Congo opposition chief comes home as crisis looms

KINSHASA: Congo’s veteran opposi t ion ch ie f Et ienne Tshisekedi returned home after a two-year absence to a warm welcome from large crowds Wednesday as the mineral- rich African nation heads into fresh turbulence.

Thousands of supporters sporting Tshisekedi T- shirts and waving party flags who had gathered at the airport flanked his motorcade as it crawled its way into the city of 11 million people.

Wearing his trademark cap and looking slightly frail, the 83year-old was greeted by opposition figures and UN officials as he stepped off a plane from Belgium, where he was medevaced in 2014.

An immensely popular figure, Tshisekedi emerged as a leading opposition voice as far back as the 1980s when he became a critic of former dictator Mobutu Sese Seko.

In Democratic Republic of Congo’s last presidential election in 2011, he ran second to Joseph Kabila but contended he was denied victory by massive fraud.

Tshisekedi “has come to take charge of operations, to enable the change of government that the Congolese people have been waiting for for decades,” Bruno Tshibala, secretary- general of Tshisekedi’s UPDS part y, said as the plane arrived.

Banners waved by opposition supporters read “Kabila, you’re nothing but a tenant, the owner is back” and “Kabila, let it be clear that your mandate’s over.”

In power since his father’s assassination in 2001, Kabila is suspected by opponents of eyeing a third term though the constitution allows only two.

Talk of the head of state hanging on beyond the expiry of his second term on December 20 has whipped up fresh tension in the country of 71 million people.

Protests erupted after the Constitutional Court ruled in May that Kabila could remain in office in a caretaker capacity beyond the end of the mandate.

The government meanwhile has called for a “national dialogue” and former Togo premier Edem Kodjo has been named by the African Union as the talks’ ‘ facilitator.’ — AFP