KINSHASA (Portal) – As Democratic Republic of Congo President Felix Tshisekedi was declared the winner of another disputed election on Sunday, he vowed to be a leader for all 100 million people.
However, allegations from opposition leaders of electoral fraud and political repression are likely to cloud his second term in office, as they did his first. His main rivals rejected Sunday's result before it was announced and called for a replay.
Tshisekedi called on his supporters for unity at his campaign headquarters in the capital Kinshasa.
“I will govern this second term with a spirit of openness,” Tshisekedi told a cheering crowd, adding that he would focus on job creation, security and a more diversified and competitive economy.
The result sets the stage for a tense political confrontation with the potential for the kind of violence that followed disputed elections in 2018, 2011 and 2006.
There could also be international implications. Congo is the world's largest supplier of cobalt, used to make batteries for electric vehicles and cell phones, and its third-largest producer of copper.
Tshisekedi, 60, son of longtime opposition leader Etienne Tshisekedi, inherited his father's sizeable support base following his death in 2017 after years in the shadows.
However, vote counts by Congo's Roman Catholic Church, which had a 40,000-strong team of observers, reviewed by Portal at the time, showed that second-place opposition candidate Martin Fayulu was the winner in 2018.
Fayulu suspected that Tshisekedi had reached an agreement with outgoing President Joseph Kabila, who was prevented from running due to term limits. Fayulu condemned the result as a “constitutional coup,” which Tshisekedi and Kabila both rejected.
With Kabila's help, Tshisekedi was able to gain much-needed support in parliament and security institutions in his first years in office. But the alliance quickly fell apart as he tried to strengthen his position by installing supporters in key positions.
As he launched his re-election campaign, Tshisekedi told supporters he needed more time to consolidate gains and deliver on promises to roll back decades of authoritarian rule, root out corruption, rebuild the economy, tackle inequality and address an ongoing security crisis in eastern Congo.
“In just two years we have been able to carry out all these actions that you have seen, but we can do even better,” Tshisekedi told a packed Kinshasa stadium on November 19, adding that his first two years in office were marred by the crisis The power-sharing agreement with Kabila was limited.
But critics said Tshisekedi fell short and accused him of suppressing dissent as his predecessors had done.
A group of nine rival presidential candidates, including Fayulu and opposition frontrunner Moise Katumbi, urged their supporters on Sunday to take to the streets to protest what they called a “sham election.”
While economic growth surged under Tshisekedi's leadership, largely due to demand for key minerals, only a small portion of revenue reached the roughly 62% of Congo's population who live on less than a dollar a day.
According to the country's statistics institute, the cost of living rose sharply due to the devaluation of the Congolese franc. The annual inflation rate was over 30% in December.
Although Tshisekedi declared a state of siege in two eastern provinces in May 2021 and increased defense spending, his government struggled to contain the numerous armed groups behind the attacks that have killed thousands of people and displaced nearly seven million in the east.
In a worrying development, Corneille Nangaa, leader of a new alliance that includes rebels and political groups in eastern Congo, rejected the election and vowed on Sunday to “march to Kinshasa.”
(Writing by Bate Felix; Editing by Alexandra Zavis and Nick Macfie)
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