Democratic Republic of Congo: “There Is Definitely a Strong Sense of Fear”

As large as Western Europe or the United States east of the Mississippi River, the Democratic Republic of Congo remains a place where Africa’s greatest potential and most wrenching tragedies are frequently lived out. Its first Prime Minister, Patrice Lumumba, was kidnapped and killed with the connivance of former colonial ruler Belgium in 1961, and for more than three decades afterwards, Congo - for a time during this period renamed Zaire - groaned under the kleptocratic rule of Mobutu Sese Seko. After Mobutu’s ousting in 1997 by an armed rebellion backed by the Rwandan government, Congo saw the rule and assasination of Mobutu’s successor, Laurent-Désiré Kabila, the great Second Congo War from 1998 until 2003, the long presidency of Laurent Kabila’s son, Joseph Kabila, and ongoing violence and unrest, particularly in its eastern regions abutting Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi. The nation of Rwanda, ruled by Paul Kagame’s Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) since 1994, has been particularly involved in Congo’s troubles, sponsoring a series of rebel groups and sometimes intervening directly with its military in the country. Most recently, Rwanda has supported the Mouvement du 23 Mars (the March 23rd Movement or M23) rebels, who launched a rebellion from 2012 until 2013 and then again beginning in late 2021 until today, during which it has seized a wide swathe of the eastern provinces of North and South Kivu. Since 2019, DR Congo itself has been ruled by Felix Tshisekedi, who has hewed to an ever-more authoritarian path as he pursued his political and military goals. Tshisekedi’s predecessor as president, Joseph Kabila, was sentenced to death for his alleged conspiring with the M23 and has since resurfaced in the M23-controlled eastern city of Goma. This past December, Tshisekedi and Rwandan President Paul Kagame signed a peace deal in Washington, DC to end the fighting, though it still continues to this day. To discuss the complex situation in Congo today, we are joined on Notes from the World by the journalist Emmet Livingstone, who has lived in and reported from the country since 2022, and Clémentine de Montjoye, senior Great Lakes of Africa researcher at Human Rights Watch.