Africa’s Deadliest Conflict: Media Coverage of the Humanitarian Disaster in the Congo and the United Nations Response, 1997–2008

Postscript: An Update on Events

165 Postscript: An Update on Events The Arrest of General Laurent Nkunda and a Rwanda-Congo Rapprochement By the end of January 2009, the “Nkunda problem” had been addressed. Nkunda’s military and political downfall came in a series of rapid developments . First, on January 12, Lydia Polgreen reported a split between General Nkunda and his chief of staff, Jean Bosco Ntaganda. While Nkunda dismissed the seriousness of the defection, Polgreen claimed that “it creates the first cracks in the invincible image General Nkunda has cultivated” (2009, Jan. 12: A5). The second bit of bad news for General Nkunda was contained in a “World Briefing” by Jeffrey Gettleman on January 21, namely that Rwandan military units had crossed the border to participate in a joint offensive with the Congolese army “against a Hutu militia that has been terrorizing eastern Congo for years.” The UN reported that “the Rwandans crossed the border near Goma and were working as ‘advisors’ for the Congolese troops” (2009, Jan. 21: A12). The final event in the switch in Rwanda’s loyalty from Nkunda to the Congolese government was completed a few days later with the report of the general’s arrest in Rwanda by Rwandan officials. Jeffrey Gettleman indicated that the change in fortunes for Nkunda signalled the strengthening of “the hand of the Congolese government, militarily and politically , right when the government seemed about to implode.” The arrest also provided hope “that the proxy war between Rwanda and Congo is finally drawing to a close.” A member of Congo’s Parliament, Kikaya bin Karubi, indicated that “General Nkunda’s arrest ‘could be the beginning Africa’s Deadliest Conflict 166 of the end of all the misery’” (as quoted in Gettleman, 2009, Jan. 24: A6).1 The arrest of General Nkunda was indeed a significant step in a long process of bringing some semblance of peace to eastern Congo (Lemarchand , 2009: 121–22). However, the rapprochement with Rwanda came with costs for President Kabila. Josh Kron reported that in 2006, critical electoral support had come from eastern Congo, Kabila’s home region and where his popularity stemmed from “his nationalistic and confrontational stance against Rwanda … But in 2009, Mr. Kabila invited Rwandan troops into Congolese territory to help root our Rwandan rebels in the areas in exchange for renewed diplomatic relations [and this led] many in eastern Congo to believe that Mr. Kabila had betrayed them” (Kron, 2011, Nov. 10: A9). Whatever the case, the problem-filled relationship between Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo makes any prediction of future cooperation between the two extremely uncertain. Intermittent, low-level violence in the region has indeed continued in the wake of twelve years of devastating conflict (see York, 2010, Mar. 27: F1). At the centre of the Congo’s security problems is the failure of state institutions. René Lemarchand, for example, argues that “the state in the DRC is effectively non-existent—it lacks the capacity to resolve conflict. Without an efficient and neutral constabulary, a reliable police force, a functioning judiciary, a legislative assembly that actually legislates , and an executive that enforces the law, conflict resolution is left to the whims of the same groups perpetrating the violence” (2009: 125). Additionally, Project Enough’s John Prendergast points out that the current conflict in the Congo is “not really a war [but] a business based on violence.”2 Specifically, he argues that there are numerous armed groups and commercial actors—Congolese, Rwandan, and Ugandan—that have positioned themselves for the spoils of a deliberately lawless, accountability-free, unstable, highly profitable mafia-style economy … Armed groups use terrifying tactics such as mass rape and village burning to intimidate civilians into providing cheap labor for the elaborate extortion racket … And until this logic of unaccountable , violent, illegal mineral extraction changes, all the peacekeepers and peacemakers in the world will have very little impact of the levels of violence there. (Prendergast, 2010, Feb. 26) While U.S. legislation curtailing the importation of minerals from the eastern Congo war zone was said to be having “a positive effect,” there were unintended negative side effects. According to critics, “the new obligations have merely resulted in a de facto ban on mineral exports Postscript 167 from eastern Congo, blowing a further hole in the region’s already fragile economy” (Willis, 2011, Sept. 19). The November 2011 Elections The presidential (11 candidates) and legislative elections (19,000 candidates running...