The DRC, formerly known as Zaire, formerly known as the Belgian Congo, is a country of vast natural resources - particularly mineral wealth. This fact has made it a target for imperialist plunder for over a century. In recent years it has been plagued by corruption and civil war.

A year after its 1960 independence from Belgium, the Congo's leftist prime minister Patrice Lumumba was killed by troops loyal to Joseph Mobutu, with the active assistance of the CIA. Mobutu seized power, renamed the country Zaire, renamed himself Mobutu Sese Seko, and built a corrupt regime that served as a loyal Cold War ally of the United States. Zaire became a staging ground for operations against Soviet-backed Angola.

The country was repeatedly invaded in 1997 by Rwanda, in pursuit of extremist Hutu militias. In the resulting turmoil Mobutu's domestic enemies, supported by Rwanda and Uganda, ousted him in a coup, installing Laurent Kabila as President in May, 1997. The following year Kabila tried to expel Rwandan military forces that had helped him overthrow Mobutu. Congolese Tutsis as well as the Governments of Burundi, Rwanda, and Uganda, all relied on the Rwandan military presence for protection against hostile armed groups operating from the eastern part of the DRC. A few months later another front was opened in the Northeast of the DRC. Zimbabwe, Angola, Chad and Namibia deployed their troops in the DRC to join forces with the loyalist army, while Rwanda, Uganda and Burundi sponsored the different rebel movements (the Congolese Rally for Democracy and the Movement for the Liberation of the Congo) with a view to toppling Kabila. The country, which was given its present name by Kabila, became a battleground for a proxy civil war, starting in 1998.

A ceasefire agreement in July 1999 led to the establishment of a United Nations "mission" in the DRC, known by the acronym MONUC. Its function was, and remains, mainly to act as a liaison between the warring factions. Canada participates in this mission, under the name Operation Crocodile, by providing staff for the mission headquarters. In February, 2000, the Security Council authorized a contingent of 5,537 "peacekeepers" to monitor the implementation of the July 1999 ceasefire.

Despite the ceasefire agreement and the "peacekeepers", the war continued.

A formal peace agreement supposedly ended the war in December 2002 and created a transitional government under Joseph Kabila, the son of Laurent, who had been murdered in 2001. But the fighting still continues; large parts of the country are beyond the control of the government.

The constitution of the DRC was formally adopted on 19 February 2006 after it was approved in a popular referendum in December.

Much of the continual civil war has been promoted and funded by multinational mining and other resource corporations, many of them Canadian. A United Nations panel of inquiry has substantiated that "the exploitation of natural resources was the main source of revenue for the brutal war, which, in turn, was sustained in order to secure access to those resources. Furthermore, although the mandate of the Panel was not specifically related to examining human rights violations, the Panel documented the widespread human right abuses that the conflict and the extraction of lucrative resources in the country have caused."

It is ironic, then, that in an article in today's Globe and Mail by Louise Arbour about the importance of restoring a respect for human rights in the DRC includes this statement:

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International private corporations can also contribute to a peaceful transition by investing and helping the Congolese to make the best use of their vast natural resources.

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Capitalism and imperialism cannot “help Africa”, since they have created today’s crisis. The governments and politicians of Africa are also blocking development, since they are closer to big business and West than they are to the workers and poor in their own countries. Source

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For more information on the Congo:
Congo Timeline
Congo Profile (BBC)
Friends of the Congo
Congo's Tragedy and Western Complicity
Congo Civil War
Exploitation by Canadian Mining Companies
The Unquiet Death of Patrice Lumumba
Congo: Victims of the Power
The Heart of Darkness

[ 28 July 2006: Message edited by: M. Spector ]

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Pecks camera cuts between the stunned anger on the faces of the Belgians listening to this speech and the elation of crowds of Africans gathered around radios cheering Lumumba’s courage to honestly portray their existence.

Lumumba’s forthright demands for economic independence, social justice and political self-determination, and his hostility to a political setup based upon tribal divisions, which the colonialists had effectively used to divide and rule Africa, sealed his fate. His threat to appeal for Soviet aid as a last resort in his effort to free the country of the continuing domination of the Belgian mining interests and Belgian troops, who continued to intervene in the aftermath of independence, gave Washington the pretext for allying with the old colonial power in seeking his elimination.

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Patrice Lumumba was their greatest hope for a unified Africa. He was the first and last democratically-elected prime minister of the Congo. There's always a pretext for killing an idea. The CIA and Belgian's were said to have hired a specialist for what was an important job at the time, a mercenary from Germany named QJ Win. In any event, Lumumba was tortured to death over several days. And may their blood scream for all eternity.

Remember Patrice and Che

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Among the 33 candidates vying for president are former rebel leaders who were offered posts as vice presidents during the transitional period to reduce the level of violence caused by their militias. Jean-Pierre Bemba, Azarias Ruberwa, and Arthur Z'ahidi Ngoma are unlikely to accept a future arrangement that excludes them even if they lose elections woefully, because they know they can turn to their old ways (armed insurrection) to make the country ungovernable.

Nzanga Ngbangawe Mobutu, who is the son of the late dictator that helped bring Congo to its knees, is also in the race for the presidency. People like these (and they are many), who must have benefited from the "kleptocracy" of the late Mobutu Sese Seko, have enough cash to destabilize Congo if they choose to do so.

Congo has been in a state of war for about 10 years, and about 4 million people have reportedly died from the conflict. Different militias are either fighting wars of greed to control minerals or fighting proxy wars for neighboring countries like Rwanda and Uganda. A 17,000-man U.N. peacekeeping force stationed in the country has been unable to stop the atrocities committed by the different armed groups. In a recent interview with CNN, the U.N. force commander likened the situation in Congo to dealing with a "tsunami every six months." There are reportedly 10,000 people with weapons in eastern Congo alone, and these people have instilled a culture of violence in the area. Women in particular have borne the brunt of the violence.

Congo's 25 million registered voters have cast their votes in the hope that the leaders who will emerge from the whopping 267 registered parties can create conditions that are conducive for them to live in peace. They hope local and foreign predators will allow the elected president and 500 parliamentarians to govern in the people's interest with little interference.

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In a statement released July 31, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack described the elections in the Democratic Republic of Congo as “historic,” being the “first open national elections held since 1960” when the country’s former dictator, Mobuto Sese Seko, came to power. State Dept. bumpf

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It was 1965 when Lieutenant-General Mobutu seized power from President Kasavubu, who in turn had seized power in a coup d'etat against Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba (with the active support of the CIA and Mobutu) in 1960 shortly after the latter had been elected in the last democratic election in the Congo.

Kabila won 45 per cent of the 16.9 million votes cast in the July 30 ballot, against Jean-Pierre Bemba's 20 per cent, electoral commission chairman Apollinaire Malu Malu said at a news conference.

My understanding of the current crop is a choice between thug A or thug B as neither of them have expressed any truly independent values and appear to enjoy the neo-lib poison (although I understand Kabila's father was at one time close with Che).