Gen Jean de Dieu Oleko
Contrary to what I previously stated here, relaying what the Congolese press had announced this past weekend—L’Avenir and Le Soft being among the culprits—Gen Jean de Dieu Oleko was AT NO TIME under house arrest.
The maddening thing about this rampant reporting malpractice that bears all the features of the Congolese grapevine of Radio-Trottoir [Sidewalk Radio] is that whenever the canard is contradicted by facts, the media culprit just picks things up where it left without ever thinking of apologizing to readers or viewers for the false reporting.
This is the case of L’Avenir, which reports this Monday June 14 that Gen Oleko appeared on Sunday at the police barracks of Camp Lufungula in the Commune of Lingwala to launch a “fortnight of [police] road courtesy” and to announce the intensification of police patrols before the Cinquantenaire. The same news is also relayed by Radio Okapi, the only reliable source of information in the DRC.
To its credit, however, L’Avenir now talks of “rumors” that maintain that “henceforth the general has to appear each Friday at the Auditorat Militaire [JAG corps of DRC] and, as a result, forbidden to leave the city-province of Kinshasa.” On his part, Ben-Clet of Le Potentiel is far more self-assured: “the general [Oleko] was briefly held and questioned by security services.”
2) Opposition MP Clément Kanku announces the creation of a Shadow Cabinet:
MP Clément Kanku
Coordinator of opposition platform "Union pour la Nation" (UN)
Radio Okapi reports that opposition MP Clément Kanku, coordinator of the UN or “Union pour la Nation” [Union for the Nation] (an opposition platform to which belongs the MLC), announced Saturday, June 12, the creation of a Shadow Cabinet (“gouvernement fantôme” in French). Radio Okapi doesn’t give, however, the composition of the shadow cabinet.
Radio Okapi quotes Clément Kanku as stating:
“We will criticize [the government] and we’ll tell the population what we would have done, if we were in power.”
My guess is that this new opposition gimmick is just what it appears to be: a gimmick! The opposition is torn by contradictions, rivalries, and corruption. For instance, though dominated by the “Union pour la Nation”, Kinshasa provincial assembly elected as governor André Kimbuta of Kabila’s party. The opposition provincial MPs are alleged to have been bribed by the ruling presidential majority alliance (AMP).
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