Kabila’s Medvedev!

By SOC Okenwa…

The former Mobutian Zaire and now Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is touted to be the richest country in sub-saharan Africa in terms of natural resources. The national history of the country is one tainted with Lumumban aborted revolution and blood. The late former Prime Minister, Patrice Emery Lumumba, is celebrated as a hero and martyr in a poor country, one unfortunate enough to have produced a demented kleptocrat in the late Mobutu Sese-Seko. Mobutu, during his decades of kleptocracy (marked remarkably by killings, kidnappings, incarcerations and other human rights’ abuses) had once boasted that he was richer than his entire country!

Mobutu was a primitive despot who behaved like an uncrowned monarch brooking no opposition and tolerating no dissent. He had eliminated Lumumba, in active cahoots with the Western intelligence community, to pave way for crude and rude despotism. The implicated imperial masters in Bruxelles and Washington had seen in Lumumba a revolutionary trait and threat which, if left unchecked, could lead to exposure of some colonial criminality and looting that lasted for centuries. He was known to have denounced them prior to his brutal execution.

The late Mobutu was forced into exile (where he died years later) after the late Laurent Kabila and his rag-tag rebellion had seized Kinshasa. Kabila himself was killed by a fatal shot fired at close range by a deranged bodyguard named Rasheed. Upon his untimely demise his son, Joseph, took over the mantle of leadership much like in Togo where Faure Gnasingbe Eyadema is still going strong against the people’s will for a change in national leadership post-Eyadema. Kabila the father was not as power-drunk as Kabila the son! Joseph has shown that he understands the management of power by applying the carrot and stick methods and tactics in grievous moments to whip the opposition into line.

President Joseph Kabila had since served out his second constitutionally-sanctioned mandate but he has deftly employed every trick in the book to remain at the presidential palace. The presidential election had been postponed on more than one occasion on technical grounds. Dozens had been killed on the streets as the anti-Kabila demonstrations rocked Kinshasa and other cities in the Congo. Even the Catholic church had gotten involved in the political struggle for the soul of Congo-Kinshasa. The clergy had demonstrated that in desperate situations like these in the Congo all hands must be on deck to bring about sanity to the abused system.

Though desperate to cling on to power at all cost but barred by the Constitution for standing for another term President Kabila was at his wit’s end trying to figure out how to play Putin. He has single-handedly chosen the former Deputy Premier and Interior Minister, Emmanuel Ramazani Shadary, to represent him and the party in the upcoming presidential poll. The opposition has two major candidates, Martin Fayulu backed by the ‘Lamuka’ coalition of the banned former Vice-President, Jean Pierre Bemba, and former Governor of Katanga Province, Moise Katumbi. And Felix Tshisekedi who is running with Vital Kamerhe as his Prime Minister-designate.

The presidential election was tentatively scheduled to hold this Sunday (December 23) but few days ago the electoral umpire called a press conference to postpone it once again for one week citing logistic challenges. Of course the postponement was in order following the arson that was committed by unknown forces at the premises of CENI (Commission Electorale Nationale Indépendante). In the wee hours of the night some days ago a fire out-break was reported at CENI office in Kinshasa! And it razed everything in sight including electoral documents and machines. Suspicions were rife that the Kabila gang must have committed the crime in order to disrupt the poll and obtain yet another shift in date.

The campaigns had started in earnest as the ruling party and the divided opposition were criss-crossing the countryside canvassing for votes only for everyone to be stunned by the mysterious fire that gutted the voting materials stockpiled in CENI office downtown. The Congolese oppressed population were eager to go to the polls to choose a new President. But now they have to wait for another week, a Yuletide week fraught with great expectations and uncertainties.

Read also: The Mediocre Games and Rollercoaster Politics of The Second Niger Bridge

Wittingly or otherwise President Kabila has transformed himself into a petty dictator. For more than a decade he has been calling the presidential shots and the Congolese people have not witnessed any spectacular improvements in their economic well-being. Rather, the Kabila inner circle have been busy enriching themselves and doing dirty deals that make a non-violent change of leadership a battle of democratic wits, warts and all.

Unlike the biblical Joseph who was sold into slavery to Egypt by his envious siblings (but who later became a powerful figure by the grace of His Creator) this African Joseph (with a new look of a war-lord) was made President by the sheer solidarity of his late father’s followers following his tragic death. Now he uses state terrorism, manipulations and intrigues to deceive some Congolese some of the time!

Lately speculations were rife in Kinshasa and Western capitals that what Kabila was trying to do by imposing Shadary is similar to what the Russian strongman, Vladmir Putin, did in Moscow some years ago before bouncing right back to the Kremlin once again as de-facto omnipotent President. By the time Shadary gets elected like Dimitri Medvedev Kabila, the godfather a la Putin, would be ‘appointed’ the executive Prime Minister or he would move over to the Senate from where he would still be pulling the power strings. And after a mandate by Shadary Joseph Kabila would bounce back to power as President on a clean constitutional slate!

From all indications the orchestrated attempt at ‘Putinism’ in the Congo no longer possesses any element of surprise. The democratic scam could be pulled off (only) if the strong opposition allowed themselves (as they have done regrettably!) to be divided by going into the presidential election in different directions. And when that sadly happens ‘King’ Kabila would have had the last laugh — having achieved the ‘putinisation’ process.

DR Congo is known globally as a country of Rumba melody. Great musicians abound. From the late Papa Wemba to Kofi Olomide to Fally Ipupa and a host of others music in Congo is indeed a way of life. But politics is another ball-game altogether. What happened in far-away Russia seems to be playing itself out in macabre fashion in Kinshasa.

All men of goodwill in Congo and elsewhere must help the Congo people to take their beautiful country back from the Kabila gang as Comrade Omoyele Sowore and others are trying to do in Nigeria right now as the general elections of early next year dangerously draws nearer.

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