Étienne Tshisekedi as a "despotic buffoon"

Ever since the constitutional revision voted by the bloc of the
Alliance of the Presidential Majority (AMP) in Congolese Parliament
(in the absence of opposition MPs who boycotted the debate) and
promulgated by the Raïs this year--a constitutional revision that
allows among other things a one-round presidential election--the
opposition has been striving to build a unified front with one sole
presidential candidate in the elections slated for November of this
year.

Opposition leaders Jean-Claude Mvuemba and Frank Dionge have just
been trying to have the whole of the opposition back Étienne
Tshisekedi's presidential bid. But some other leaders were instead
pushing for US-style primaries at which one leader would be elected as
the opposition standard bearer.

Meanwhile MP François Muamba, the President of the MLC bloc in
Parliament, was sending mixed signals all along. For Muamba, the MLC
wouldn't be committing itself before the party's congress in April,
when MLC party members also expect Jean-Pierre Bemba to be freed by
the International Criminal Court (ICC)! Where they got this notion of
a "not-guilty" verdict for Bemba is anybody's guess...

Muamba was also saying that the MLC is the strongest opposition force
in Parliament. Besides, its candidate--Bemba--got 42% of the votes in
the second round of the 2006 presidential election, whereas the
strength of Étienne Tshisekedi's UDPS can't be clearly ascertained as
this party chose at that time not to participate in the presidential
and legislative elections. What's more, Muamba insists that in this
day and age political leaders aren't chosen for their charisma but on
the strength of their political program.

Then, this week, in an interview with Radio France Internationale
(RFI), Tshisekedi stated: "I didn't fight for 30 years only to give my
place to someone else." He then added that whatever the opposition
decides he'll stand as a presidential candidate in November.

This shattering statement means that the "sacred union" contemplated
by the opposition in November is yet another pipe dream and, if
anything, it confirms the charge of autocratic tendencies leveled at
Tshisekedi aka Lider Maximo from within his own already splintered
party. Even more damning, opposition leaders now consider Tshisekedi
as a "despotic buffoon"--an expression René Lemarchand used to
describe Mzee Laurent-Désiré Kabila.