The Democratic Republic of Congo (RDCongo) holds four elections this Wednesday amid rising tensions and violence, with current President Felix Tshisekedi emerging as the candidate with the best chance of winning the presidency.
The number of candidates in the four elections – presidential, legislative (national and municipal) and community councilors – taking place this Wednesday in southern Africa’s largest country, bordering Angola, reaches almost 100,000, three times more than in the last elections in 2018 of the year. According to the Independent National Electoral Commission (CENI), which registered almost 44 million voters, including from several countries in the diaspora.
According to analysts contacted by Lusa, the current head of state is the candidate with the best chance of winning the main race, the presidential race.
The activities of NENI, led by Denis Kadima Kazadi, a figure trusted by Tshisekedi, will come under particular scrutiny, especially from the Congolese bishops gathered at the National Episcopal Conference of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (SENCO) and the leaders of the Church of Christ in the Congo (ECC), who this time they are threatening to release the results collected by their own election observers if a scenario similar to 2018 repeats.
Tshisekedi’s main opponents include Martin Fayulu, a politician who heads the Lamuka (“Wake Up” in Lingala) coalition and who was the legitimate winner of the 2018 presidential election but was considered the second most voted candidate in official results. and Moise Katumbi, leader of Juntos pela Republica (EPR), wealthy businessman, former governor of Katanga province.
Denis Mukwege, a physician who won the 2018 Nobel Peace Prize for his work with rape survivors in DR Congo and is known internationally but largely unknown in his own country, also introduced himself to these presidential candidates.
A severe cost of living crisis, corruption and insecurity characterize daily life for some 100 million people in a country the size of Western Europe.
Two-thirds of the population now live below the absolute threshold of extreme poverty (defined by the World Bank as US$2.15 a day or less), and the country’s conflicts continue to expand, led by rebel groups such as M23; ADF (Allied Democratic Forces, an armed Islamist group operating in Uganda and DR Congo), or Codeco – Congo Development Cooperative.
As a result of the violence, DR Congo has the largest number of internally displaced people in the world.
In this context, the recent withdrawal from the country of Kenyan soldiers of the East African Community Regional Force (EA-RF), as well as 19,815 soldiers, 760 military observers and 1,400 police from the Mission for Stabilization in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (Monusco), are both needed by Kinshasa.
Author: Lusa
Source: CM Jornal
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