, 2011

(Credits) 

2) MONUSCO Force Commander Gen Chander Prakash lays down elections’ security contingency plan

Lt. Gen Chander Prakash

MONUSCO Force Commander

Photo: Biliamino Alao/MONUSCO 

(Credits)

I was directed to this story yesterday by a tweet from @MONUSCO, which I retweeted. 

Alain Likota, of MONUSCO press services, caught up in mid-September with Lt. Gen Chander Prakash who was on an inspection tour in the Kivus where the Indian senior military officer also held meetings with Gen Pacifique Masunzu, Commander of FARDC 10th Military Region, and Col. Delphin Kahimbi, commander of the counterinsurgency “Amani Leo” operations. Gen Prakash met these FARDC senior officers in order “to brief them on MONUSCO’s plans to provide security during the elections.”

Answering a question put to him by Alain Likota, Gen Prakash elaborated on MONUSCO's elections security plan:

“The main objective of the contingency plan is to prepare ourselves, and be ready for any situation that may or may not occur in the next six months. As you know, our resources are limited, and there are challenges such as inaccessibility to various areas in the country; there are challenges related to the lack of infrastructure in some parts of the country. There are also challenges related to limited administrative support. So we studied the various situations that we may be confronted with, elaborated strategies on how best to react to unforeseen emerging situations, the backbone of all this being the protection of civilians, strictly in accordance with the new mandate, as you know, the 1991 [UN Resolution].”

3) Catholic Bishops Conference to mobilize 30,000 election observers countrywide

Mgrs. Javier Katata (Caritas) and Nicolas Djomo Lola (CENCO President)

Photo: John Bompengo/Radio Okapi

(Credits)

The 3-day training of trainers of election observers/civic educators, begun on September 23, ended on September 26 at the conference hall of the Catholic high-school Collège Boboto, in downtown Kinshasa.  This project of the Catholic Bishops Conference (CENCO) was co-sponsored by the American evangelical NGO World Vision. Participants came from Bandundu, Bas-Congo, Equateur, and the Kivus provinces. CENCO plans on deploying 30,000 election observers countrywide.

The ambitious project of CENCO goes beyond mere election monitoring; it plans on carrying out civic education of both voters and politicians.

Said Mgr. Nicolas Djomo Lola, CENCO president:

“We are undertaking consciousness awakening of all citizens: those who will have to vote and those [running to be] elected. What we’re aiming at, is the improvement of living standards of the Congolese. And in order to do that, the essential condition is peace. When you have peace, you give a chance to democracy, to economic growth [to take off].”

4) Questions about Rwandan citizenship of Vital Kamerhe dog presidential hopeful again

UK-based Maman Alphonsine mwa Nkingi and her son, Vital Kamerhe

Congress of Union pour la Nation Congolese (UNC)

Kinshasa, Thursday, July 28, 2011

(Credits)

Try as he might, Vital Kamerhe can’t succeed in distancing himself from his erstwhile boss and current nemesis, Joseph Kabila. These two political leaders seem to be twins joined at the hip. First, there were rumors that Kamerhe is Kabila’s stalking-horse, an accusation that envenomed Kamerhe attacks against Kabila. To no avail...

Now, just as Joseph Kabila has been accused of being a Rwandan Tutsi, claims of Kamerhe’s Rwandan citizenship have resurfaced and intensified! And these claims seem to have been spread by the Kigali regime in 2002 during the negotiations at Sun City, in South Africa, where Kamerhe was one of the mouthpieces of the Kinshasa regime.

At the time, the publisher of Le Soft, MP Tryphon Kin Kiey Mulumba, was the spokesman of RCD. In the issue 788 of March 26, 2002, of Le Soft, Kamerhe is presented not only as a Rwandan Hutu citizen born in Cyangungu, but also as the cousin of Hutu Gen Grancient Kabiligi, one of the “planners of the Rwandan genocide, arrested on July 18, 1997 by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), and [extradited] to Arusha, in Tanzania.” 

What’s more, confronted by the press over this allegation of his Rwandan origins, Kamerhe defiantly exclaimed: “So what’s the big deal of being a Rwandan?” To this day, Kamerhe has still to address his kinship with Gen Grancient Kabiligi.

Right now, everywhere Kamerhe goes—Canada, Washington DC, at CSIS (see video below)—he is dogged by this disquieting issue of his Rwandan citizenship. In February this year, at CSIS in Washington DC, Kamerhe failed to answer squarely the following question a concerned Congolese citizen posed him: Given that all Zairians had to shed their Christian first names by presidential decree in 1972, by what miracle was Kamerhe allowed, had he been a Zairian, to have his name Vital—a “foreign” name—written on his college diploma obtained in the 1980s?

Well, we all had to officially shed our Christian names. Mobutu himself showed the way by taking a kilometer-long “authentic” name. Only foreigners living in Zaire could keep their Christian names. Kamerhe couldn’t give a plausible answer to that question. Instead, he lashed out at his "inquirer," a so-called “political analyst” who, by the way, thought the word “originality” meant “origins”!...

A line of defense Kamerhe used at CSIS is also untenable: arguing that the fact that his father worked everywhere in the DRC in the national savings agency CADECO (or CADEZA) somehow establishes his bona fide Congolese citizenship. Now, people from the African Great Lakes worked freely in those three countries (Burundi, Rwanda and Congo had the same currency under Belgian rule)—especially in post-independence Congo, with its open-border policy. In fact, Barthelemy Bisengimana, a Rwandan Tutsi, was even the chief of staff of Mobutu for many years. Kamerhe also doesn’t help his case when he insults the people raising this issue, which isn’t going away.

Another big mistake of Kamerhe is to throw at people’s faces the so-called “royal” tribal lineage of his mother! As if people care about such meaningless and stupid things. Does Kamerhe forget that the DRC is a republic? A mistake compounded by Kamerhe calling in his “royal” mother from her permanent home in the UK to come and parade at the congress of his party. This alienated many poor voters resentful of rich people sheltering their families in Europe and America, then going back to wreak havoc in a country they’ve deemed to be the boondocks from which they’ve exfiltrated their own families.

Kamerhe’s citizenship quandary has become so serious that the Belgian-based non-profit Dialogue des Peuples, whose collaborators are laity close to the Catholic Church and which also contributes to the running of the influential Brussels-based CongoForum, had to weigh in, through its email-circulated newsletter Dialogue (issue no. 39 of this week), in a long-winded article penned by the Kivu academic native coincidentally named Vital Barholere and entitled “The perennial question of Congolese nationality: The Vital Kamerhe Case” (pp. 13-17 of Dialogue).

The article purports to defend Kamerhe, though the author is also baffled by the “seeming fuzziness that [Kamerhe] may be maintaining about his origins.”  The article is academic, and as such, convoluted, and worse, it speculates that Kamerhe may well have a Rwandan uncle [the Hutu army general génocidaire]: “it seems normal to me that Kamerhe might have an uncle, [and] siblings in Cyangungu (Rwanda), as these lands used to [belong to the] Shi [ethnic group].”

And worse still:

“By ignorance of history, the Bashi of Congo have ended up no longer recognizing the Bashi of Rwanda as their own [kin]. For them, they are Rwandans. Now, in the old days, when we were young, it was not smart to be considered a Rwandan. It was even insulting. The younger Kamerhe might have learned to dissemble, all the more so as he might have frequented other Bashi (like [Mobutu’s minister] Mushobekwa) who have long suffered of this rejection. Thus is made the history of peoples and identities! This being said, nothing excludes the fact that when [Kamerhe] could have taken advantage of this ambivalence he could have done so.”

This kind of speculation is another nail in the coffin of the political career of Vital Kamerhe in a country permanently in the throes of primeval anti-Rwandan nationalism. Kamerhe appears to think that he’d put this controversy behind him; in fact, his official campaign website posted the video below and thinks that it would stand as a final explanation on Kamerhe’s Rwanda-gate. Kamerhe and his campaign can’t be more wrong!

Strangely, Kamerhe thinks that these attacks are coming from the Kabila’s camp—a misreading that shows that he may not see what may hit him next (in politics, they call that a lack of acumen). If anything, he and Kabila are on the same boat on this one, though his case is arguably worse than his former boss’.

The conclusion of Vital Barholere’s article, however, is very clear as to the source of the smear campaign against Kamerhe:

“if Tshisekedi or another candidate wants to beat Kamerhe and Kabila in the Kivu, it would be more reasonable to use more rational and convincing arguments, i.e. the balance sheet of the actions of these two candidates. 

Pushing too far the Rwanda issue risks (and it’s already the case) having people ask Etienne Tshisekedi to explain why he signed agreements in Kigali, at the harshest moment of the occupation of the Kivu by the RCD. Beware of the swing of the pendulum, the boomerang effect.”

For those interested in reading the full article in French, I uploaded Dialogue on Scribd here.

KAMERHE AT CSIS, Washington, DC (February 21, 2011):

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DRC Elections 2011: 1) Children of Hemp to CENI Chairman: “On December 6, if Tshisekedi isn’t president-elect, CENI Chair Rev Mulunda, his kids, and his entire generation will be killed”; 2) Radio-Trottoir: Tshisekedi’s health declines; and 3) CENI: Number of MP candidates jumps to 19,000 and counting

1) Children of Hemp to CENI Chairman: “On December 6, if Tshisekedi isn’t president-elect, CENI Chair Rev Mulunda, his kids, and his entire generation will be killed”

CENI female official slugging it out with Bana-Congo

Behind Brussels Police buffer

Brussels, Friday, September 23, 2011

Video screen capture: Alex Engwete

Johannes Fabian is an anthropologist whose books read as thrillers. In one of his memorable books— Out of our Minds: Reason and Madness in the Exploration of Central Africa—Fabian recounts how in the late 19th century, a whole clan of the Bena Tshilenga, in what is today the Kasai Occidental Province, changed its name to Bena Diamba or “Children of Hemp.” The clan chieftain and his sister had decreed that henceforth all clan members had to ritually smoke hemp on a daily basis! As could be anticipated, this didn’t sit well with the colonial authorities when colonization was thereafter streamlined. Belgian colonial administrators forced the Bena Diamba to shed that name and go back to their roots as Bena Tshilenga, and hemp smoking was banned—a law still enforced today. Fabian, as an anthropologist fascinated at seeing culture as an artifact made out of whole cloth, seems to be partial to the Bena Diamba cultural engineering!

I’ve here called the Bana-Congo “informal sovereigns” (after Thomas Blom Hansen) and “Doppelgänger anticitizens” (after Comaroff and Comaroff). I will also now refer to them as “Children of Hemp” as well, in light of the way they behaved as hemp smokers toward CENI Chairman Rev Daniel Ngoy Mulunda this past weekend in Brussels. (Traditionally and culturally, in the DRC, by smoking hemp, you choose to cast yourself in the fringes of social discourse as a "mad person"—whether you inhale it or not.)

On Friday, Rev Ngoy Mulunda held a press conference after meeting with donors’ representatives in Brussels. But at his arrival at the meeting venue, he was assailed by pro-Tshisekedi Bana-Congo who were chanting: “Assassin! Rapist! Vote rigger!”

Without the buffer of Brussels police, no one knows what might have happened. Outside the hotel where the meeting was taking place, Bana-Congo “combatants” (as UDPS supporters are called) vowed “to kill him, his family, his children, and his entire generation” if on December 6, Tshisekedi is not announced as president-elect.

A crazed Mwana-Congo combatant issuing a fatwa against Rev Daniel Ngoy Mulunda

“We will kill him, his family, his children, and his entire generation”

Video screen capture: Alex Engwete

But Rev Ngoy Mulunda isn’t a man to be easily intimidated. He requested to meet with a delegation of the Bana-Congo, who viciously ranted instead of engaging in a civil exchange with the CENI chairman. He reminded them of his work in apartheid South Africa as an aide to Archbishop Desmond Tutu, in Togo, in Liberia, eastern Congo and Kinshasa—in the latter two localities, he’d helped in collecting thousands of weapons. He also told Bana-Congo to send in electoral observers on the ground. Bana-Congo representatives’ position was their old broken record: Kabila is a dangerous Rwandan usurper, who might even have Rev Ngoy Mulunda “poisoned” if the latter was seen as collaborating with the Bana-Congo! The Bana-Congo did, however, raise a valid issue: the injustice of denying Congolese expats the right to vote—an issue beyond the purview of CENI.

As this was going on in Brussels, a pro-Kabila group, calling itself “Anti-Combatants” and donning PPRD yellow polo shirts with Kabila effigies, sprang up in Paris where they held a demo at the Gare du Nord metro station, the “very gates of Paris,” they said. The interesting thing about this group is that it’s made of Kinois men and women—and Lingala speakers to boot, not the usual Kabila’s constituency. Things will come to a head when this group crosses path with hardcore Bana-Congo “combatants.” And, when this happens, it will be something akin to what I recently saw emblazoned on a t-shirt, “Look out! There’s fuss about!,” with the picture of nightstick-wielding cops battling an unruly crowd of gangbangers.

Pro-Kabila Kinois “Anti-combatants” at the Gare du Nord in Paris

“Look out! There’s fuss about!”

Video Screen capture: Alex Engwete

2) Radio-Trottoir: Tshisekedi’s health declines

While pro-Tshisekedi “combatants” in Brussels are vowing to kill Rev Daniel Ngoy Mulunda and his “entire generation” in the likely event that their leader isn’t declared president-elect on December 6, Radio-Trottoir back home in Kinshasa is spreading rumors concerning the declining health of the “Sphinx of Limete.” Pro-Kabila media in Kinshasa are relaying the following rumor:  “According to press sources that leaked the scoop, the trip of the politician and candidate to the presidency of the Republic [Tshisekedi] would be justified by health reasons. According to the same Sources, the deterioration of the health condition of the opposition has motivated his [trip abroad].”

Note: 1) the use of the conditional mode in the first sentence; and 2) the redundancy of the second sentence, in which the verb leaps to the affirmative mode in an attempt to turn the assumption into a certainty. We’ll see more and more of these linguistic gimmicks coming from all sides in this electoral cycle.

Be that as it may, it wouldn’t be a bad idea for the next National Assembly to add to the electoral law a provision about presidential candidates’ health status.

3) CENI: Number of MP candidates jumps to 19,000 and counting

On Friday, September 23, CENI published the provisional list of the remaining constituencies of Bandundu, Equateur, and Kasai Oriental—which made the number of MP candidates jump to 19,000. This number might grow after the hearings at the Supreme Court of Justice on the petitions of the rejected candidacies.   These hearings were slated to take place from September 24 [some other sources put the start of the hearings on September 22] to September 27.

All these 19,000 candidates are competing to fill 500 seats.

According to L’Avenir, this jump from the 9,632 MP candidates in 2006 to the whopping number of 19,000 this year could be explained by mind-boggling perks associated with the position of MP in a country with a rate of unemployment of “80%”!

L’Avenir details these perks as follows: the “‘famous jeep’ [SUV], a fabulous [monthly] salary of $6,500, immunities, bonuses, etc.” L’Avenir failed to include paid missions overseas, pensions, salary increases voted by MPs themselves (the outgoing Parliament started out with a monthly salary of $5,000), and free first-class medical care!

There are, however, some political parties that are already crying foul upon reading the published lists of MP candidates. In the Ituri constituency in Orientale Province, one political party decried the fact that PPRD lined up 10 MP candidates for 5 seats to be filled, which is in violation of Paragraph 2 of Article 22 of the Electoral Law, which stipulates the following:

“A list presented by a political party, a political cartel or a candidacy presented by an independent is declared irreceivable if it carries the name of one or several ineligible persons, it carries a number of candidates greater than the number of seats determined for each constituency, it carries the name of a candidate in more than one electoral constituency for the same level [of elected seat].”

CENI Orientale officials scrambled to come up with an explanation. And they did come up with one such explanation: a computer glitch. CENI officials claim that the candidates of another political formation whose acronym is similar to PPRD—that is, the Parti du Peuple Pour la Paix et le Développement (PPPD)—were carried onto the list of PPRD by this technical glitch!

The most important thing to note in what would be a short-lived controversy is that the person who brought to the attention of CENI this apparent violation of the Electoral Law is a candidate of the Alliance des Forces Démocratiques du Congo (AFDC), a party belonging to Kabila’s own cartel Majorité Présidentielle (MP), but whose leader, MP Modeste Bahati Lukwebo of South Kivu, has always been a thorn in the side of his own pro-Kabila group. In May 2010, he was branded in the pro-Kabila media as one of the “Gang of Four” (with Olivier Kamitatu, Antipas Mbusa Nyamwisi, and José Endundo) who were out there to sabotage Kabila’s presidency.  In light of the recent pro-Kabila media attacks against Planning Minister Olivier Kamitatu Etsu over an alleged assassination conspiracy against the Raïs involving presidential candidates Vital Kamerhe and Antipas Mbusa Nyamwisi (see my recent Grim Reaper sightings), MP Modeste Bahati Lukwebo must brace himself for renewed media lynching over this alleged “technical glitch” his party official uncovered.

MP Modeste Bahati Lukwebo (South Kivu)

Chairman, Alliance des Forces Démocratiques du Congo (AFDC)

Pro-Kabila politician

A Permanent thorn in the side of the pro-Kabila alliance

(Credits) 

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A case of acute congolaiserie: Rights lobby ASADHO demands that the government continue to provide free decent lodgings and meals to Congolese repatriated from Libya in early March

Hunt for Blacks in Tripoli

Photo: Reuters

There’s a heart-wrenching article posted today on the portal of Radio Okapi entitled “DRC: Some repatriated Congolese from Libya live in destitution in Kinshasa.”

An advice before going to read that article on Radio Okapi website: have within reach a huge box of Kleenex tissues—to contain or wipe the torrent of tears that would gush from your eyes and, incidentally, to blow your nose.

These poor guys were repatriated from Tripoli where they were stuck at the beginning of the Libyan revolution by two flights chartered by Kabila or the government—depending on one’s viewpoint. My own opinion is that without Kabila, these guys would be dead today in the ethnic cleansing systematically targeting black Africans that is being carried out by Libyan revolutionaries. I also remember that some denizens from the right bank of the Congo River—Brazzaville, that is—took advantage of the flights chartered by Kabila-qua-DRC government.

As early as the “fourth day” after their return from Libya, after being sheltered at some of the decent and expensive hotels in Kinshasa--the kind of hotels Kinois residents themselves can't afford--these displaced people were already demanding that the government “continue taking charge of them.”  In fact, the government did book flights for most of them who wanted to rejoin their families in the interior.

Then, fast forward to today…


Incredible! According to Radio Okapi, the situation of "nine families of returnees from Libya" in Kinshasa is so dire that ASADHO, our rampart of human rights, denounces this criminal negligence and “demands that the government take urgent measures for their social and economic reinsertion.” A man-made humanitarian catastrophe, and the usual universal indifference of government officials. Just think: these "nine families" live rent-free in government buildings that have no beds and no toilets. And the start of the school year has come and gone, their kids are not going to school! What kind of government is this? Jesus-Mary-Joseph!

The representative of these devastated citizens sobbed:

“The authorities had promised us our reinstallation, our reinsertion and [they also assured us that], to the extent that this was possible, they'd see to it to send us to [and be hired by] companies here and there, because many among us are technicians. None of the promises was kept.”    

These wails shook me, and caused me to write the following heartfelt comment on that teary article of Radio Okapi. But as my comment is still “awaiting moderation” as I'm writing this, after several hours of being posted under the article of Radio Okapi, I've come to realize it would never be posted. That’s what motivated me to post here my comment Radio Okapi pitilessly censored.

My comment to Radio Okapi (adapted translation):

“Radio Okapi and ASADHO, please do tell me you’re joking! Don’t you think that these poor souls should instead thank Kabila on both their knees for having had the divine vision of getting them out of the Libyan hornets’ nest? Don’t you know that Sub-Saharan Blacks who weren’t evacuated from Libya by their governments are now being hunted down and massacred like rats by Libyan revolutionaries? I don’t see what the responsibility of the Congolese government could possibly be in the daily life of these denizens. Was it the government that asked these people to uproot themselves from their country to go seek out good fortune in Gaddafi’s paradise? There are many Congolese expats who send their share of their hard-won monies to their families and friends in Congo; and when they go back, they find shelter and food on the table… How many millions of indigents are there in the Congo? And you really think that before the government takes care of these millions of Congolese indigents, it must first concerns itself with these citizens repatriated at taxpayers’ expenses? And with what budget, I ask you… Hell, no ! ASADHO, for Crissake, seek out other legitimate causes, please ! Bad governance, assassinations of journalists and human rights activists, ill-treatment of kids and women, mass rapes in eastern DRC, good causes are aplenty!... Liboma too nini [is this madness or what]?”

Madness, indeed, this acute congolaiserie of ASADHO… Well, no wonder Radio Okapi permanently moderated my rant!

***

A version of this post in French is posted here.  

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DRC Elections 2011 Watch: 1) Supreme Court of Justice finds against 5 presidential hopefuls rejected by CENI; 2) Rev Daniel Ngoy Mulunda talks to African ambassadors accredited to Kinshasa; and 3) “Dizzying numbers”: 13,401 MP candidates in 8 provinces for 500 seats

1) Supreme Court of Justice finds against 5 presidential hopefuls rejected by CENI

DRC Supreme Court of Justice

Photo: Myriam Asmari/MONUSCO

(Credits)

On Wednesday, September 21, the Supreme Court of Justice rejected the petitions introduced by the following 5 presidential hopefuls whose candidacies were rejected by CENI:

1. Ismaël Kitenge Pungwa;
2. Rev Jean-Paul Moka;
3. Jean-Pierre Lokongo Limbala;
4. Rev Vanga Kaniki ; and
5. Mrs. Léonard Lomami.

These candidates were mostly rejected for failing to pay the $50,000 non-refundable deposit required by law to file to run for president.  And the flimsy reasons these candidates came up with to justify this failure are worth examining as they bear on their good judgment.

Ismaël Kitenge Pungwa’s lawyers argued that their client had contracted with the Commissariat Général du Cinquantenaire (CGC), the entity created in 2009 to organize the festivities of the 50th independence anniversary celebrated in 2010, for the supply of unspecified “gadgets.” But having delivered those “gadgets” to CGC, Ismaël Kitenge has still to be paid by that body, which has since been dissolved. As the government still owes him for that unpaid contract, Kitenge thought that a “compensation” of sorts could have been arranged by CENI. Countering this argument, CENI experts argued that the electoral commission registers candidacies upon being shown, among other required documents, the bank receipt of the deposit payment. Furthermore, nowhere in the electoral law is CENI given the mandate to negotiate “compensations” for breached contracts with the government.

Rev Jean-Paul Moka, not being present in court, his lawyers asked for a 3-day continuance, which was immediately dismissed by the Supreme Court. But that evening Rev Moka told a convoluted story to the media.

The Belgian news agency Belga reports that according to Rev Moka,

“CENI refused to register his candidacy, claiming that his file was incomplete for lack of payment of the required $50,000 deposit. Now, Mr. Moka insisted that he had introduced the receipt of his payment, made through the Union des Banques Congolaises (UBC), in accordance with the instructions communicated by CENI. (…) But, he charged, CENI used the same form as for the 2006 elections without realizing that UBC had been dissolved in… 2006 and taken over by the Banque Congolaise (BC).”

 An explanation that baffled the press.

3. Jean-Pierre Lokongo Limbala’s argument was even more bizarre. Lokongo finally came up with the $50,000 at the Supreme Court hearing. He claimed that he couldn’t come up with that sum by CENI deadline as he had been arrested when attempting to cross the Congo River on his way to Brazzaville at an unauthorized crossing point. Upon his release, however, he went to Brazzaville to get his money and, therefore, CENI had still to register him.

4. Rev Vangu Kaniki’s file, besides lacking the required bank receipt of deposit, didn’t even have the 4 passport photographs needed. His appeal was summarily rejected.

5. Mrs. Léonard Lomami blamed the dysfunction of a local bank that failed to timely transfer her money deposit to the bank officially designated to receive the candidates' deposits CENI. It wasn’t clear what she expected the Supreme Court to do with  about this alleged banking dysfunction.

The last petition to be examined by the Supreme Court came from the chairman of the Parti du Peuple Pour le Progrès du Congo (PPPC), Rev Stephen Nzita-di-Nzita, an alumnus of Geneva College (Pennsylvania) and an evangelical politician who is not even a contender in the presidential race. Rev Nzita-di-Nzita took the opportunity of his appearance at the Supreme Court to deliver a sermon-like attack against CENI and the Electoral Law. He asked the Court to scrap the Electoral Law, which, according to him, is in violation of a few provisions of the Constitution, including the age requirement (brought down from 25 to 18 for candidates in provincial assemblies), and the college degree requirement—which, in his words, was conducive to massive frauds as university credentials could be verified by communal quarters’ chiefs in the stead of notaries public. Nzita-di-Nzita accused CENI of thus “aiding and abetting analphabetism,” which is “one of the fundamental problems that hamper the democratization of the Congo.” Nzita-di-Nzita asked the Court to postpone the elections for 40 days during which the electoral law would be sent back to the National Assembly for a rewrite! The mystified court dismissed Nzita-di-Nzita's petition-qua-rant.

Rev Stephen Nzita-di-Nzita

Chairman, Parti du Peuple Pour le Progrès du Congo (PPPC)

(Credits)

2) Rev Daniel Ngoy Mulunda talks to African ambassadors accredited to Kinshasa

Rev Daniel Ngoy Mulunda

CENI Chairman

Photo: John Bompengo/Radio Okapi

(Credits)

On the same day that the Supreme Court ruled on the petitions of the rejected presidential candidacies, CENI chairman Rev Daniel Ngoy Mulunda met with African ambassadors accredited to Kinshasa at the Lubumbashi Hall of Grand Hotel, in the Gombe Commune.

During the one-hour meeting, Rev Ngoy Mulunda recapped the brief history of CENI. He shared with them challenges his organization had to face in a short time span: the “coupling” of the presidential and legislative elections; logistical woes; a last-minute surge of MP candidacies (see next section); CENI funding; the audit of the electoral rosters; computer systems glitches; and the high number of “doublons” or duplicate registrations uncovered during the revision of the electoral register. He said that there were 119, 000 “doublons”—40% of them due to computer glitches, and 60% of them were “criminal doublons.” He promised that in October he’ll send the list of the “criminal doublons” to the justice system.

3) “Dizzying numbers”: 13,401 MP candidates in 8 provinces

Wednesday was also the day CENI released the provisional and partial list of MP candidates in 8 provinces. The provinces that saw their lists of candidates published are the following: Bas-Congo (980 candidates), Equateur (1,463), Kasai Occidental (1,304), Kinshasa (5,734), Maniema (325), North Kivu (1,457), South Kivu (879), and Oriental (1,259). Three provinces have still to know the names of their candidates: Bandundu, Kasai Oriental, and Katanga.

Looking at the staggering number of candidates, the daily Forum des As exclaimed in its headline: “The numbers filtering out of CENI (…) are dizzying: 13, 401 deputy candidates for 8 provinces!,” adding in the body of the article, that this number prompted “an analyst to wonder whether, for the Congolese, the job that pays the best and that also seems to be the easiest wouldn’t be (...) the job” of MP. In comparison, in 2006, the number of nationwide MP candidates was around 9,200!

The candidates whose names weren’t retained by CENI have to petition the Supreme Court between September 22 and September 25.

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DRC Elections 2011 Watch: 1) Major MONUSCO airlift operation underway to deploy electoral kits countrywide; 2) CENI okays access to server, audit of electoral rosters and is poised to publish voters’ registry; 3) Outbreak of “Balkanization Conspiracy Theory”; 4) Grim Reaper sightings: Plot-Fatwa to assassinate Kabila; 5) French anti-racism lobby SOS RACISME denounces attacks of Rwandan expats by Bana-Congo during Kagame Paris visit; and 6) Jaynet Kabila to chair UNESCO Regional Research and Documentation Center for Women, Gender and Peace-building in the Great Lakes

1)  Major MONUSCO airlift operation underway to deploy electoral kits countrywide

Unloading electoral kits from a MONUSCO C-130 Hercules aircraft

September 17, 2011

Bunia airstrip, Orientale Province

Photo: Sylvain Liechti/MONUSCO

(Credits)

MONUSCO press release:

“Kinshasa, 16 September 2011 – Three cargo planes transporting three hundred tons of electoral material landed at N’Djili International Airport, in the Congolese capital, on 14 and 15 September. This first batch of electoral material from China comprised electoral kits intended for elections that are expected to start later this year.

The United Nations Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUSCO), in line with its mandate, started deploying the material to the different regions in the country. Six tons were delivered to the relevant provincial authorities in Equateur Province on 15 September.

MONUSCO will further ship them to sub-hubs from where it will then be the duty of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to distribute them to the smallest communities in Equateur as well in the neighboring Bandundu province. The process will continue until all polling stations are supplied with the necessary equipment before the date of the first elections. More material is expected in the coming weeks.

Meanwhile, a ship from Lebanon with 70 containers of additional electoral material docked at the Matadi port on 15 September. According to the INEC authorities, each container comprised 116 800 voting booths.

The delivery of this equipment represents a major step in the electoral process. Other milestones include the submission of presidential and parliamentarian candidacies that concluded on 11 September; the publication on 8 September of a Code of Good Conduct for all political parties taking part in the elections; and the voter registration, which was completed on 17 July. The electoral campaign is slated for 28 October and the presidential election a month later.”

On January 7, 2010, reflecting on three events that had occurred in quick succession in the DRC that saw the crucial logistical participation of the then MONUC in two of those (the eruption of the Nyamuragira Volcano in North Kivu and the Enyele insurrection in Equateur), I published a post here titled “Can the DRC function and survive without MONUC?”

In that post I said, “MONUC should seize the country. For one or two generations, till a new generation of politicians comes of age.”

My assessment still stands today. While the politicians kept squabbling for the better part of the second half of 2010 and of this year over the membership in CENI board, the electoral law and other related matters, they knew perfectly well that time was running out, and that with each passing day the country was inching towards the brink of a constitutional crisis that the postponement of the general elections could automatically trigger. And, as we speak, the ballot papers with the names of the 11 presidential candidates and 7,200 MP candidates have still to be printed out and deployed throughout the country. It’s now clear that Congolese politicians’ recklessness is phony. Deep down, they know they could rely on the Hail Mary pass by MONUSCO.  

2) CENI okays access to server, audit of electoral rosters and is poised to publish voters’ registry

MP Jean-Pierre Lisanga Bonganga

Chairman, Convention Chrétienne pour la Démocratie (CCD)

Spokesman of the pro-Tshisekedi opposition “Fatima Wing”

On Monday, September 19, at the conference hall of Kinshasa Memling Hotel, CENI chairman Rev Daniel Ngoy Mulunda and pro-Tshisekedi opposition leaders of the “Fatima Wing”—aka “DTP” (Dynamique Tshisekedi Président)—finally reached an understanding that could pave the way for these holdovers to finally sign the election Code of Conduct.

The contentious issues of access to CENI central server and the audit of the electoral rosters were solved as CENI yielded to the pro-Tshisekedi opposition politicians’ demands. Rev Ngoy Mulunda also said that his organization is poised to publish the complete voters’ registry.

Vocal members of the opposition voiced their satisfaction at the end of the meeting—including pro-Tshisekedi hardliners Martin Fayulu, head of the party Engagement pour la Citoyenneté et le Développement (ECiDé); Hubert Efole, RCD secretary general; MP Jean-Pierre Lisanga Bonganga, leader of the Convention Chrétienne pour la Démocratie (CCD) and spokesman of the Fatima Wing; Joseph Olenghankoy Mukundji, 2006 presidential candidate and leader of Forces novatrices de l’Union sacrée (Fonus);  Moïse Moni Della (RCDN); MP Léonard Lumeya Dhu Maleghi, head of parliamentary caucus of Christian-Democrats, and Fortunat Kandanda Muele, leader of the Alliance Nationale des Libéraux du Congo (ANALCO).

Strangely, instead of having IT experts go to the central server of CENI, opposition politicians chose to do this by themselves. CENI rapporteur Mathieu Mpita revealed the names at 3 opposition leaders who would be part of this team: MP Jean-Lucien Busa (MLC), Valentin Mubake (UDPS), and Martin Fayulu (ECiDé).

There were, however, some new demands made by the Fatima Wing. Instead of having both the ruling coalition and the opposition teams audit CENI central server, the opposition wants to do this in the absence of the ruling majority—as MP Jean-Pierre Lisanga Bonganga insisted: “Without the [presence of the] majority, we can work [at the central server] with the help of the international community.”

Furthermore, the opposition tosses in an additional condition: in the event that the audit of CENI voters’ registry obtains major discrepancies, the electoral commission has to scrap its current timeline—in other words: a postponement of the elections, which implies a power sharing transitional mechanism!

Instead of wasting their time in these unending squabbles with CENI, the opposition leaders should heed the advice Rev Ngoy gave them free of charge at Memling Hotel. The central server only serves in collecting data coming from the ground, and cannot perform anything beyond these basic arithmetic operations. Though automated voting is theoretically mentioned in the Electoral Law, the actual voting will be done manually. Additionally, upon completion of voting at a polling station, the votes are counted on the spot in the presence of representatives of parties involved and the results immediately posted. The better way for the opposition to make sure that there’s no foul play is to start training their observers and deploying them to the 62,000 poll counting stations countrywide.

In the meantime, the Fatima Wing has still to sign the Code of Conduct.

At the same meeting, Rev Ngoy announced he was requesting the assistance of Kinshasa Governor André Kimbuta in enforcing in Kinshasa the strict ban on illegal electoral campaigning. According to the official CENI timeline, electoral campaigns run from October 28 to November 26.

3) Outbreak of “Balkanization Conspiracy Theory”

Presidential candidate Antipas Mbusa Nyamwisi and Paul Kagame 

Undated Photo

(Credits)

The “Balkanization Conspiracy Theory” decried by the US Kinshasa Embassy in 2010 has flared up anew in the Congolese capital--and with a vengeance this time. In its September 19 issue, Le Palmares published a long-winded article titled “Balkanization of Congo—2011 presidential election: the danger looming over the horizon is taking shape.”

In a jocular comment on the article, the Brussels-based CongoForum notes that it “opened with an apocalyptic description borrowing its images to from continental drifts.”

As a matter-of-fact, the article is a series of bad metaphors run amok:

“Never before has the Democratic Republic of Congo been as fragile as it is at the present moment. The presidential election of November 28 turns into an issue around which all the impossibilities attempted yesterday seem suddenly able to find an outlet. For those who can closely examine these developments, the lineup of protagonists in this [electoral] rendezvous obtains geopolitical arithmetic that sends chills down the spine.

The big entities previously stable are subjected at this moment to the unbearable pressure of swell waves [ground swell]. The slide of tectonic plates is already being felt. Well-informed political seismologists have no illusions about the (…) outcome of the process that started with the implementation of CENI board. We are truly far from 2006 when the provision of a second round allowed quelling a dangerous volcano…”  

And at one point the author of this metaphor-riddled article comes to almost naming one of the forces causing these tectonic shifts:

“Let’s note that among the presidential candidates in contention, there are those who had tasted the vainglory of ruling a micro-state within the Congolese state. They had as their sponsor a reconciled aggressor. (…)

If something had to give after December 6 [publication of provisional results of the presidential election], strategists plan to break up the DRC into four “républiquettes” [tiny republics]. Count the number of viable presidential candidates among the eleven ones retained by CENI.”

This is clearly a diatribe against presidential candidate and former minister Antipas Mbusa Nyamwisi who was a leader of RCD-K-ML during Africa’s World War with a small territory bordering Uganda under his control. The “reconciled aggressor” is Rwanda. The 4 “viable candidates” the article alludes to may be: 1) Kabila, 2) Kengo; 3) Kamerhe; and 4) Nyamwisi.

Should I follow the twisted logic of this article and attempt to map out the four “républiquettes”? Well, let me try... Kabila would have Katanga, Maniema, Orientale and the Kasai; Kengo Equateur; Kamerhe South Kivu; and Nyamwisi North Kivu! What about Bas-Congo and Bandundu? This stupid episode could have been laughable if it didn’t involve a blatant attempt at intimidation of presidential candidates—including Vital Kamerhe (see next section). It’s also a lame attempt at putting some distance between Kabila and his cumbersome ally Paul Kagame in an electorate still enflamed against Rwanda.


4) Grim Reaper sightings: Plot-Fatwa to assassinate Kabila

Grim Reaper Tattoo Design

(Credits)

DRC Radio-Trottoir [Sidewalk Radio, grapevine] has been reporting sightings of the Grim Reaper lately. Last week, rumors were rife that Etienne Tshisekedi met his early demise on arrival in Belgium: that’s why Belgian police whisked his dead body from Zaventem Airport! UDPS members accused pro-Kabila militants of spreading the rumor, calling them “prophets of doom” “bent on discouraging millions of Congolese who found their hope in the Sphinx of Limete.”  The “Sphinx of Limete” is one of several monikers of Tshisekedi, who lives in the Limete quarter of Kingabwa Commune. (Incidentally, a new rumor spread today by L'Avenir claims that the entirety of the war chest of Tshisekedi has allegedly been stolen by some of his closest associates and relatives--a rumor vigorously denied by Albert Moleka, his chief of staff.)

Not to be outdone by pro-Tshisekedi activists, pro-Kabila militants came up with the improbable narratives of an implosion of the country (see previous section) and the nefarious plot that has been hatched to assassinate Joseph Kabila. An article, published in the pro-Kabila news portal DigitalCongo, and reprised as headline by Africa News in its August 20 issue, was titled “Hotbed: A Plot-Fatwa against Joseph Kabila in progress”—whatever that confused title means.

Citing unnamed “sources [who] report that contacts were taken by [some] opposition [members] in order to have the country plunge into violence, [by] planning, in a fateful schema of chaos, an attempt at the physical integrity of the head of state,” the article, on its tangled autopilot course, adds:

“Some sources report that contacts might have already been taken (…) with neighboring countries generally involved in this kind of plot. This scheme would consist in triggering chaos by the [assassination] of the current head of state, chaos that would activate the constitutional provision relating to the vacancy at the Presidency of the Republic. For the advocates of this option, the path [to power] by the ballot box would seem no longer reassuring.
As of today, everything may already be set in motion to have the electoral process flounder, as were evinced (…) by different troubles sparked off here and there, including those of September 5 and 6, 2011.
With the situation that would thus be created [the death of Kabila], the plan would be to garner the conditions [needed] for power sharing among the plotters. The premiership would be given to a defector of MLC, [a party] known as a beggar of that position. The charges of the speakership of the “transitional” National Assembly and of Foreign Ministry would be given to two political personalities coming from the former constituency of the head of state. Which would explain the recent defections (…) within the ruling majority and the repositioning of plotters into the opposition.”

The most important thing to look at in the quote above is the systematic conditional mode of the verbs used, a defining characteristic of rumors.

Worse, the Africa News article is also headlined as “Plan B of the trio Kamerhe-Mbusa-Kamitatu”! In May 2010, the pro-Kabila media unleashed similar attacks against four politicians of the presidential cartel they then called the “Gang of Four.”  The four politicians were: 1) Olivier Kamitatu Etsu, Minister of Planning; 2) José Endundo, Minister of Environment; 3) Antipas Mbusa Nyamwisi, then Minister of Decentralization; and 4) independent MP Modeste Bahati Lukwebo. The four politicians had dared to voice concerns over the governance of Prime minister Adolphe Muzito and attempted to create their own wing within the ex-AMP called the “Liberal and Patriotic Center” (CLP), a move that was quickly squashed by Kabila at his Kingakati farm where the four culprits were summoned. This time around, the defamation campaign takes on an ominous characteristic as the accusations leveled are nothing less than an assassination attempt on the person of Joseph Kabila.  

One would hope that this crazy narrative of the Grim Reaper sightings is only confined in the mind of some pro-Kabila kooks on the fringes of the media. Uunfortunately, this doesn’t seem to be the case. Major pro-Kabila Kinshasa newsprints ran the story in chorus, including the daily Forum des As, already at the forefront of the 2010 attacks against the “Gang of Four,” which meekly stated that “where there’s smoke there’s fire,” as if to acknowledge that it had nothing to substantiate its horrendous assassination plot accusations. Incredible... So, what do these people expect the General Prosecutor of the Republic to do: arrest presidential candidates Vital Kamerhe and Antipas Mbusa Nyamwisi and Planning Minister Olivier Kamitatu for plotting to assassinate Kabila? Are they joking? This whole media cabal stinks to high heavens!

Olivier Kamitatu Etsu

Planning Minister

As the Grim Reaper  

5) French anti-racism lobby SOS RACISME denounces attacks of Rwandan expats by Bana-Congo during Kagame Paris visit

SOS Racisme logo

“Touche pas à mon pote” [Don’t touch my pal]

The French anti-racism lobby SOS Racisme issued a press release denouncing alleged attacks of Rwandan expats by Bana-Congo during Kagame’s visit in Paris on September 12. What’s funny about the press release is that instead of using the verb “perpetrate” it mistakenly uses the verb “perpetuate.” Not once, but twice: in the title and in the body of the press release.

The title reads: “SOS Racisme denounces the racist attacks perpetuated [sic] against Rwandans in connection with Paul Kagame’s visit.”

Then the second paragraph of the press release states:

“The attacks perpetuated [sic] by groups, in all likelihood issued from the DRC, targeted isolated individuals, who were insulted, assaulted and beaten up on public transportation systems or in the streets.” 

Now, I watched these protests on television, on YouTube and read online reports on them—including the blow-by-blow account given by Vincent Harris of the blog Colored Opinions here and here. And nowhere did I come across anything resembling the account given by SOS Racism. On the contrary, I saw Congolese and Rwandan expats united in their wrath against Kagame.

Update: Vincent Harris has a new post on the reaction of Paris Congolese expats, who went to the SOS Racisme headquarters in hopes to confront Sopo, the head of the anti-racism lobby, over this press release (with a video).

Firefighters put out fire at a burning car set ablaze by Congolese anti-Kagame protesters

Paris, September 12, 2011

Photo: Fabianna Lévy/LP

(Credits)

6) Jaynet Kabila, Joseph Kabila’s twin sister, to chair UNESCO Regional Research and Documentation Center for Women, Gender and Peace-building in the Great Lakes

Jaynet Kabila and North Kivu Gov. Julien Paluku

Goma, March 7, 2010

(Credits)

On Sunday, September 19, at the close of a two-day meeting held at the Faden House Hotel in downtown Kinshasa,  ministerial delegates from Angola, Burundi, the Central African Republic, Congo, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kenya, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia chose Jaynet Kabila, DRC president’s twin sister, as the chairwoman of the newly created UNESCO Regional Research and Documentation Center for Women, Gender and Peace-building in the Great Lakes, which will be headquartered in Kinshasa.

This follows the agreement signed on January 14 by UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova and Joseph Kabila.

According to UNESCO,

“The creation of the Centre is part of UNESCO’s programme in favour of promoting the human rights of women living in the Great Lakes Region through policy-oriented research, consultations, networking, capacity building and the promotion of sustainable peace in this region.”

The project for this center dates back to 2005. Janet Kabila, who was pushed for the job by the DRC government, is also the chairwoman of the Foundation Mzee Laurent-Désiré Kabila.

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