The Political Role of the Ethnic Factor Democratic Republic of the Congo

The Political Role of the Ethnic Factor around Elections in the Democratic Republic of the Congo Hubert Kabungulu Ngoy-Kangoy Abstract This paper analyses the role of the ethnic factor in political choices in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and its impact on democratisa- tion and the implementation of the practice of good governance. This is done by focusing especially on the presidential and legislative elections of 1960 and 2006. The Congolese electorate is known for its ambiguous and paradoxical behaviour. At all times, ethnicity seems to play a determining role in the * Hubert Kabungulu Ngoy-Kangoy is a research fellow at the Centre for Management of Peace, Defence and Security at the University of Kinshasa, where he is a Ph.D. candidate in Conflict Resolution. The key areas of his research are good governance, human security and conflict prevention and resolution in the SADC and Great Lakes regions. He has written a number of articles and publications, including La transition démocratique au Zaïre (1995), L’insécurité à Kinshasa (2004), a joint work, The Many Faces of Human Security (2005), Parties and Political Transition in the Democratic Republic of Congo (2006), originally in French. He has been a researcher-consultant at the United Nations Information Centre in Kinshasa, the Centre for Defence Studies at the University of Zimbabwe, the Institute of Security Studies, Pretoria, the Electoral Institute of Southern Africa, the Southern African Institute of International Affairs and the Human Sciences Research Council, Pretoria. The article was translated from French by Dr Marcellin Vidjennagni Zounmenou. 219 Hubert Kabungulu Ngoy-Kangoy choice of leaders and so the politicians, entrusted with leadership, keep on exploiting the same ethnicity for money. Although the East-West rift is a reality which was particularly eminent during the elections of 2006, it is something that should be relativised. This divide is however not always linked to the ethnic factor. The analysis is more complex. At the legislative level, the voting pattern has always shown a contrast, particularly with the individual vote, the modification of ethnic allegiance, and the conflict of ethnic fidelity, as well as ethnic clientelism in its various forms. Individual interest often confronts and/or merges with the interest of the group, leading to a rather casual relationship. Finally, political identification can be expressed in political, linguistic, economic or regional ways. The very subjective character of the vote has a negative impact on the political choices, and consequently on good governance, which then shows up, as often is the case, as incompetence and corruption. The study ends with some recommendations that may eventually contribute to voting for the sake of the advantages of democracy and the exigencies of good governance. Introduction In the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) the period around elections has always been a moment of rift between the present and the past, a moment in which the question of identity is expressed in different ways. Using both the psychoanalytic and the psychological approaches in the construction of identity, Eric H. Erikson (1902-1994) refers to identity as a process which is developed throughout existence, especially in times of rift. In this regard, ‘identity is no longer regarded as a sub- stance or an indispensable attribute in individuals or groups, as the case was with culture, for example.1 Dominant contemporary theory 1 To refresh our memories, ‘in 1952 Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn published a compilation of various efforts to define the notion of culture – or notions close to it – in the social sciences. They found no less than 164. Their version did not stop only at their planned definition (content, function, properties) but went further to 220 The Political Role of the Ethnic Factor insists that the image of self-esteem and communal or political iden- tities are developed in the contradictions between individuals, groups and their ideologies. They all stress that the starting point of identification is psychological and that it never stops to build and update itself’ (Ruano-Borbalan 1998:29). The aim of this study is to analyse the ethnic factor as a basis for political choices in the DRC, the impact of the ethnic factor on democratisa- tion, and the implementation of good governance. In fact, for Young (1979:107), ‘no serious study on the political evolution of the Congo can neglect the difficult problem of “tribalism” or what may be referred to as “ethnicity”. This is one of the major issues that place a question mark over the very existence of the Congolese entity’. The role of the ethnic component will be analysed only at the level of the presidential and legislative elections of 1960 and 2006. It should be noted that the 1965 presidential elections could not be organised due to differ- ences between Tshombe and Kasa Vubu in the race for power. Context The electoral experience of 1960 The first elections took place in May 1960. The entire Congolese electoral assembly was called upon to choose parliamentarians and political councillors for the chamber of representatives and the provincial assem- blies. In total, 250 lists (individual and collective) were presented to voters with a view to electing 137 parliamentarians. In a population of the usage of the word in the widest sense’. See Journet 2002:1. But ‘studies on contact and cultural change (constructivism – cultures on the move) caused in the seventies a revision of the notion of culture. According to Fredrik Barth (1969), culture is revealed more and more as an element of strategy, often unconsciously, by social stakeholders, especially if they are involved in social or political battles. Consequently the notion of identity seems to explain that of culture… The notion of culture is that of everyday usage, but its definition always seems to escape us. Its development, in all cases, is closely linked to that of human science’ (Journet 2002:11). 221 Hubert Kabungulu Ngoy-Kangoy over 15 million inhabitants (Congo 1960), only 2 733 595 voters partici- pated in the elections (Congo 1960:264). The Mouvement National Congolais of Lumumba (MNC-L) (41 seats) and its allies won a total of 64 seats out of 137 in the chamber (Congo 1960:269). Katanga province did not elect a single pro-Lumumba parlia- mentarian. The rift between the ‘people from the upper side’ (Ba-Likolo) and the ‘people from the lower side’ (Bato ya se) was already a reality at the time, and Leopoldville managed to elect only one MNC representa- tive in the district of Lake Leopold (Mai-Ndombe). This is confirmed by Benoit Verhaegen: The capital ‘Leopoldville had three major ethnic groups: the Bakongo, who were slightly in the majority, the people of the “upper side”, who belonged to ethnic groups foreign to Leopoldville and non-Bakongo, and finally the Bateke-Bahumbu, the first occupants and holders of land certificates over most of the Leopoldville area’ (Congo 1965:208).2 This configuration seems to have evolved with time into a more broad-based structure. The electoral success obtained by Lumumba was very limited. Out of 34 purely MNC-L seats, 21 came from the Eastern Province of which the capital Kisangani had always been his headquarters. Using his pan- tribal base doctrine in his political campaign, Lumumba mainly focused on the Mongo ethnic group, which was very fragmented and extraordi- narily scattered all over the country (Kusu, Lokele, Tetela, Mongo, etc.). Lumumba himself belonged to the Tetela ethnic group. 3 2 Kwilu and Lake Leopold II later became the province of Bandundu. All the groups living along the upper Congo River between the provinces of Equateur and Katanga are regarded as ‘people from the upper side’. The ‘people from the lower side’ are those in the provinces of Bandundu and Lower Congo. While the former are patrilineal, the latter are mostly matrilineal. 3 In 1960, ‘the provinces of the Congo could be divided into two categories: those where political consciousness in the cities was already well mastered but where energy was focused on other conflicts like those between ‘sons of the soil’ and ‘foreigners’, and those where politics was still reserved for only the elites. Kasaï and Katanga belong to the first category. In these two categories, the conflict that arose during local elections in 1957 and 1959 continued to dominate political life’ (Weiss 1994:58). 222 The Political Role of the Ethnic Factor Map 1: The ethnic regions Source: Young 1968:113. In Katanga and Kasaï, another phenomenon was developing. The Luba, who were voting for Kalonji, Lumumba’s greatest adversary in Kasaï, were giving their vote of confidence to Sendwe, friend and ally of Lumumba in northern Katanga. But in Elizabethville (Lumumbashi), the same Baluba of Kasaï voted for the Katangese National Confederation (CONAKAT) and ipso facto, Tshombe. Why this contradiction? The reason is because Kalonji had issued an injunction against Belgians who supported Tshombe. At the same time, the Lulua and the Baluba who were killing each other in Kasaï in a determined fashion, were fraternising 223 Hubert Kabungulu Ngoy-Kangoy and working together in welfare and cultural unions in Katanga (Weiss 1994:59). In fact, Weiss points out that ‘in Kasaï, the first urban preoc- cupation of the leaders were closer to the real ethno-political divisions of their provinces, be it in Leopoldville or in Katanga. In fact, political life in Luluabourg was initially centred on the fight between the Lulua ‘sons of the soil’ and the Baluba (from Kasaï) who were considered foreigners’ (Weiss 1994:59). But ‘as far as Leopoldville is concerned, the initial conflict led to the Bakongo opposing the people of the Upperside’ (Congo 1960:208) – the Baswahili and the Kasaians.

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