Post-election worries

Congolese and international observers, first suspected, and then documented numerous irregularities in the electoral process. The big day has passed; today, reports describe the situation as being relatively calm.

Tomorrow will bring other problems – ntango eza ndeko ya liwa. Giving some examples of these irregularities will help frame what the ambiance will be once results are announced.

Compared to the 2006 vote, this one was more violent and fewer voters cast their ballot. MONUSCO and other international observers witnessed attempts to cheat.

Reporting from Goma, Cindy McCain - founding member of the Eastern Congo Initiative and wife of Arizona Senator John McCain - referred to technical difficulties from the polling stations that were clearly organized.

The electoral process initiated in 2006 legitimized poor leadership. Kabila used his first five-year term to consolidate power at the expense of the Congolese people. His position as incumbent, plus the money generated by the selling off of state assets at bargain prices, enabled him to dominate the campaign landscape.

Candidate Kabila had a disproportionate access to state media.

Kabila illegally used state planes, jeeps and helicopters while on the campaign trail.

The state security forces under Kabila’s control systematically obstructed opposition candidates from campaigning – notably Etienne Tshisekedi.

Kabila’s clansman Pastor Ngoy Mulunda, head of the Commission électorale indépendante, was partisan, not independent.

Fictitious polling stations and pre-marked ballot papers were discovered. Stuffing the ballot boxes is not uncommon in Africa, but inventing fictitious polling stations seems to be a new twist on Congolese creativity.

The Belgian company Zetes organized the high tech services needed for voter registration. Zetes reported that hundreds of thousands of voters were registered twice.

Some European Union election observers were withdrawn from polling stations on election day for their own security, testifying to the potential for things to explode.

Some opposition candidates – but not Tshesikedi - have called for the annulment of the elections because of these irregularities.

Theodore Trefon speaks with BBC News: "Failed state: can DR Congo recover"

As the Democratic Republic of Congo prepares for just its second general elections in four decades on 28 November, BBC News spoke with Trefon on whether whether this failed state, still recovering from a war which led to an estimated four million deaths, can ever be rebuilt.

Read the full article: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa

Kabila condemned by UK MP, Eric Joyce

British MP Eric Joyce, chair of the UK Parliament Great Lakes of Africa Group, has just released a devastating report. It details Kabila’s systematic pillaging of Congo’s resources. Kabila and his friends are the beneficiaries – the Congolese people are the big losers. The government sells state-owned mining assets to shady business partners based in the British Virgin Islands.

Joyce documents a strategy that has already resulted in the loss of $5.5 billion – 'Powerful evidence proves that the natural resources of the Congo are not being used as a legitimate source of revenue for the people. Instead, a series of complex arrangements between their own government and various BVI shell companies means that a few are enriched at the terrible cost of the many.'


copyright Eric Joyce

Masquerade?

Read the full report:

http://ericjoycemp.files.wordpress.com/2011/11/summary-5-5m-loss-to-congolese-people-through-questionable-mining-deals.pdf

Free Fair DRC review of Congo Masquerade

Review of Theodore Trefon’s Congo Masquerade

Banners and posters on Kinshasa's campaign landscape

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

Congo’s social agenda

Can logistical obstacles be overcome to allow people vote on 28 November? How will the runner-up and his supporters react to the results? Will Congo follow the Côte d’Ivoire scenario? Will the disenfranchised of Masina, Kimbanseke and other ‘zones rouges’ of Kinshasa take to the streets? These are important questions. They are timely and require immediate planning.

But focus on these questions tends to mask other priorities. The recently released UNDP report on human development indicators puts elections hype in perspective. It ranks DRC at the bottom of the list of 187 countries surveyed. The new Doing Business report also reveals Congo’s fragility. Already poorly positioned last year, DRC dropped down two points this year, ranking 178 out of 183 countries.

Some macroeconomic stability has been achieved under the aggressive tutelage of the FMI and IMF. Public works efforts at reconnecting the fragmented territory need to be acknowledged thanks to the EU and China.

Security in the Kivus remains alarming despite the UN’s largest and most expensive peacekeeping force. Five years after the election of Joseph Kabila, ordinary people have not seen social benefits. They remain hungry and poor, angry and confused. The 'cinq chantiers' development program is an unequivocal failure. The current government is reproducing the historic dynamics of institutionalizing humiliation.

Kabila or Tshisekedi (or Kamerhe or Kengo) as president matters little. The way that power will be structured to improve the well-being of ordinary Congolese after the elections is the real issue. With attention riveted on the elections and the personality politics character of the campaign, people’s needs and expectations tend to be overlooked. Holding elections is important but designing and implementing a participative social agenda is equally essential.

Leadership issues in Congo

Boston University's Leadership Corner asked me to comment on leadership issues in DRC.

Below is the text of that interview:

BU in Congo

Dr. Trefon, thank you for spending some time with me. One of the topics that BU students in the MSL program tackle is the definition of the term "leadership." It is a concept that seems simple at first, yet grows more complex the more you probe it. You have spent the past 25 years studying the politics and anthropology of state/society relations in Congo/Zaire. With that breadth of experience, how have you come to understand what it means to be an effective leader?

The main problem facing Congo today is precisely the lack of responsible leadership. In a country where political authorities do very little for their constituents, when officials do just a little, they are venerated. But this is populism and not real leadership. There are few outstanding figures on the political landscape with vision, those who are able to bring an end to corrupt government, reduce poverty, solve the country’s security problems or improve the well-being of ordinary people. This would require the talent of being able to mobilize people around shared objectives, the power to deal forcefully and pragmatically with regional and international partners and the capacity to manage the macro-economic challenges facing what has unfortunately become one of Africa’s notoriously failed states. President Kabila does not have these leadership credentials; ex-dictator Mobutu had the charisma and flair of what is sometimes expected of an African ‘big man’ but he used it against the interest of the people; the first democratically elected prime minister, Patrice Lumumba, was assassinated before having the chance to deploy his leadership skills.

The situational model of leadership focuses not only on the leader personally but also the context in which the leader operates. In Congo Masquerade, you focus on the ingrained political culture of corruption among the Congolese elite. What situational challenges do leaders (both within and external to the Congo) face in trying to improve the quality of life of the ordinary Congolese? In other words, besides being a strong leader in and of himself, what must a politician know about the Congolese system in order to be effective?

After 32 years of dictatorship, violent conflict and machinations orchestrated by Rwanda and a very difficult – but still unsuccessful political transition towards democracy, everything on the state-building agenda is priority. Public health, education, road infrastructure, providing people with water and electricity, re-engineering public service provision, creating the enabling conditions for political participation, etc. are all priorities. But there is no master plan shared by the Congolese authorities and their international partners. While many programs appear to make sense at the theoretical level, implementation is a real problem. The country is also vast (the size of Western Europe) and diverse (in terms of distribution of natural wealth, ethnicity and population density). Managing a country that is fragmented in this way is an additional challenge. Probably the most important thing for a Congolese politician or international partner to bear in mind is the only thing that is predictable in Congo is the unpredictable.

How does the ordinary, everyday Congolese citizen view the leadership of his or her country?

Congo is one, but plural at the same time. Again, the country is diverse and fragmented so it is impossible to expect a consensus on anything, let alone on leadership. This is a very hot question because presidential and legislative elections will take place at the end of November. Perceptions of political leadership in Congo have to be understood in terms of social issues. People are very frustrated by the lack of progress in the government’s development program known as ‘cinq chantiers’. There is a lot of justifiable grumbling about lack of water, electricity, roads and access to health services. Kabila has strong support in some provinces but faces heavy opposition in others. The fact that he was able to amend the constitution, to have a single round of voting instead of the two-round system is a distinct advantage for him so he is likely to win the elections. Winning the elections is one step, transforming it into legitimate authority based on respect and transparent negotiation is something else. People have become very skeptical about how much government can really do for them and have consequently come to rely on their own home-grown systems to survive.

Students learn in class at BU about leader emergence, or how one individual rises out of the crowd and assumes a meaningful leadership role. Often this emergence is due not only to the individual's traits, but to the perception of the individual by the others in the group. Have you witnessed any instances where an otherwise ordinary individual rises up from the ranks and assumes a leadership role, no matter how small?

As people expect relatively little from government, new forms of social organization emerge. Congo, however, remains a very hierarchical society, perhaps something that is a spillover from Belgian colonialism. Religious leaders, civil society activists, traditional chiefs, diaspora representatives, successful businessmen and women and even musicians are leaders and opinion formers that political authorities have to deal with.

I know that everyone at BU Brussels is very happy to have you join the team. Turning to your role at BU, what do you feel are the most important lessons that students can learn about leadership? What new understanding and knowledge do you hope to pass on to them in your class?


I’ve devoted the past twenty-five years to Congo/Zaire as a researcher, project manager, professor and consultant. My approach is policy oriented and I have tried to narrow the conceptual gap between political science theories on development and state-building and a grassroots, anthropological understanding of very local-level social dynamics.

My course at BUB accordingly focuses on international development. Specifically, the discourses, practices, strategies, pitfalls, challenges - and when relevant - success stories of this vast agenda. I try to avoid over conceptualizing or theorizing about these issues because at the Master’s level, students seem to be more motivated by pragmatic examples and case studies. Are the Millennium Developments Goals attainable? How does micro-finance work? How do you carry out stakeholder analysis in the field? What are the links between access to natural resources and well-being? The main messages that I try to convey are one, development is a very complex issue so we have to be culturally sensitive and humble, two, be open-minded – bringing in the private sector in development strategies, for example, is something that I explore with students and three, be prepared for the unexpected – the role of social media in the Arab spring is a good case in point.

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For further information: http://buleadershipcorner.blogspot.com