A fourth election within the constitutional mandate will be a positive sign that the country is moving in the right direction and consolidating its democratic standards.
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n the context of defending democracy, the US-led Summit for Democracy (S4D) presents at least two excellent opportunities in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The first is to rally democracy advocates and civil society actors, and the second is to inspire a new DRC administration that has yet to master the kleptocracy system.
The DRC's commitments at the S4D indicated that the country needs to build a democratic system, particularly consolidating democratic norms and institutions. Three of the five written commitments submitted by the DRC government address the country's pressing needs in defending democracy and are crucial for building basic democratic norms. However, the DRC’s commitments do not address the vital issues of open government, such as civic participation, fiscal openness, and access to information, which are essential for strengthening democracy.
The Upcoming Elections
The only commitment with measurable activities made by the government as part of the S4D is related to organizing elections within the constitutional timeframe. It should be noted that the DRC has held three presidential election cycles under the current constitution and experienced the first peaceful transfer of power in the country's history in December 2018 with the election of President Félix Tshisekedi. A fourth election within the constitutional mandate will be a positive sign that the country is moving in the right direction and consolidating its democratic standards.
However, organizing elections is nowhere near enough to build democracy. The DRC's commitment to the S4D missed addressing the concerns of the previous three elections, such as the credibility of the electoral process. As the country prepares for the 2023 elections, the National Episcopal Conference of Congo (CENCO) and the Church of Christ in Congo (ECC) are concerned about the current administration's commitment to organizing a credible election and continue to denounce different maneuvers that are risks to the 2023 elections. Additionally, the two largest religious denominations in the DRC are adamantly opposed to the politicization of the Independent National Electoral Commission (CENI), which is under the control of the inner circle of the president and his political family.
Countering Corruption
In his address to the Summit, President Félix Tshisekedi acknowledged that corruption is preventing the country from realizing its potential and pledged to strengthen the Inspectorate General of Finance (IGF), the National Anti-Corruption Agency (APLC), the Court of Auditors and the Courts and Tribunals. If fully implemented, this commitment will address the lack of accountability and support good governance. Encouragingly, the government has funded the Inspectorate General of Finance and, in the first quarter of 2022, the agency has recruited an additional 100 inspectors, improved its capacity to intervene and expanded its scope of investigation in public institutions.
Unfortunately, however, the courts and tribunals that are supposed to support the work of the IGF are poorly funded, instrumentalized and corrupt to the point that they do not effectively enforce the law. Unfortunately, the new administration is showing the same discouraging tactics of the former authoritarian regime. Recently, experts, politicians and civil society actors denounced the brutal replacement of the President of the Constitutional Court, tainted by irregularities and corruption, by the ruling majority in order to ensure the loyalty of this institution in view of the 2023 presidential election.
Strengthening Legal Frameworks
The biggest challenge to democracy in the DRC is corruption, mainly in misappropriating public funds by the authorities. In his speech, the President called it a "gangrene" that robs the state coffers of billions of dollars yearly. He pledged to reform anti-corruption laws to ensure transparent management of public resources and execution of the state budget. On a positive note, The government has made some progress in enforcing taxes and increasing state revenues, and the country's public finances have improved significantly this year. For example, foreign exchange reserves reached $3.3 Billion, equivalent to 13 weeks of imports compared to last year's usual two weeks.
Unfortunately, the government has not yet taken any legal measures or initiated reform or additional steps to stop the misappropriation of public funds. It has the same propensity as the previous regime system to perpetuate impunity and blind eyes on corruption in managing natural resources. While preparing its commitments, in February 2022, the DRC government signed a secret agreement with the notorious mining magnate Dan Gertler, whom the US government sanctioned under the Magnitsky Act because of suspicions of opaque and corrupt mining and oil contracts in the DRC. Since March 2022, the Congo Not For Sale (CNPV) movement has been campaigning for the full publication of the agreement between the DRC government and the Dan Gertler company. So far, the government has refused to make the secret deal public.
In addition, the main perpetrators of the misappropriation of funds within the 100-day program of President Tshisekedi are free and back to business as if nothing happened. These are the President's close collaborators, including the former President's chief of staff, sentenced in the first instance in June 2020 to 20 years in prison for tens of millions of US dollars.
Where did the hundreds of millions of US dollars intended for the 100-day program go? Who are the real embezzlers? Is the justice system incompetent to protect public property?
Reforms are imperative to reinvigorate democracy in the DRC, and the S4D was seen as an opportunity to ignite this process. Unfortunately, the Year of Action is supposed to ignite nascent collaboration between the government and other stakeholders for a change but did not stir up momentum around democratic reform. As we enter the last quarter of the YoA, the DRC's commitments will likely remain rhetoric without concrete reforms.
Sadly, the DRC's participation in the S4D is a missed opportunity to strengthen democracy that could have changed the country's direction that endured so much in the past two decades. Missed opportunities because the government is not open and does not collaborate, where the Congolese civil society focuses much on dynamism and solo criticism instead of forming working groups around the country's five commitments to track the country's YoA progress. As of today, the DRC's five commitments are not followed and may not produce meaningful progress. Thus, the insufficient collaboration among the civil society actors and lack of structured dialogue between the government and civil society actors to advance the country's commitments is a cause of much concern.
Guillaume B. Mpoko is the Founder of Open DRC. Loketo Ours is the Country Director of Accountability Lab DRC.