Regional
DRC: Tshisekedi fools opposition to support his dangerous political game for 2023
The
Democratic Republic of Congo is expected to hold presidential elections in
December 2023, which is not far away given that different political actors have
to start political campaigns in a few months to come.
The
incumbent, President Felix Tshisekedi, has set a trap for the opposition which
they have willingly fallen into. He has exploited the war with M23 rebels in
the east of the country as an opportunity to rally the opposition against ‘a
common enemy.’
The opposition and civil society have been fooled and distracted from their opposition agenda by organizing demonstrations in different parts of the country hence supporting Tshisekedi’s diversionary political game.
Although Kinshasa knows very well that the M23
rebels are Congolese citizens with genuine grievances that can be solved
through political dialogue, the political lie fed to the Congolese people is
that their country is at war with Rwanda. This lie has fooled the opposition
not to demand accountability for Tshisekedi’s failure to bring peace and
development as he promised during his campaigns five years ago.
According to the World Bank, most Congolese live on
less than $2 a day. Tshisekedi’s government has done nothing to ensure that the
country’s vast natural resource wealth benefits majority Congolese citizens who
are poverty-striken. Although DRC is endowed with vast mineral resources, the
country remains one of the five poorest countries in the world. In 2021, nearly
64 % of Congolese, just under 60 million people, lived on less than $2.15 a
day. About one out of six people living in extreme poverty in sub-Saharan
African lives in the poverty-stricken nation.
Tshisekedi has managed
to manipulate and contain the opposition on a populist agenda of fighting “a
war against foreign aggression” and this has worked for him as he positions
himself for re-election in 2023.
If the sleeping pill Tshisekedi
gave to the unsuspecting opposition and civil society lasts, they will wake up
to another five years of dysfunctional government, increased poverty and
chronic insecurity especially in the east of the country.
The genocide dimension
Tshisekedi’s political
game plan has also taken a dangerous dimension of perpetrating genocide against
the Kinyarwanda speaking Congolese Tutsi community. Government officials,
religious leaders, and opposition politicians have all joined the sinister government
plot of instigating hate speech, violence and killing of people they call
“enemies, traitors, infiltrators, unwanted foreigners” in reference to the
Tutsi.
Worse still, the FDLR,
a terrorist militia group founded by remnants of the mass murderers who committed
the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda, are now openly working with
government forces. The latter coalition has been spreading genocide ideology in
eastern DRC and getting involved in acts of genocide against Congolese
Kinyarwanda speaking communities. Several FDLR fighters have been captured on
the frontline by the M23 rebels, wearing FARDC uniform.
More intriguing though,
is the silence of the international community on acts of genocide against
Congolese Tutsi taking place in eastern DRC. Rwanda’s Ambassador to New York, Claver
Gatete, while addressing the UN Security Council on the crisis in DRC, pointed
out that, “we are appalled by the silence of the Council on the hate speech,
xenophobia, and killings targeting the Congolese Tutsi population which has escalated.”
Gatete reminded the
UNSC that 28 years ago, only three elected members of the of the Council; the Czech Republic, New Zealand and Nigeria, condemned
the then on-going genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda while most Security
Council members remained silent avoiding to anger the genocidal regime.
The international
community is once again silently avoiding condemning Kinshasa because of their
interests probably fearing to lose mining concessions that are more profitable
to them than the lives of innocent people being killed.
“This Council should never again allow itself to reproduce
the silence of the Council 28 years ago, which passively watched the rapid,
systematic and most widely broadcasted Genocide that took over one million
human lives in Rwanda,” Gatete said.
By
deception, Tshisekedi managed to fool the opposition and civil society actors to
dance to his tune of dangerous populist political maneuvers by scapegoating
Rwanda for his failure to bring peace in eastern DRC.
Tshisekedi
is instigating hate against the Rwandophones. And this is likely to escalate
into genocide if the international community remains indifferent.
After
four years in power and with a new round of elections looming in 2023, socio-economic
conditions have worsened for the ordinary population. Conditions are even worse
for rural populations, where even a semblance of state presence does not exist.
According
to political analysts, the main cause of the DRC’s socio-economic and political
problems is the crisis of the state, or the country’s governance deficit.
Endemic
corruption and a culture of impunity have made the state of affairs so bad that
Congolese have no hope for a better future. Politicians know this and, they
always find scapegoats for their gross failures.