Presidential election in the DRC: candidates to conquer the troubled East

A festive atmosphere and security expectations: In eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), candidates for the December 20 presidential election are drawing crowds despite armed conflicts and fears of violence, which have already leaves one dead on the sidelines of the campaign, entering its second week.

Bunia, Bukavu, Butembo, Beni, Oicha and Goma have been plagued by violence for almost thirty years. But, with the electoral campaign, crowds come and go between airports and city centers, where candidates hold popular meetings in a festive atmosphere in the main squares.

On December 20, nearly 44 million registered voters, out of around a hundred million inhabitants, are called to elect their president, but also their national and provincial deputies and their municipal councilors.

“Restore Security”

The opponent and wealthy businessman Moïse Katumbi, one of the 23 candidates in the running – three have joined him in recent days – is the first to have gone to Goma, capital of North Kivu, epicenter of repeated violence and humanitarian crises.

There, residents expect contenders for the supreme office to “restore security,” as Zéphanie Mayolo, a 33-year-old motorcycle taxi driver, told AFP upon the arrival of Moïse Katumbi.

“The question of security is one of the major themes” of this campaign, analyzes for AFP Valery Madianga, from the Center for Research in Public Finance and Local Development (CREFDL). However, “the debate is not yet gaining momentum” due to the absence of clearly established governance programs, he believes.

Boss of the renowned Tout-Puissant Mazembe football club and former governor (2007-2015) of the mining province of Katanga, the economic heart of the country, Mr. Katumbi, who travels by private jet, criticizes the security record of the outgoing president, Félix Tshisekedi , facing the rebellion of the March 23 Movement (M23).

“Trust again.”

Supported by the Rwandan army, according to UN experts, the M23 took up arms again at the end of 2021 and seized large portions of the territory in North Kivu of which Goma is the capital. They recently took the strategic town of Mweso, about sixty kilometers from Goma.

The outgoing head of state, Félix Tshisekedi, controversial winner of the 2018 presidential election and much criticized for his record by the opposition, is seeking a new five-year term. Accompanied by his wife, he arrived on Tuesday in Bunia, in the neighboring province of Ituri. The province has been plagued by violence since 2017, and 1.7 million residents have fled their villages there due to massacres perpetrated by different armed groups.

“Trust again, give me the second mandate with a view to pursuing our various projects,” he launched from the city’s grandstand, where six days earlier, Mr. Katumbi had held a meeting in an atmosphere festive and relaxed.

“Candidate for peace”

The 2018 Nobel Peace Prize winner and presidential candidate Denis Mukwege launched his campaign on Sunday in his hometown of Bukavu, South Kivu.

“The man who repairs women”, his nickname inherited from a documentary dedicated to him for his work with raped women, then went to Butembo and Beni where he was welcomed by his supporters, including many women in t-shirts emblazoned with the number 15, a position assigned to him by the electoral commission.

Throughout the different stages, the 68-year-old gynecologist notably promised to fight corruption and put an end to war and famine. “I am a candidate for peace (…) Together, let’s put an end to hunger and vice,” he insisted in Beni, stronghold of the ADF rebels, affiliated with the Islamic State group.

“We don’t feel the commitment”

The campaign is taking place in a particularly tense political and security context. A member of Moïse Katumbi’s party was killed Tuesday in Kindu (east) in clashes with supporters of Tshisekedi’s party.

An unsuccessful candidate for the 2018 presidential election, in which he continues to claim victory, Martin Fayulu is also traveling the region. Tuesday in Beni, accompanied by a musician to enhance his meeting, he called on the population to “block the road” to Tshisekedi, accused of playing the game of the attackers.

“If you vote for me, we will provide Beni with a military camp so that Rwanda and Uganda respect us,” he said in this town where residents did not vote in 2018 due to an Ebola epidemic.

In the various speeches, “we do not feel the real commitment to put an end to violence”, especially since “the social projects of the candidates are not really part of the debate”, regrets Oswald Rubasha, expert electoral and coordinator of the NGO Clinique electoral congolaise, based in Bukavu.