DRC Elections 2011 Watch: 1 ) Vital Kamerhe and François-Joseph Nzanga Mobutu file to run for president; 2) UDPS and PPRD cancel demo and counter-demo scheduled for September 8; and 3) Bana-Congo attack DRC Paris embassy with Molotov cocktails

1) Vital Kamerhe and François-Joseph Nzanga Mobutu file to run for president

Vital Kamerhe and François-Joseph Nzanga Mobutu

Filing at CENI

Kinshasa, Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Photos: Lievine Mbuinga and Tshimi/ Radio Okapi

(Credits)

Vital Kamerhe and François-Joseph Nzanga Mobutu filed to run for president on Wednesday, September 7. Coincidentally, the submission of the candidacy Nzanga Mobutu coincided with the 14th anniversary of the death of his father, Mobutu Sese Seko, who died in Rabat, Morocco, on September 7, 1997.

Their candidacies come on the heels of those already filed by Jean Andeka Djamba and Etienne Tshisekedi.

In a statement he made afterward, Kamerhe said he was still open to talks with Tshisekedi and other leaders of the opposition to craft a common opposition program.

But Kamerhe took digs at Kabila, promising that, if elected and with a comfortable majority in the National Assembly, the first thing he would do will be to reverse the constitutional change made this year to the current system of one-round presidential election:

 “It is to be feared that this situation [one-round presidential election] would seriously damage the leadership of the next President of the Republic, make him appear as the president of a partisan faction, or of a fraction of the territory, and ultimately render the country ungovernable.”

Commenting on the recent violence in Kinshasa, Kamerhe said:

“You are rightly wondering if democratic elections must always be an occasion for violence, aggressions and other acts of vandalism with injuries, destruction of property, and other serious infringements of fundamental liberties and human rights. Fears (…) for a democracy ensnared by cheating, falsification, lies, crackling of gunfire, use of knives; a democracy bereaved by killings, suspected of abuse of power…”

2) UDPS and PPRD cancel demo and counter-demo scheduled for September 8

 The UDPS planned demo at CENI headquarters on Thursday, September 8, and the counter-demo scheduled by the youth wing of PPRD at the same venue have both been canceled. Both parties may have been brought to their senses by the outcries of residents and Cardinal Laurent Monsengwo as well as the condemnations and calls to calm from diplomatic missions—including the pressing cease-and-desist call from the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.

Earlier, UDPS Jacquemain Shabani made one of his outlandish statements on Radio France Internationale (RFI), claiming that PPRD operatives ransacked their own office so as to blame UDPS. He then added: “Everybody knows that Joseph Kabila’s PPRD is setting up an armed militia” in Kinshasa!

On his part, Kinshasa Governor André Kimbuta, who is a PPRD member, banned all political rallies till Sunday, September 11.

In an op-ed published in the sarcastic section “Apostrophe” of the daily Le Potentiel, Ben-Clet blasted politicians from both sides for the violence:

“Look! These anarchists of politicos are attempting, for their exclusive alimentary interests, to put Kinshasa to fire and sword. In less than ten days, they have instrumentalized or let loose delinquents who, assured of impunity, have set fire first on the hut of Joseph Kabila’s party. In retaliation, the hut of Tshisekedi’s party has burned with, in its wake, the television studio of an opposition operative. Ow! the politics of the poor."  

3) Bana-Congo hit DRC Paris embassy with Molotov cocktails

 DRC Paris Embassy

Bana-Congo attacked the DRC Paris embassy in the night of September 6/7. The attack took place at around 5 AM local time. According to the television channel Europe 1, which broke the news, “a dozen [incendiary] devices were thrown against the façade of the building, located in the 8^th arrondissement.”

A source at the criminal police brigade of Paris investigating the arson told the Belgian newspaper Le Soir that the “reception hall of the building sustained damage.”

Strangely, in a post just this past week, I was describing the Bana-Congo, detailing their M.O. in Europe. And I said that their “third method is attacks at the residences of Congolese ambassadors and diplomats (one attempt thus far, at the residence of Kinshasa ambassador in London).” This is their first terrorist attack on a Congolese diplomatic mission.

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DRC Elections 2011 Watch: Etienne Tshisekedi as a “despotic buffoon” (Redux)

PPRD office ransacked by UDPS members

"Violence by UDPS goons"

Kinshasa, Monday, September 5, 2011

Photo: John Bompengo/Radio Okapi

(Credits)

Etienne Tshisekedi’s “Plan-B” is now clear, according to pro-Kabila media: to put the international community in front of the fait accompli of the supposedly dictatorial regime of Kabila, with an unsustainable (in human toll, that is) campaign of “Tunisia-zation” of Kinshasa.

An “Intifada” or a tropical remake of the “Arab Spring.” These aren't just words I'm tossing around: they came from the mouths of Tshisekedi, UDPS leaders and oppositionist politicians at the Easter Sunday rally Tshisekedi held at Stade Tata Raphael. I was in Kinshasa, on Oshwe Avenue, in Kalamu Commune, less than one hundred meters from the entrance of the stadium when I sent a short post that summed up the mood (or the plan) of Tshisekedi that Easter Sunday: "Tshisekedi warned that if a new president isn't sworn in by December 6, the constitutional deadline, his party would take to the streets to kick the Rais out..." By the way, according to the revised timeline published by CENI, the president-elect will only be sworn in on December 20. What would Tshisekedi then do? Take to the and kick government out? 

This campaign of attrition, according to this reading of Tshisekedi’s plan, would force the hand of the international community, by compelling it, by proxy of its enforcement instrument on the ground—MONUSCO—to take charge of the situation and follow this course of action:

1) to  step in between the “belligerents” in order to separate them;

2) Point (1) in fact amounts to suspending the sovereignty of the DRC (already merely nominal with the very presence of blue helmets; a country the politically-correct-inclined people call "post-conflict" and those with no qualms describe as  "failed state" and others "banana republic": in such a place, anything goes! );

 3) to delay elections indefinitely; and

4) to draw all the political stakeholders for rounds of interminable negotiations that would eventually lead to power-sharing and caretaker TRANSITIONAL schemes between political parties…  And damn the people and their votes!

Then, Tshisekedi, smart as a whip, though certain to lose the upcoming November presidential election any other way one could look at it objectively, would emerge as the inescapable leader of this band of thieving heathens just by the sheer "license" of his seniority (as it turns out, old age, like sexism, is still an unshakable privilege this side of the jungle of the Congo Basin)…  The old geezer would then step in center stage, by the fiat of the deus ex machina of the international community, without bothering to go through the cumbersome process of the universal suffrage.

In other words, Etienne Tshisekedi has just embarked on a course that logically leads to a coup d’état staged by one political party—namely the UDPS, and the other parties in its cartel. And he’s staging this coup d’état in broad daylight. With the tacit approval of all the suckers of this world…

Brilliant, isn’t it?

In my view, this isn’t a conspiracy theory at all. This is the plan hatched by Thisekedi and his associates who’ve been busy these past few months attempting to destabilize and destroy CENI by what I’ve called a campaign of (pointless) urban guerilla skirmishes.

In these urban donnybrooks that have now turned bloody, the government’s or the incumbent’s side can’t win. Though Tshisekedi is clearly the nasty villain in this story, he is somewhat cast as the victim and Kabila as the bogeyman.

Just consider the slant taken by the international and some national media as well as rights groups in reporting or denouncing the events of the last 48 hours. Two UDPS activists killed by the police; a dozen others seriously injured; an office of the UDPS torched; an opposition television station set ablaze; and riot cops firing tear gas canisters in residential neighborhoods! Journaliste en Danger (JED) was the first rights  organization to cry murder: it demanded that the government bring to justice the perpetrators of these unspeakable acts of arson and vandalism... committed against RLTV... Period! Forget the rest. Forget the PPRD office. Forget the small businesses that were looted by Tshisekedi's mob.

Reading the report of the event on the portal of Radio Okapi, for instance, there’s no way one would know that the story is picked up in media res—or into the middle of things. The whole beginning of the story is cut out, edited, redacted. One has the impression that one camp—the presidential majority and, incidentally, the other leaders of the opposition who aren’t party to Tshisekedi’s madness—just woke up one morning and decided to kill willy-nilly UDPS members! Fortunately, for Radio Okapi, its ubiquitous photojournalist, John Bompengo, toured all the scenes of the clashes and thanks to him we can thus piece together the story from its beginning—by checking out the basic element: the old fashioned calendar date (day, month, and year) when the photographer snapped those shots…

A simple question one should put to the Lider Maximo: what’s the point of dragging your whole village to the headquarters of CENI where you only had to individually expedite a few formalities? On their way back from CENI offices, UDPS goons who accompanied the Lider Maximo—does the old geezer even know this used to be the moniker of a dictator called Fidel Castro?—destroyed property and businesses, burned cars, and ransacked PPRD offices. Well, PPRD has its own hooligans too, who were bound to retaliate, or take matters into their own hands--a counter-violence to match the initial violence.

Burned UDPS office in the same neighborhood as in the photo on top

"Counter-violence by PPRD hooligans"

Tuesday, September 6, 2011 

Photo: John Bompendo/Radio Okapi

(Credits)

I had Kinois old-timers on the phone yesterday. Strangely, the wanton violence by UDPS hooligans and the equally wanton retaliatory counter-violence by PPRD hoodlums didn’t remind them of the 2006 pre- and post-electoral unrest. The violence reminded them of the pillages and destructions of the early 1990s… Democracy isn’t about looting, they were complaining worryingly. Democracy means civil exchanges of views… and, at the end of the day, winning by universal suffrage. This expression is the leitmotiv here: universal suffrage, a notion alien to Tshisekedi.  

I reread today with a creepy sense of uncanniness—pardon the tautology!—a post I wrote in Kinshasa on February 15 and sent by email via BlackBerry to this blog. I had entitled it “Etienne Tshisekedi as a ‘despotic buffoon.’” 

Though some elements contained in the post are dated and a few political actors have changed positions and alliances on the political stage, the gist of my argument remains pertinent today—and, especially, the Lider Maximo is still the same zany old geezer. So allow me to quote at some length that post:

“Opposition leaders Jean-Claude [Vuemba]  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 (…) 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.”

In Africa, “despotic buffoons” are a dangerous breed. Remember Idi Amin?…

Riot cops in Limete Quarter

Kinshasa, Tuesday, September 6, 2011

Photo: John Bompengo/Radio Okapi

(Credits)

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DRC Elections 2011 Watch: Violence mars aftermath of Tshisekedi’s candidacy submission in Kinshasa

Charred RLTV studio building and car 

Kinshasa, September 6, 2011

Photo: John Bompengo/Radio Okapi

(Credits)

Violence erupted in Kinshasa yesterday after Tshisekedi’s candidacy submission at CENI headquarters. Violence continued in the wee hours of September 5/6. According to AFP, one UDPS member was killed early today when an unauthorized demo was dispersed by riot cops in the Mombele quarter, near Limete.

Yesterday, UDPS members accompanying the motorcade of Tshisekedi after his appearance at CENI headquarters, ransacked a PPRD “inter-federal” office on Sendwe Boulevard, in Kalamu Commune (near Limete, where the UDPS leader resides), after a verbal confrontation with the police guarding the building. UDPS members also burned seven vehicles nearby, including one belonging to the head of the PPRD office.

In retaliation, unknown arsonists (believed to be PPRD sympathizers) torched the RLTV studio building belonging to MP Roger Lumbala, chairman of RCD/National (a splinter group of Ruberwa’s RCD) and 2006 presidential candidate, who belongs to the opposition Fatima Group that backs Tshisekedi for president. [Update: As written on the facade of the TV studio building, while keeping the same acronym his party had after splitting from Ruberwa's RCD during Congo's World War, Lumbala has cleverly transformed it to stand for: "Rassemblement des Congolais Démocrates et Nationalistes.] The Limete UDPS headquarters has also been burned.

In an unrelated development, UDPS senior leaders had announced earlier that their planned demo on Thursday, September 8, will take place as scheduled, despite Tshisekedi’s filing to run for president.

This would spark further violence as the government, through its spokesperson, Communication and Media Minister Lambert Mende, has warned that “CENI building and its immediate surroundings are, by virtue of laws, neutral zones. Consequently, demonstrations intending to exert upon the organizing power of the electoral process physical pressure of any kind are proscribed by the laws of the country.”

 Inside RLTV studio

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DRC Elections 2011 Watch: 1) WikiLeaks : Joseph Kabila, Augustin Katumba Mwange and Dan Gertler ; 2) Breaking News: Tshisekedi files to run for president; 3) Bipolar opposition: Fatima Group vs. Sultani Group; and 4) Zero Tolerance: Postal Service CEO Jean-Pierre Muhondo thrown in Makala Prison for stealing more than $3m

1) WikiLeaks: Joseph Kabila, Augustin Katumba Mwange and Dan Gertler

Augustin Katumba Mwanke

Photo: Le Soft Numérique

(Credits)

A cable created on December 14, 2009, by the US Kinshasa Embassy comments on the resignation by Augustin Katumba Mwange as secretary general of Kabila’s political cartel then known as "Alliance de la Majorité Présidentielle (AMP)." Katumba, a Katangan and a longtime key powerbroker in the Kabila regime, is described in the cable as “a kind of shady, even nefarious figure within Kabila’s inner circle,” who “is believed to manage much of Kabila’s personal fortune.”

The cable also alleges that Katumba may “have significant health problems. He spent several weeks in South Africa earlier this year for medical treatment.  The nature of his health problems is not known.  Some observers, however, believe he is HIV positive. This theory would seem bolstered by his emaciated physical appearance.”

Katumba, the cable further alleges, “is known to be close to Israeli citizen Dan Gertler, a mysterious trader in precious minerals who, according to some sources, lends Kabila his private jet for trips abroad.”

In a description of Kabila’s entourage eerily reminiscent of Jason Stearns’s hypothesis of the “Logic of Disorder in Kinshasa,” the cable concludes:

“While the removal of Augustin Katumba as head of the AMP is a significant change in the leadership hierarchy, his demotion may not signal permanent exclusion from Kabila's inner circle, nor does it follow that he will exercise less influence vis-a-vis his boss.  Kabila, as Congolese leaders past, routinely rotates his followers in and out of positions and closer or farther from the center of power.  This juggling may keep potential rivals from consolidating their authority by maintaining the established patron-client relationship.  With Kabila's focus turning more toward his reelection campaign, more changes are sure to follow.”

2) Breaking News: Etienne Tshisekedi files to run for President

Etienne Tshisekedi

Filing to run for DRC president

CENI Headquarters, Kinshasa, Gombe Commune (downtown)

Monday, September 5, 2011

Photo: John Bompengo/Radio Okapi

(Credits)

Accompanied by thousands of his followers and the opposition leaders backing him as their “common presidential candidate,” Etienne Tshisekedi went this Monday to CENI headquarters to file to run for President.

Speaking to the press afterwards, Tshisekedi stated:

“A group [of the opposition] freely took a stance for my candidacy; but there was another group which, rightly, either has laid down conditions or was reluctant. As I’m a democrat, I respect the opinions of all. (…) However, I have to put an end to this process of consultation [between oppositions parties].”

Tshisekedi was alluding to the recent bipolar division of the opposition between two groups: 1) The Fatima Group, which is also called the “Dynamique Tshisekedi Président” (DTP) that backs the presidential bid of Tshisekedi; and 2) The Sultani Group, or the “Cadre de Concertation de l’Opposition” (CCO). The CCO wants elaborate consultations between opposition parties over their respective platforms and programs before choosing a presidential candidate. Kengo, a CCO participant, even floated the idea of holding opposition primaries.

Kamerhe, MP Thomas Luhaka (MLC), Léon Kengo wa Dondo, and Dr. Oscar Kashala belong to the Sultani Group.

These groups are named after the venues where their crucial meetings took place: the conference halls of Notre Dame de Fatima Parish and of Sultani Hotel—both located in the Gombe Commune (downtown Kinshasa).

More about the rift between these two groups below.

3) Bipolar opposition: Fatima Group vs. Sultani Group

MP Jean-Claude Vuemba Luzamba

Chairman,  Mouvement du Peuple Congolais pour la République (MPCR)

Leading member of the Pro-Tshisekedi Fatima Group

(Credits) 

Squaring the circle, as the Kinshasa daily La Prosperité recently quipped about the unending squabble over a common opposition candidate, is the only apt metaphor to describe the rift tearing opposition leaders and their political parties.

This rift has crystallized around two groups now being referred to by the opposition and the media as “Fatima Group” and “Sultani Group.”

Etienne Tshisekedi, backed by the Fatima Group (around 80 smaller parties plus the UDPS), has just filed to run for president. It’s announced that Vital Kamerhe and Léon Kengo wa Dondo will also file to run for president this week.

Not content to stop at their division, these two groups have now resorted to lobbing verbal assaults at each other in newsprints and on prime-time TV.

The latest in those donnybrooks is the interview La Prospérité published this Monday ( August 5) of MP Jean-Claude Vuemba Luzamba, leader of the Mouvement du Peuple Congolais pour la République (MPCR).

The interview reveals the following:

a) MP Vuemba, who hails from the Bas-Congo Province, has turned into the political enemy of MP Ne Mwanda Nsemi, also a native of Bas-Congo and leader of the banned Bundu dia Mayala, for the latter’s support for Kamerhe in their province;

b) On the reluctance of Kamerhe and Kengo to endorse Tshisekedi as president, MP Vuemba, in so many words, accused them of being pro-Kabila opportunists masquerading as opposition leaders (a conspiracy theory rampant in the rank and file of the opposition): “We have now come to realize that some friends wanted to bamboozle the big family of the Opposition into declaring them opposition presidential candidates.”

Commenting namely on Kamerhe and Kengo, MP Vuemba said:

“Kamerhe has just arrived on the scene, not even six months ago. You’re not going to request that Tshisekedi receive [the preconditions voiced by] him. What’s President Kamerhe’s [political] worth at the present moment? (…) Kengo wa Dongo was an independent until about fifteen days ago when he launched his political party.”

Someone recently asked me to place a bet on the upcoming presidential election in the DRC—granted that these elections are held on November 28 as planned, as serious snags have now arisen (see here and here, courtesy of Mel in her comment on my post of September 3). I said Kabila will win hands down. And these quarrels seem to confirm my bet.

4) Zero Tolerance: Postal Service CEO Jean-Pierre Muhondo wa Shabalala thrown in Makala Prison for stealing more than $3m

Jean-Pierre Muhondo wa Shabalala

Disgraced thieving CEO of SCPT 

(Credits)

The opposition and “Radio-Trottoir” (grapevine) often mock Kabila’s anti-graft campaign called “Zero Tolerance” as more often than not only small fish are caught in its net. This time around, it seems that a sizeable fish has been caught.

Jean-Pierre Muhondo wa Shabalala, CEO of the woebegone Société Commerciale de Poste et de Télécommunication (SCPT), has just been nabbed and thrown into Kinshasa Makala Prison for stealing more than $3m of the paltry $8m the government borrowed from local banks to transition from the  expensive Internet access by satellite to fiber optic speed.

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DRC Elections 2011 Watch: 1) WikiLeaks: Ambassador William J. Garvelink advises against Kengo’s high-level meetings during Washington visit (2010); 2) CENI opens central server to opposition; and 3) Bana-Congo put the fear of God into Congolese soukouss musicians

1) WikiLeaks: Ambassador William J. Garvelink advises against Kengo’s high-level meetings during Washington DC visit (2010)

Senate President Léon Kengo wa Dondo

(Credits)

The summary of a cable created on January 20, 2010 by the US Kinshasa Embassy and titled “Senate President Kengo’s Ouvertures to the U.S.- What’s the Old Fox up to now?” reads:

“Senate President Kengo wa Dondo has unexpectedly approached United States diplomats, in Kinshasa and at the AU in Addis Ababa (reftels), to request assistance in facilitating meetings with senior USG officials during an upcoming trip to Washington.  One of the Congo's most astute politicians, Kengo is the only oppositionist to hold a senior position in the GDRC [Government of the Democratic Republic of Congo].  We suspect he may be testing the waters to see if the U.S. will support him in connection with a possible run for the presidency in 2011.  We recommend that Department not arrange meetings for Kengo without the knowledge of the DRC embassy in Washington (which Kengo does not want) as Kengo may wish to embarrass Kabila, or even the U.S.  Although possibly discredited by his long association with late dictator Mobutu Sese Seko and handicapped by his ethnic background (European father and Rwandan Tutsi mother), Kengo may eye an historic opportunity to lead the dispirited, rudderless opposition lest the increasingly unpopular Kabila wins the 2011 race by default.  We are skeptical Kengo will capture voters' imagination in 2011 but Congolese politics is nothing if not unpredictable.”

The prospective analysis of Ambassador was uncannily right and, in this case, it proved prophetic. Since the date of the creation of this cable, Léon Kengo wa Dondo: A) has launched a political party, the Union des Forces du Changement (UFC) that held a mass rally at Kinshasa Stade des Martyrs on July 24, and B) is among the presidential contenders.

2) Fallout of UDPS urban guerrilla campaign of mass action: CENI opens its central server to opposition

Jacques N’Djoli Eseng’Ekeli

CENI Deputy Chairman

Photo : Le Soft Numérique

(Credits)

At first blush, it’d seem that the UDPS campaign of mass harassment of CENI has somehow paid off. Before the smoke of tear gas fired by riot cops at UDPS demonstrators had cleared out in downtown Kinshasa, Jacques N’Djoli Eseng’Ekeli, CENI deputy chairman, announced, at the weekly press briefing of the national independent election commission held on Thursdays, access to its electoral rolls as well as opening the central server to the opposition and Kabila’s camp. “The opposition, as well as the entire Congolese nation, will have access to the electoral roll,” N’Djoli stated.

But the devil is in the details, as the saying goes. And the details N’Djoli gave will in no way allay the opposition politicians’ suspicion—particularly the deeply-entrenched anti-CENI bias harbored by UDPS secretary general, Jacquemain Shabani.

N’Djoli said that the “law forces CENI to publish these lists 30 days ahead of the electoral campaign.” According to Le Potentiel, this means that these rolls will be published on September 28. Now, the problem is that the opposition wants to access the central server before the treatment of the electoral rolls and its publication by CENI.

As regards the access to the central server, N’Djoli only reiterated what CENI chairman Rev Daniel Ngoy Mulunda had said on August 21, in his response to the opposition memorandum. Both the opposition and the incumbent’s camp have each to designate each 2 IT experts to whom “would be clarified the concerns regarding the utilization of the central server and its connected applications.” Rev Mulunda had also extended an invitation to “5 leaders of the opposition and 5 leaders of the Majority to visit the national data treatment center and the facilities of data transmission using VSAT technology.”

And in his response to the opposition, Rev Mulunda had made perfectly clear that there’s one element that is non-negotiable: “the need to safeguard the independence of CENI, expression and overt will of the constitution legislators as asserted by Article 211 of the Constitution.”

In Rev Mulunda’s mind, anything that doesn’t follow the letter and spirit of the Constitution would amount to meddling with the independence of CENI.

3) Bana-Congo put the fear of God into Congolese soukouss musicians

Noël Ngiama Makanda aka Werrason aka Le-Roi-de-la-forêt aka Igwe-de-la-jungle aka Ya-Ngiama aka Mbonge aka Sima-Ekoli

Congolese Soukouss star

(Poster)

Werrason is one of the most successful and prolific soukouss musicians of DRC. His club, La Zamba Playa, where his band rehearses, was set ablaze by Jean-Pierre Bemba’s supporters on July 26, 2006, for writing pro-Kabila songs and appearing at PPRD rallies during the presidential campaign.

Werrason recently complained on Kinshasa TV that “we [Papa Wemba, Tshala Mwana, Koffi Olomide, JB Mpiana, etc.] can no longer play in Europe” as these musicians are now systematically and violently attacked by the Congolese diaspora opposition goons known as “Bana-Congo”—whom I call “informal sovereigns” (Thomas Blom Hansen) or “Doppelgänger anticitizens” (Comaroff and Comaroff)—who are the bane of any Congolese appearing on their list of accursed “Josephites” (or supporters of Joseph Kabila).

According to the article of the e-zine LeSoftonline quoted above, the Bana-Congo have achieved in putting the fear of God into Congolese soukouss musicians. These days, in Kinshasa, whenever pro-Kabila politicians invite musicians to play at the opening of their rallies, no one shows up—despite the lucrative contracts this usually obtain. With the exception of musicians like Koffi Olomide, who has officially enrolled in Kabila’s PPRD (and thereby barring himself from European concert venues); emerging bands “who have nothing to lose and everything to gain”; and Christian soukouss bands nobody would dare to attack for fear of retribution from the God of hosts! Those who still show up at pro-Kabila rallies despite Bana-Congo’s fatwas are fair game in Europe: “Upon landing at the first [European] airport, you are assured of being slapped by the first group of Bana-Congo that spots you, if they don’t make you swallow your passport.”

Things have been so bad lately for Congolese musicians on their tours overseas that some of them have become “turncoats.” Thus, claims LeSoftonline, Werrason was recently seen in Canada marching with Congolese women protesting against rapes in eastern DRC—which is not anti-Kabila activity per se, but, LeSoftonline thinks that this appearance might have “laundered” Werrason's past and ingratiated him with Bana-Congo. And the proof of this change was that the Bana-Congo let him perform unmolested.

But this assessment is contradicted by Freddy Mulongo, one of the intellectual forces behind the Bana-Congo, who wrote in a stinging op-ed published August 18:

“Down with a chameleon artist of the ilk of Werrason Sima Ekoli who acts modestly when he’s in Europe and changes into a pyromaniac when he’s in Kinshasa, prancing on all TV studios belonging to the Josephites to attack resisters-patriots-combatants…”

When it comes to politics, Congolese musicians have historically been caught between the devil and the deep blue sea. Under Mobutu, Tabu Ley Rochereau pulled a daring stunt by writing a song for executed rebel leader Pierre Mulele. He was personally confronted by Mobutu and never ever again dared to pull that one. Franco Luambo Makiadi obviously sang for Lumumba before Mobutu’s takeover; after which, he turned into Mobutu’s patented griot. The only Congolese who had successfully resisted Mobutu’s pressure to produce praise songs was Joseph Kabasele aka Jeff Kalle.

Besides, it doesn’t help musicians’ case when one of them, namely Papa Wemba, claims ad nauseum with a straight face that “musicians are like prostitutes” and can’t be expected to take political stances! Meaning that they can sing for the highest bidding politician!

A “Mwana-Congo” Leader seeking “cooperation” from Brussels riot cops 

Bana-Congo wanted to go into the blocked path to an Ixelles shopping mall

DRC First Lady Olive Lembe was meeting Congolese businesswomen at the mall

Brussels, September 2007

(Credits)   

I have described, here and there on this blog, the M.O. utilized by Bana-Congo. Their methods have evolved over the years; and so far 6 of these have been identified as the template by European metropolitan police (especially in London, Brussels, and Paris):

a) The first method is used with isolated individuals in the streets: 1) they surround their unsuspecting victim in the street; 2) drag him/her in a dark alley; 3) set up a kangaroo court, with one of the muggers playing the role of a pro-bono defense attorney; 4) then a “judge” renders a guilty verdict and a sentence that usually entails stripping naked the victim, beating him/her (though so far there had been no female victims), and 4) posting on the internet the videos of the mugging.

b) The second method is used at concert or conference venues. A flashmob of Bana-Congo would suddenly materialize, attack the place, and suddenly set upon whoever is declared a “Rwandan infiltrated agent” (that is, any pro-Kabila politician or senior government official).

c) The third method is attacks at the residences of Congolese ambassadors and diplomats (one attempt thus far, at the residence of Kinshasa ambassador in London).

d) The fourth method is mass demonstration whenever Kabila or a high-ranking Congolese official visits a European capital; or whenever there are important events happening in the Congo.

e) Cyberattacks: two years ago or thereabout, Bana-Congo attacked the internet portal of the DRC embassy in Washington DC—smearing porn photos on its homepage.

This dangerous antidemocratic trend is encouraged by radical opposition politicians and opinion-makers like Honoré Ngbanda, Freddy Mulongo, and others. Known Bana-Congo gang leaders organizing these “blackbloc”-type direct actions on the ground in Europe are Didier Ramazani, Jean Pierre Samba Tele, and Henri Muke Disuishe, who are identified by intelligence services of European police. Some of them, like Didier Ramazani, have spent months in Belgian prisons for torching vehicles at violent anti-Kabila demos.

Doppelgänger anticitizen Didier Ramazani Ali

Leader of the Bana-Congo in Belgium

Solo picketing in Brussels

(Credits)

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DRC Elections 2011 Watch: 1) WikiLeaks: Transitional Foreign Minister Antoine Ghonda to Ambassador Roger Meece: Museveni ordered Bemba to fire me; and 2) ANCC Jean Andeka Djamba makes history: First candidate to file to run for president

1) WikiLeaks: Transitional Foreign Minister Antoine Ghonda to Ambassador Roger Meece: Museveni ordered Bemba to fire me!

Antoine Ghonda 

DRC Transitional Foreign Minister (June 30, 2003-July 23, 2004)

Then MLC member

Photo: AFP

(Credits)

***

Two cables created by the US Kinshasa Embassy are among the mass of cables recently dumped by WikiLeaks. Those two cables will soon cause a hoo-ha in the tense pre-electoral atmosphere prevailing now in the DRC: a) A cable created on August 9, 2004, that has the then just fired Transitional Foreign Minister Antoine Ghonda, an MLC member appointed to government by Jean-Pierre Bemba, who went to see then US Ambassador Roger Meece (currently UN Secretary General Special Representative to the DRC and head of MONUSCO); and b) a cable created on October 27, 2004, that recounts a meeting between Etienne Tshisekedi's political adviser Jean-Joseph Mukendi and the Embassy's political officer.

a) The first cable--with the subject heading: "Former FM Ghonda discusses his dismissal"--confirms the "nationalist" instinct of the Congolese who were convinced that the Transitional government was made of a bunch of recreants and treasonable bandits whose sole motive was to plunder and, in order to achieve this aim, had transformed their own country into a franchise micro-managed from Kampala and Kigali.

After being fired by Bemba on July 23, US-educated Ghonda went to see Ambassador Meece to update him on the reasons behind his dismissal by Bemba (a previous cable said that Ghonda was expecting being fired): 1) Ghonda's insistence to first report to Kabila as head of state before briefing Bemba on important business at his ministry; 2) his refusal to back up Bemba's illegal purchase of an airplane belonging to Charles Taylor; and 3) crossing President Yoweri Museveni in his designs over the Congo. In fact, Ghonda "believes that undoubtedly the Museveni complaint was a factor leading to Bemba's decision to change Foreign Ministers."   

b) The second cable--with the subject heading: "Opposition figure Tshisekedi keeping his options open"-- is more damning as it demonstrates that even a vestigial opposition leader like Tshisekedi would readily send his "close [political] adviser" Jean-Joseph Mukendi to discuss sensitive plans involving his party and his country with an embassy's political officer (an underling) of a foreign power. This is a huge scandal Tshisekedi and Mukendi have on their hands. 

WikiLeaks is definitely a treasure trove for the recent history of the Congo--an episode that would have otherwise been irretrievably lost.   

 Jean-Joseph Mukendi

Tshisekedi's Political adviser

(Credits)

 2) ANCC Jean Andeka Djamba makes history: First candidate to file to run for president

Jean Andeka Djamba

Chairman of Alliance des Nationalistes Croyants Congolais (ANCC)

Filing to run for president

Kinshasa, CENI headquarters

Friday, August 2, 2011

Photo: John Bompengo/Radio Okapi

(Credits)

ANCC chairman Jean Andeka Djamba made history on Friday, August 2, by being the first candidate to file to run for president at the national headquarters of CENI in Kinshasa. Andeka is most certainly a true believer as the name of his party indicates ("croyants" = believers) to bet $50,000 of non-refundable deposit on this fool's errand.

Now, the comment I'm about to make has nothing to do with politics, it's about fashion, if that. If you look closely at the sleeve of the presidential candidate's suit, just above where the shirt sticks out, you'll notice that it still has the store tag of the designer's griffe. Congolese keep that tag to telegraph to people around them that they can afford to shop at expensive European boutiques! I've even seen young women and men keep the price tag at the collar of their blouses, shirts, and jeans to show that they weren't bought at some cheap thrift store...

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DRC Elections 2011 Watch: 1) UDPS clashes with riot police in Kinshasa and Mbuji-Mayi; 2) URDC Chairman François Nicéphore Kakese Malela launches presidential bid; and 3) WikiLeaks: Le Potentiel runs my translation of the US Kinshasa Embassy “Balkanization conspiracy theory” cable

1) UDPS clashes with riot police in Kinshasa and Mbuji-Mayi

One UDPS demonstrator is subdued after being pepper-sprayed by riot cops

Kinshasa, Boulevard du 30 Juin, September 1, 2011

Photo: John Bompengo/Radio Okapi

(Credits)

At a press briefing held on Tuesday, August 27, UDPS secretary general Jacquemin Shabani had called for nationwide demos on Thursday, September 1, “to protest and denounce the opacity deliberately maintained by CENI and its board over different major operations of the electoral process.” UDPS also wants its experts to audit finances and electoral rosters of CENI as well as to be granted access to its central server. UDPS systematically contests CENI chairmanship of Rev Daniel Ngoy Mulunda Nyanga, whom it accuses of being a relative of Joseph Kabila and a founding member of PPRD. The latter charge is spurious as CENI deputy chairman, Jacques N’Djoli, was an MLC senator till his appointment early this year by vote at the National Assembly, just as were the other members of the board of the national independent electoral commission.

Responding to Shabani’s call, thousands of UDPS supporters demonstrated on Wednesday Thursday, September 1, across some DRC major cities.

In Kinshasa, UDPS party members started their march at around 10:30 AM from the 10th Street of Limete, in front of the party's headquarters (Tshisekedi’s residence is also located in the same neighborhood). By early afternoon, the demonstrators had reached the Boulevard du 30 Juin, in the Gombe commune in downtown Kinshasa. But they were blocked by the Police d’Intervention Rapide and the city’s efficient riot police, nicknamed “robots” for their bionic-looking anti-riot gears. Frustrated, UDPS members then lobbed stones and projectiles at riot police, and set ablaze a few cars nearby. Riot cops responded with tear gas and gunshots in the air.

After UDPS members were thus heavy-handedly dispersed, Shabani, who, of late, has turned into some kind of a loony bin with his lurid exaggerations dispensed to the media, bemoaned the police-state methods utilized to stifle political opposition, and concluded:

“Here in Kinshasa we have just witnessed a scene we haven’t experienced since more than 20 years. Even Mobutu had at one point resolved to no longer do that.  The police fired live bullets.”

But according to the Kinshasa correspondent of Radio France Internationale (RFI) present at the scene of the demonstration, Kinshasa riot police were equipped with  “crowd-control equipment in accordance with [international] norms, that is, without lethal weapons.”

UDPS had nonetheless been issued a city permit to demonstrate and the previous day its officials even met with Kinshasa police officials to determine the path of the demonstration, according to General Jean-de-Dieu Oleko, Kinshasa Police Provincial commissioner: “After consultation yesterday [Wednesday, August 8 31] at City Hall, there were changes by common agreement [with UDPS officials] to have demonstrations take the Avenue des Huileries, in lieu of Avenue Kasa-Vubu. Instead of stopping there, they wanted to head towards Boulevard [du 30 Juin] at CENI headquarters.”

Gen Oleko added: “Two vehicles were set on fire by cocktail Molotov. Five vehicles of the municipal road system have no longer windshields.”

In Mbuji-Mayi, the provincial capital of Kasai Oriental and stronghold of UDPS leader Etienne Tshisekedi, the demonstration was a non-starter as party officials didn’t secure a demo permit. But this didn’t prevent UDPS members from attempting to demonstrate. This quickly lead to clashes between them and the riot police backed by a unit of FARDC. Cops and troops fired in the air and more than a dozen UDPS demonstrators were arrested for disorderly conduct. Arrests of UDPS members were also reported in Goma, in North Kivu Province.

In Lubumbashi, however, UDPS demonstrators were allowed to march peacefully to the local CENI headquarters where they delivered their memorandum.

The UDPS is stubbornly sticking to the wrong-headed strategy of torpedoing the elections with its urban guerrilla campaign of mass protests launched since early July… UDPS leaders already have called for another mass action in Kinshasa on Thursday, September 8.

UDPS demonstrators marching towards CENI headquarters

Kinshasa, Boulevard du 30 Juin, September 1, 2011

Photo : John Bompengo/Radio Okapi

(Credits)

2) URDC Chairman François Nicéphore Kakese Malela launches presidential bid

Dr. François Nicéphore Kakese Malela

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

Kinshasa, Salle du Zoo, Gombe Commune

August 31, 2011

Photo : John Bompengo/Radio Okapi

(Credits)

The URDC (Union pour le Réveil et le Développement du Congo) is among the tiniest of the tiny among of the 417 political parties officially registered in the DRC. Created in 2009 by veterinarian and businessman Dr. François Nicéphore Kakese Malela, a resident of Pretoria, URDC held its first congress this week at the Salle du Zoo in downtown Kinshasa, where the 200 national congress participants designated their party’s chairman as their presidential nominee.

A former high-level official of the South-African Department of Agriculture, Dr. Kakese is also a successful businessman: his consultancy company—ACF Agro-Vet. International—has a global reach. Despite his impressive resume and business credentials, Dr. Kakese doesn’t stand a chance as a presidential candidate. A native of the Bandundu Province, he could have done well as a candidate for National Assembly—either as an independent or as a member of PALU, which dominates the province. That being said, Dr. Kakese may still win over some voters from a section of disgruntled PALU members who are angry at the decision made by their party chairman, Antoine Gizenga, of not throwing a presidential candidate into the fray this time around.

3) WikiLeaks: Le Potentiel runs my translation of the US Kinshasa Embassy cable on “Balkanization conspiracy theory” 

Le Potentiel cartoon illustrating my WikiLeaks translation

Cartoon by Thembo Muhindo Kashauri aka Kash

(Credits)

On Wednesday, August 31, the daily Le Potentiel ran my translation of the WikiLeaks US Kinshasa Embassy cable speculating on the “Balkanization conspiracy theory” in the DRC. I emailed the translation to Le Potentiel. The translation is also published on my blog in French, here.

Le Potentiel graced the WikiLeaks story with a cartoon by internationally renowned Congolese cartoonist Thembo Muhindo Kashauri aka Kash.

The 2 balloons read:

1) “They’re definitely not stupid!... They’ve understood everything!... [in English] Fucking internet!”

2) “We’ve got to counter this fucking theory… [in English] Shit! Shit!”

Thembo Muhindo Kashauri aka Kash

Kash drawing a street scene 

Video screen capture: Alex Engwete

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