I Don’t Get It
****Photo MONUC
When my friend Mzee in Washington told me Jean-Pierre Bemba’s partisans had set the Supreme Court offices on fire, I did not believe it. I thought it was a joke, bad humor. He said he had called Kinshasa and confirmed with his contacts in town, and it was true. I still refused to believe it.
“How could anyone set the Supreme Court on fire?” I asked. “I cannot understand it.”
See, if you had visited Kinshasa recently, then you would understand my disbelief. Primo, the neighborhood around the Supreme Court, which is close to Bemba’s residence, has been protected by MONUC troops, guarded with UN armored vehicles and heavily armed Uruguayans and EUFOR elements stationed every so many meters. One could not help, but feel under siege when driving around the court. The area felt like a war zone. I remember seeing one or two armored vehicles parked right outside the court.
So how did a crowd of partisans force its way to the building and set it on fire? I know the Congolese do not like facing the barrel of a gun, let alone armored gunships. Perhaps I miss something.
Secundo, why would Bemba incite his supporters to burn the court, the very institution he petitioned to review election results? I, for one, refuse to believe Bemba would discredit himself so blatantly. I doubt he is that foolish.
Congo runs on a powerful rumor-mill called Radio-trottoir, which is skeptical and cynical. Like many Congolese, I would like to know who benefits from the incident. It is not Bemba. What happened to the security cordon around the court? Where did our UN and EUFOR friends go?
I see a MONUC/EUFOR pattern here that does not reassure the Congolese – too little, too late and rarely at the right place when needed. In Summer 2004, MONUC failed to stop Laurent Nkunda’s siege of Bukavu, observing as the killing lasted two weeks. Despite much chest-pounding and gun-toting, EUFOR was caught off-guard by the three-day battle between Bemba’s troops and Joseph Kabila’s Republican Guards this past August. Now, apparently UN/EUFOR troops were not there when the fire started. I don’t get it.
Categorized as:Uncategorized> Congo> UN, MONUC> Bemba> Kabila> Elections - Congo You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
Hi Mvemba,
You wouldn’t say it in your article, so I will. Perhaps the Supreme Court demonstrations/burning was a set up by
UN/EUFOR/Kabila camp to further discredit Bemba and give themselves more time to get “things in order”?
Comment by brad — November 24, 2006 @ 2:31 pm
Many people seem to be reluctant to believe that Bemba could have ordered such a thing. Perhaps he didn’t - he doesn’t have absolute control over the militants in his camp. The Union Pour la Nation (eg Dindo, on TV the evening before) certainly mobilised the original protest, to put pressure on the court. It’s likely that many of those that showed up were already less than neutral towards the court.
It doesn’t take much to wind up a crowd, and it seems when things started to get messy, the police backed down and called for backup instead of imposing their authority. Worse, many of them took off their uniforms and ran away. The recent history of violent confrontation with the police made a clash highly likely from this point. MONUC pulled back, and so nothing prevented the extremists/opportunists from invading the court and starting the fire.
This was a foreseeable and preventable scenario, and you are rightly mystified. But all those armoured cars are there to prevent by dissuasion; when the chips are down, as we have seen, they are not instructed to intervene. MONUC say this is the job of the national authorities, and that its actions are in line with its mandate. As for EUFOR, they say they will only intervene on request from MONUC.
If you are shocked or disappointed, imagine the feelings of the court staff, observers and others present.
Comment by F — November 24, 2006 @ 3:39 pm
[…] Following the announcement of election results in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, some angry voters decided to set the Supreme Court offices on fire. Eye on Africa does not get it. Ndesanjo Macha […]
Pingback by Global Voices Online » Blog Archive » D.R. of Congo: who set the Supreme Court on fire? — November 24, 2006 @ 5:23 pm
I am with Brad on this one. Weren’t there questions about the real authors of a “failed coup d’etat” during the early years of the transition?
Comment by Lorraine — November 26, 2006 @ 4:42 am
Lorraine, fyi Brad left a similar comment here, to which I replied.
Comment by F — November 26, 2006 @ 10:27 am
[…] [Background: MLC = Mouvement de Libération du Congo, political party and former rebel movement led by Presidential challenger Jean-Pierre Bemba. With the help of a new political alliance called Union pour la Nation, Bemba is contesting the results of the second round of the Presidential elections, which showed a 60-40 split in favour of Joseph Kabila. The Supreme Court was attacked and set on fire on Tuesday after a small protest was mishandled. Fortunately, nobody was killed but lots of important documents were lost. The hearing resumed in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Friday. Congolese radio, television and print journalists were given access, and observers from the Carter Center and the European Union were also present.] D R Congo, November 25th, 2006 Tags: elections, Kinshasa, news, politics, tension […]
Pingback by Final hurdle at Extra Extra — November 26, 2006 @ 10:41 am
Mvemba -
As you rightly said commenting on the three-day war in Kin last October, the successful post-apartheid transition in SA was as much to the credit of the political class as of the existence of a robust institutional framework to investigate anti-democratic crimes and ANC-Inkatha inter-ethnic violence. Capacity — political will — to investigate criminal acts and violent behavior aimed at derailing the process is the most important piece that has consistently been lacking to support the Congolese transition and election process.
And this has not been for lack of institutions responsible for such investigations. Both MONUC’s human rights division and the pro-Kabila leaning national judiciary have the legal mandate, sufficient resources and the necessary moral authority to investigate political violence and anti-democratic criminal behaviors such as this one and bring authors to justice. They have deliberately chosen not to pursue their mandate. Short term political gains (blame pro-Tshisekedi opposition for the 2005 violent demonstrations in Mbujimayi, discredit Bemba’s post-election legal efforts after the Supreme Court burning, etc.) are casting a black shadow over the long-term political stability of the country.
Comment by Nzanzu — November 26, 2006 @ 11:37 am
I’d like to point out that MONUC and EUFOR soldiers are not crowd control police. The Congolese are fully equiped to handle such disturbances. They went through training and have European equipment — I’ll be quick to point out.
The weapon of a soldier is a machine gun and if he uses it it would get very ugly. Imagine the headline: "MONUC shoots into crowds, 6 dead". That would seriously ignite Kinshasa, in which a majority believe the international community is there only to get rid of Bemba.
If the Supreme Court got badly damaged, it’s because Kinshasa doesn’t have a proper fire department. Small fires turn into blaze in Kin. We saw two fire trucks go back and forth between the court and the river to get water. Ridiculous.
Comment by kim — November 26, 2006 @ 3:36 pm
Perhaps it was the M17 that set the Supreme Court on fire. Do not forget that several parties were in the court filing complaints about the reported results including people from the Kabila senior camp.
Comment by karana — November 26, 2006 @ 9:52 pm
Ah Mvemba, you are very incisive as usual, and I like that. I am rather upset that ANYONE would attack the Supreme Court, however biased we may think it is. In fact, it is because I believe that there is a tidbit of Kabila bias in the court that I have a hard time believing that Kabila would have done anything to disturb the proceedings. But I agree that it doesn’t make any more sense for Bemba to do it.
That said, when was the last time that Congolese politics made sense, I ask you… Mystere et boule de gomme! In the mean time, let’s wait and see what they will say, although it is almost a foregone conclusion.
Comment by AfroVoltaire (aka TheMalau) — November 27, 2006 @ 12:47 pm
Thank you everyone for your insightul comments. It appears, at least, that there are more questions about the Supreme Court incident than the mainstream press would have us believe. I did not think it was as black and white as had been reported.
Kim, your points are well-taken as usual. You are right that the Congolese police is trained/equipped to handle this type of incidents. Clearly, they have not been up to the task — and this is not the first time. Still, I have one question for you. What exactly is MONUC/EUFOR’s mandate in these circumstances? On Nov 17, a friend and I were attacked and stoned by shegues (street kids) unhappy with the election’s results as French para-troopers stood by and watched from their APC. There was no police officer around. They obviously did not deter the shegues…Even street kids know that MONUC/EUFOR do not bite. What was the point of their presence there?
Comment by Mvemba — November 29, 2006 @ 2:06 am
you have to understand how the military actually works. soldiers have a chain of command, and they can only obey to orders coming down this chain. example: soldiers are sent on patrol on the boulevard in an armed vehicle. their orders are: go from this location to that one; report anything unusual. no other instructions.
on the way, they notice a civilian car being harassed by street children, quite an ordinary thing. still they report by radio to their officer. this gentleman also has instructions from his own hierarchy: avoid unecessary confrontation, engage only if human life is directly threatened; this measure to avoid triggering a bigger problem, that may put the whole election process in jeopardy;
the officer asks to his patrol: is anyone’s life in danger?
the answer is no; therefore the patrol stays on the scene but makes no movement. It may be interpreted as inaction. it’s just a stand-by, waiting for further developments.
the alternative would have been: identify targets, proceed to extraction, be prepared to eventually engage, which means eventually open fire.
Is that what you expected to see? Eufor soldiers shooting shegues on the boulevard? Monuc troops opening fire on demonstrators in the court premises?
it’s damage control; dans une situation violente, il faut accepter de laisser la part du feu
Comment by snipe — January 5, 2007 @ 12:31 pm
Sniper,
Thanks for your comment. I do think you missed the point of this posting. I am not questioning the competence of UN/EUFOR troops — they are professional soldiers. I have been embedded/integrated with them (UN troops) — and went on patrol with them — in various parts of Congo . I have a clear sense of their work. The issue is the type of mandate they have. That mandate is questionable and the Supreme Court incident underscores that. Mvemba
Comment by Mvemba — January 11, 2007 @ 4:08 am