In a large robe embroidered with gold, Bishop Voyemawa paces the ranks of the first Orthodox church in the Central African Republic. As he passes, the place fills with the scent of incense. The hymns rise as the faithful come to kiss the cross under the icons. The scene may seem exotic in Bimbo, a peripheral district of Bangui. The inhabitants of the country until then practiced Catholicism, various forms of Protestantism, Islam and animism; the Central African Republic can now count on a new Orthodox community, a symbol of growing Russian influence.

“The church is not 10 years old, but we already have more than 700 faithful,” says Régis Saint-Clair Voyemawa, baptized “Sergueï” last year by Metropolitan Leonide de Klin, Patriarchal Exarch of Africa, who is currently attending the Russia-Africa Summit in St. Petersburg. The eldest of 20 children, Bishop Voyemawa first embraced the Catholic faith following a “miraculous” recovery from stubborn scabies. As a theology student, he discovered Orthodoxy in Cameroon, before being chosen by his trainers to found the first Orthodox church in the Central African Republic.

It was in 2013, when the country was about to experience one of the darkest episodes in its history. The civil war between Seleka militias and anti-balaka self-defense groups was accompanied by community massacres and prompted the intervention of the French army. Mr. Voyemawa was then far from suspecting that ten years later, Russian fighters would have replaced the soldiers sent by Paris. “Even Wagner’s soldiers pray in our church!” “, Rejoices today a faithful.

Vodka and cartoons

Arrived under cover of a defense agreement with Moscow at the end of 2017, the group of mercenaries took advantage of the vacuum left by the departure of the French operation “Sangaris” to extend its influence in the Central African Republic. Yevgeny Prigozhin’s men are today “the real masters of the country”, according to Western chancelleries. They have extended their activities beyond security and mining to make the Central African Republic the base of the group’s propaganda operations on the continent.

Wagner has produced cartoons praising Russian cooperation, an action feature glorifying mercenaries and even his own brand of vodka and beer “made in the Central African Republic”. A stone’s throw from the French Embassy in Bangui, a “Russian House” offers language lessons. In his garden floats a huge flag and spins a Soviet-era carousel, reddened by laterite.

Is the Orthodox Church part of this project? Telling his rosary, the first Central African pope defends himself from any link with the mercenaries. He simply welcomes the Russian “renewed interest” in his country. But since his allegiance to the patriarchate of Moscow rather than that of Constantinople, in the summer of 2022, the finances of his church are doing much better.

Invited twice to Russia, “Sergei” received funding for the construction of a second classroom, where children learn basic Russian in addition to French, English and Sango, the national language. Moscow also supports teachers’ salaries, scholarships for two theology students as well as social assistance for the poorest. “We are praying for the construction of a great Orthodox temple in the city center,” Bishop Voyemawa said as he attempted to pay for repairs to his 4×4 via text message.

“We are Francophiles”

Hair sculpted in two vertical braids, Elisabeth Valérienne Akékabou, faithful of the church, tempers: “Russia has been in the Central African Republic for a long time. In high school, my second language was Russian. In the 1990s, they were less present because of the situation there, but times change and interests are reborn. Today, Wagner protects us against the rebels. All we want is to live in peace. »

Exactions of mercenaries widely documented by the UN and NGOs? “A bad campaign against Russia,” Bishop Voyemawa retorts, fearing that this “misinformation” will drive away his flock. He sees in it the hand of the former colonial power, which he accuses of being at the origin of the evils of the Central Africans, taking over elements of language that we hear regularly in Bangui since the arrival of Wagner. “Russia has never colonized an African country, while France is the source of insecurity in our country,” he argues, seeing Paris responsible for the mutinies of the 1990s as well as the current economic slump. .

If Wagner was able to take advantage of the disappointment of the Central Africans vis-à-vis France, this resentment is long before his arrival. It has its roots in the country’s troubled history, where Paris has played a major political role, including in regime changes. “We are above all Francophiles,” explains Bishop Voyemawa. If France wants to return to better sentiments and correct its faults, it will always be welcome. We are orphans she abandoned and blamed for finding an adoptive father! »