DRC’s Tshisekedi likely to win second term this week
Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) President Felix Tshisekedi is poised for a second term when the country votes this week.
Wednesday’s election is expected to attract more than 40-million of the 100million-plus population. But though it appears Tshisekedi will emerge victorious, it will not be a walk in the park.
He is being challenged by more than 20 candidates, some of whom have formidable support. They include businessman and former governor Moise Katumbi and Martin Fayulu, who believes he won the election in 2018.
The duo is part of a fragmented opposition whose disunity is likely to split the vote and hand Tshisekedi a second term.
The disbursement by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) of $201m (about R3.7bn) to boost the country’s foreign reserves just days before the election is seen as likely to boost Tshisekedi’s prospects. He is also using foreign and local investments to industrialise the DRC’s economy by building roads, refurbishing government buildings and constructing a new $290m financial centre in Kinshasa, which is officially opening this week. There are also plans to refurbish Kinshasa’s international airport.
These developments, coupled with plans to stop mining companies from exporting raw materials and instead process them internally to create jobs, are likely to win favour with the Congolese.
But Tshisekedi has the daunting task of convincing the electorate that the plans will lift them out of immense nationwide poverty and that the war in the eastern part of the country will come to an end.
The DRC has vast mineral wealth and is one of the biggest exporters of copper, cobalt, zinc, gold, manganese, uranium and platinum. Yet its people are among the poorest in the world.
More than 60% of citizens live below the poverty line, have very little electricity and have to contend with poor roads. The country is also highly corrupt, which has helped to grow the divide between rich and poor to unimaginable levels.
Most of the country has had to resort to using the US dollar for trade as the local Congolese franc has depreciated. This has hurt the locals, who have the added expense of converting their meagre salaries into foreign currency.
Finance minister Nicolas Kazadi said runaway inflation and the depreciating local currency were not the worst in Africa.
“The position of the local currency is something that is happening all over Africa, and is one of the results of the international crisis. Covid-19 and the war in Ukraine have worsened the situation at a global level and it was already known that some small economies’ currencies would be affected. The Congo is in the same situation,” he said.
Kazadi said the DRC’s inflation is not the worst in Africa. “Some countries have inflation of 140%, 80%, 40% but we are still around 20%-22%. That’s not good at all, I agree, but we are not the most affected because we are implementing policies to reduce the consequences of the global situation.”
Kazadi hailed Tshisekedi’s leadership qualities, especially in the fight against widespread corruption, saying that, for the first time, the country is seeing “a real fight against impunity”.
A law will be implemented in 2025 to force all Congolese to declare their incomes and assets. Though this happens elsewhere, it will be a first in the DRC.