Eurac: Bulletin sep.2011

EDITORIAL

Consolidating democracy or deepening confusion?

Tough you may doubt it, there will soon be elections in the DRC. Without knowing by what miracle the CENI will keep to its own timetable, election fever is certainly on the increase.

The events in Kinshasa on 5 and 6 September were noted all over the world. In June there seemed to be a risk that election fever in Katanga might arouse some the demons of the past. Political demonstrations were banned in Mbuji Mayi from 7 to 11 September. In South Kivu, public life has been paralysed by serious tension within the army while elsewhere in the province instability continues to increase. On 13 September civil society organisations in North Kivu condemned the widespread insecurity.

The potential for violence is palpable. Clearly this is linked to the elections but I do not have the impression that we are facing a scenario anywhere where the people are divided into two or more camps, each one lined up behind a leader who incarnates the aspirations of one section of the community. The potential is more a case of people feeling that enough is enough: the conditions of daily life have not improved since the last elections. Many people are thus easily exploited.

In the east the situation is still more complicated because there is even no lasting progress in dealing with insecurity. Early in 2011 we saw efforts to reach a negotiated settlement with the FDLR, accelerated and superficial integration of armed groups etc. This had the aim of reversing the unpopularity of the President in the provinces which gave him his victory in 2006. But the government faces the almost impossible task of dealing with different Pandora’s boxes at the same time. To make progress on the issue of effective integration of the CNDP (which is still a state within a state, an army within an army), it is hard not to agree to the promotion to ranks that the CNDP has been demanding for two years. But if the authorities grant this, the pressure from Congolese armed groups will increase and there is a risk that they will get unrealistic expectations. The greater the effort made to respond to expectations of the various groups in the east, the greater the feeling of exclusion which existed already elsewhere in the army and the republican guard. And if you scratch the surface you can see how national and provincial politicians try to use the armed groups as a way to promote their political ambitions. In the Congo, all the major questions are interrelated and at the moment they are all coming together around the elections. It is our fear that the Congolese state and its agencies may be too weak to stand up to a reality of disintegration, accelerated because of the elections. This is why we have joined AETA’s appeal to the political actors to commit themselves and non-violence during the electoral process while maintaining a space for interactive dialogue between them. We are adding to this our recommendations to the EU to be more involved in the electoral process so as to guarantee that the Congolese people can make their choice and express their wishes in a free and transparent process.

Kris Berwouts Director

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