08 02 14 Kongomani – Some thoughts and facts about the ongoing crisis in the DRC (Part 1)
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national hero of the war against the M-23 rebels, was killed in an ambush in
Beni. But this was not all: behind the thick curtains of Kabila’s palaces in
Kinshasa and in Lubumbashi a real power struggle broke out between Kabila
himself and some of his closest generals. Today this struggle is still ongoing.
In fact there are lots of other things happening in the country: the war against
ADF-Nalu is still raging, several Mayi Mayi groups are fighting the FARDC in
Katanga, other militia’s want to give up their struggle and others won’t. In
Kinshasa people are disappearing and a new repression apparatus is put in place
to control the opposition.
The
situation in the country is indeed very complex. Diplomats in Kinshasa,
UN-officials and NGO-staffers are very well informed about the ongoing problems
but keep quit. A lot of the protagonists have a double nationality and want to
leave a door open to Europe of the US in case things are getting bad for them in
the DRC, so they pass on a lot of information. Also to people like me. In the
land of the blind the one-eyed man is the king !
I
was in the DRC the last couple of months and I wrote down everything I heard
and experienced. And I talked to a lot of people. I might be wrong about some
smaller details – in the DRC one can never be completely sure about a source –
and some of these thoughts are rather personal. I’m already working and living
in the African Great Lakes Region for more than 25 years. So I think that my
ideas might contribute to a better understanding of the ongoing trouble in the
country. I hereby also want to apologize for my bad writing skills in English.
I’m a Belgian free-lancer and I don’t have the cash to have my writings checked
up by a corrector.
The
attacks of the 30th of december
The
attacks on the RTNC-tower in Kinshasa on the 30th of December and the fighting
that erupted in and around the airport of Ndjili and in Lubumbashi smashed to
pieces the last hopes of a revival of the Kabila regime. This might be a harsh
statement but I can guarantee You that several other Congo watchers are sharing
this opinion. Kabila had just regained a bit of confidence and trust of the
outside world with the victory on the M23-rebels.
According
to the Congolese Minister of Information Lambert Mende the attacks on the 30st
were the work of a renegade and completely crazy Congolese politician-preacher,
Paul Joseph Mukungubila. But although Mukungubila might have been involved in
the clashes nobody believes that theory. People who have been following up on
the situation see two possibilities. The first one is the most obvious one: the
attacks were planned by followers of John Numbi, the former commander of the
Congolese police and a close collaborator of Kabila. The position of Numbi
became compromised after the killing of human rights activist Floribert Chebeya
of which Numbi had been accused in the foreign media (it was the Belgian
journalist Thierry Michel who scooped the story). The word was out that Numbi
felt betrayed by Kabila and was looking for revenge. In Katanga Numbi would have
found an ally in the person of former governor Kyungu Wa Kumwanza, a man known
to have eaten already from all kinds of sausages. In the other scenario Kabila
created these problems himself to justify his position as the president of the
country. He is already in his second term as the president of Congo and
according to the constitution he can’t be re-elected for a third term. If he
manages to convince the outside world that the constitution has to be changed he
might be in for a third term. So he might want to profile himself as a strong
leader that can lead the country I difficult days…. He might also be scared to
end up in the International Tribunal in The Hague when he looses his job. I
personally think that this second option is less probable… Several confidential
reports and conversations show us that the first option is the more likely one.
Not everything that happened that day has been put on paper yet and You might
have to be a Congolese to understand well these rather contradicting
facts.
According
to my sources the attacks on the 30th started in Lubumbashi. Several followers
of Mukungubila gathered in a church during the night to pan an attack on
Kabila’s residence-palace in town, the Kamanyola palace. But Kabila would have
been tipped off about this by informers. This might also be the reason why he
arrived in Lubumbashi on the 29th, to organize a counter attack. Some of my
sources told me that when Kabila arrived in Lubumbashi and he found out what
was going to happen he started panicking. According to my sources he jumped in
his car and tried to flee to Zambia. His body guards had a lot of trouble to
convince him to stay on his post. Kabila’s troops stormed the church at five
o’clock in the morning. Most of the defenders were shot down on the spot but
some could flee. After that there was heavy shooting in the so called ‘Golf
area’ in Lubumbashi where Kabila’s forces found a safe house of Mukungubila.
According to officials several dozens of so called rebels, but also women and
children, were killed during these attacks.
The
attack on the RTNC tower in Kinshasa started at 7h30 in the morning. And around
that time the first shots were also fired at Ndjili airport, in Kindu (Maniema
province) and in Kolwezi. If Mukungubila would have been the master mind and
the coordinator of these events the attackers in Kinshasa would have know
already that their friends in Lubumbashi were already on the run. The strange
and unwritten part of this story is that Kabila’s Presidential Guards were
engaged in a gun battle for more than half an hour with FARDC troops loyal to
the ex commander in chief of the FARDC ‘Tango Four’ (general Amisi) at the RTNC
towers. The situation was very confuse, some of the attackers could flee and
the battle raged on in other parts of Kinshasa. In Kitambo a hotel where some
Banyamulenge officers were lodged was machine gunned. As strange as this might
sound all of these scenario’s have one thing in common: they were all organized
by the Katangese strongmen of the regime.
While
lots of articles have been written about the strange ‘pasteur’ and renegade
politician Mukungubila nothing has been heard ever since about the true
perpetrators of the attacks on the 30st. Numbi’s houses and depots in Katanga
have been searched by security forces while Numbi himself was hiding in his farm
outside of Lubumbashi. But the man himself has not been bothered yet. According
to my sources he’s in Kinshasa now where he can move around freely. This again
can have two possible explanations: Numbi might not have organized the problems
on the 30th and Kabila just used him as a scapegoat to cover his own
intentions. Or he did it anyway and Kabila wants to bake sweet cakes with him
to soften his stand. It is sometimes very difficult for outsiders to verify
with what kind of vegetables this ‘bouillabaise à la Congolaise’ (soup) is being
cooked !
The
Mayi Mayi debacle in Katanga
The
atmosphere in the Katanga province was very tense the last couple of weeks
because the city of Katanga and its surrounding were under threat of an imminent
attack of Mayi Mayi rebels. During the past days and weeks several villages
have been burned down by the FARDC, thousands of people fled their villages
because of the violence and hundreds of innocent people died in the fighting
between the FARDC and rebels.
There
are several Mayi Mayi groups active in the province. Most of them were equipped
en formed during the period that the province was under threat of the Rwandan
army and when the pro Rwandan RCD-Goma was fighting against the father of Joseph
Kabila in the Pweto and the Moba area. After the Rwandans left the area these
militia’s were kept alive by the authorities in Kinshasa for other purposes: to
keep the pressure high on the very popular and charismatic governor of Katanga
Moïse Katumbi and to maintain a force that could create trouble in Katanga
whenever needed when the Katangese strongmen in Kinshasa wanted to create a
diversion to cover up problems in the rest of the country. Moïse Katumbi is the
darling of many diplomats: this soft spoken rich businessman is intelligent and
could be an ideal presidential candidate. Therefore he has always been a thorn
in the eye of the Balubakat strongmen in Kinshasa. Katumbi is a Bemba from the
south who knows how to deal with foreign investors – especially Americans,
Belgians, English – who are in competition with the Chinese to exploit the rich
mineral-belt of Katanga. This belt is situated in the south of the province, in
an area that is mostly populated by the Bemba-, the Rund- and the
Tsjokwe-tribe. The Balubakat-strongholders – people like Kabila, Numbi, Kyungu
and others – are originating from the poorer north of the province where no
minerals can be found. A couple of years ago, when the first cracks in the
collaboration between Kabila and Katumbi occurred, stirring up the Mayi Mayi
activities was a good way to illustrate Katumbi’s inability run the province in
a decent way. Governor Katumbi can count on the support of people of the south
and also of the thousands of Kasaïens (citizens of the Kasai province) who live
in the copper belt. In the 90ties the previous governor of Katanga, Kyungu (a
Muluba) expelled thousands of Kasaïens from the province and put them on trains
to send them back to the Kasaï province. Hundreds
of them died during this unfortunate exodus.
Insiders
agree on the fact that the entire Mayi Mayi – scene in Katanga was orchestrated
out of Kinshasa by people like John Numbi, ex governor Kyungu and Kabila
himself. One of the biggest Mayi Mayi groups in the province is known under the
name of Bakata Katanga. Several months ago they walked into Lubumbashi to
surrender but they were machine gunned by the Presidential Guards. But the whole
Mayi Mayi set up changed on the 30st of December of last year. That day the
former wing-adjudant of president Joseph Kabila went rogue on his boss because
the latter had put him aside and replaced him at the top of the Congolese police
by the Rwandophone general Charles Bisengimana. That day Kabila lost the
control over the Katangese Mayi Mayi and the militia became the tool by
‘excellence’ of his Balubakat opponents to put pressure on their former boss.
This theory is the most plausible one. A couple of weeks ago reports reached
Lubumbashi that the Mayi Mayi forces around the city had received weapons that
were stolen in FARDC depots (according to my sources Numbi also has followers in
the army), the Mayi Mayi killed several villagers, looted cows and crop from
farmers and the army responded with the burning over several villages and the
killing of hundreds of innocent villagers. In the Pweto-, Manono- and
Moba-region thousands of villagers fled the violence and the fighting between
the army and the Mayi Mayi. Nobody knows for sure how many people died and s
always the local press is not in a very good position to report correctly about
these events. Lots of the burnings and killings were done by the so called
‘regiment 811’, a loose collection of ex-CNDP fighters and other militia
members who were reintegrated into the FARDC when Laurent Nkunda was put under
house arrest in Rwanda. Journalists who speak out about these events face harsh
jail sentences. Others just disappear. Radio Okapi, the official radio station
of the UN, seems to have just one concern: not to tell the complete truth in
order to let the outside world believe that everything is still under control.
In the meanwhile the prices of vegetables and meat in Lubumbashi are rising by
the day because farmers can’t work on their fields anymore because of the
problems.
According
to our sources Olive Kabila was also harassed a couple of months ago by
followers of the ex governor Kyungu when she was on her way from the center of
Lubumbashi to the Kabila farm outside town. One of her body guards was killed
during this event and Olive herself was rescued out of this situation by some
members of the Presidential Guards who were following the cortege. If this is
true this shows clearly that the Kabila family is not very popular anymore in
the Katanga province. Rumors are even circulating that Kabila himself was
attacked by the Bakata Katanga in his farm outside town.
My
latest information about John Numbi is that he’s in Kinshasa. This is strange
because until recently Numbi barricaded himself with a number of well armed
followers in his luxurious farm, outside Lubumbashi. As I already told You
this can mean two things: the possibility that Numbi is being pampered again by
Kabila to cool him down. Or the possibility that it was not Numbi who was behind
the attacks on the 30th.
I hope the near future will shed more light on that ! Today the situation in
Katanga seems to be rather quit again. And that’s a very good thing for the
local population and the thousands of foreign workers who were not allowed to
leave their plants for weeks.
The
possibile resurgence of the Katangese Tigers
The
last hot Katangese patato is the fact that that the Katangese Tigers are
recruiting actively again in the region around Likasi, Lububmbashi and Kolwezi.
Young members of the Bemba-, Rund- and Tsjokwe-tribes are being lured into this
militia by recruiters that operate out of Angola, under the umbrella of the
Angolan army. This is a fact: last year I travelled trough the region and the
villagers told me that most of the young men left to Angola to join the Tigers.
Last month some of our contacts in the region intercepted a document of the ANR
(‘Agence Nationale de Renseignement’) in which a detailed summary was given
about the activities of the Tigers. According to this document about 2000
Katangese Tigers should already have been infiltrated in the region from
Angola. According to this report they would plan an attack on the FARDC
barracks in Kamina from where they would declare the independence of Katanga.
Even when this figure might be exaggerated and knowing that the ANR is known
for its amateurism this can be interpreted as a sign on the wall that the Tigers
are moving themselves into more strategic position. The Angolans might keep
them as a stick behind the door to put pressure on Kabila. Everybody knows that
the Angolans are digging up every years kilo’s of diamonds out of the Congolese
soil and nearly half of the Angolan oil is believed to originate from Congolese
territorial waters (Kabila’s father gave them these concessions in exchange for
support to fight the Rwandans in the east of the country). The possibility that
these Tigers will move into action in the region might add some extra vegetables
and spices to the already hard boiling Congolese
‘bouillabaise’.
Another
dark cloud that is currently hanging over Katanga is the fact that the
government has failed so far to deliver the necessary electricity to the big
mining companies that are exploiting the mineral rich soil. So most of the
companies are forced to produce their own electricity (huge diesel generators
that consume tons of fuel can do this job) and the Congolese government is
forcing them to produce the copper plates on the spot. Former president Laurent
Kabila distributed lots of pieces of mineral rich land to local diggers and
smaller companies in the Kolwezi area. Most of them are selling their minerals
to Chinese companies that are bribing their way trough the Congolese
bureaucracy. This is a thorn in the eye of the bigger companies who are forced
to respect the local mining codes. The IMF froze most of its support to the DRC
because of the ongoing corruption and the rehabilitation of the Inga-dam in
Bas-Congo (when this dam would work it could provide electricity to a big part
of Africa) and this leaves the big mining companies on their hunger to produce
cheaper and to be more competitive on the world markets. Some of my contacts
even claim that the current political impasse in Katanga is serving the
government well to force the IMF to review its decision to cut the sponsoring of
the DRC. I’m not an economist but this element could be very interesting for
further research.
Marc Hoogsteyns
In
a couple of days I’ll publish my findings and experiences about the situation in
the Kivu’s.