Opposition calls for unity in bid to oust Congo’s Kabila

THOUSANDS of supporters of exiled Congolese opposition leader Moise Katumbi gathered on Saturday in Kinshasa to hear a message from him demanding a united front for presidential elections scheduled for December 23.

The meeting of supporters of Katumbi’s platform Ensemble passed off without incident.

Violence flared earlier this year when three rallies calling for President Joseph Kabila to step down led to more than a dozen deaths, while a UN report in March said a crackdown on demonstrations had led to a death toll of 47 from January 2017 to January of this year.

Katumbi appeared via Skype to address his supporters a day after the release of another anti-Kabila figure, former warlord Jean-Pierre Bemba, who won an appeal against an 18-year jail term for war crimes at the International Criminal Court in The Hague.

“We must do everything in agreement with your son and my brother Jean-Pierre Bemba, with Felix Tshisekedi, Vital Kamerhe and the others to present a common candidate at the presidential election,” Katumbi told the crowd.

There was widespread applause as he told them that was the only way to “bar the path to a third [mandate] wanted by President Kabila”, whose critics suspect he is plotting an illegal third term at the twice-postponed poll.

Escalating tensions over his intentions have fuelled protests and led to a deadly security crackdown. Katumbi promised to put an end to the suffering of residents of Kinshasa if he is elected.

The crowd responded by chanting “we are waiting to elect you president of the republic”.

Katumbi, who risks arrest if he returns to his homeland over accusations of real estate fraud, launched Ensemble in South Africa last March as a platform to oust Kabila, whose mandate formally ran out in December 2016, 15 years after he took power.

Meanwhile, the DRC’s parliament has decided, almost unanimously, that nationals living abroad will not be able to vote in the December election to choose a successor for Kabila.

That rules out 16 million potential voters, according to figures from expats minister Emmanuel Ilunga.

The national electoral commission is “incapable of organising voting for our compatriots abroad,” said Henri Thomas Lokondo, a parliamentary deputy from Kabila’s ruling People’s Party for Reconstruction and Democracy, who confirmed Friday’s parliamentary decision.

Like other African diasporas, the overseas Congolese nationals often vote for the opposition and have held protests in Paris and Brussels as well as being active on social media.

Congolese abroad were not allowed to vote in the two previous presidential elections.

Around 40 million voters are officially registered in electoral commission lists for the presidential, legislative and provincial elections on December 23. Kabila took over from his assassinated father in 2001, and presides over a country with a dark reputation for corruption, poor governance and violence.

He has not clearly stated whether he will step aside despite appeals from the US, France and Britain for him to clearly state that he will not seek re-election.

He was obligated to step down at the end of 2016 after he reached his two-term constitutional limit, but a constitutional clause has allowed him to remain in office until a successor is elected. —