The body of longtime Congolese opposition leader Etienne Tshisekedi arrived Thursday evening in Kinshasa as his son Felix – now the nation’s president – waited expectantly at the airport. The younger Tshisekedi then accompanied the body during a formal procession that stopped at his home and at the headquarters of…
It was February 2017 when longtime Congolese opposition leader Etienne Tshisekedi died in Brussels, amid the turmoil of former president Joseph Kabila’s refusal to step aside after two terms leading the Democratic Republic of Congo. Now, the body of the late Tshisekedi will return to Kinshasa at last. His repatriation,…
Laureen is the editor of Africa Times
The World Health Organization has appointed an Emergency Ebola Response Coordinator in the Democratic Republic of Congo, as it continues a fight against an Ebola outbreak that has shown no signs of abating. David Gressly, the UN’s deputy special representative serving with MINUSCO, will focus on improving access to communities…
President Felix Tshisekedi has finally named a prime minister for Democratic Republic of Congo, and it’s longtime politician Dr. Sylvestre Ilunga Ilukamba who gets the nod. The announcement of Ilukamba, most recently the head of the nation’s railway system, was made Monday in a television address. The new prime minister…
At the National Episcopal Conference of Congo (CENCO) headquarters in Kinshasa, the anti-Kabila banners came down this weekend. At the same time, a new video – its content and style appearing very much like campaign material – has suddenly appeared in support of President Joseph Kabila in the Democratic Republic of…
The Southern African Development Community (SADC) has opened an office in Democratic Republic of Congo it says will establish a greater presence for the regional body amid Kinshasa’s national political crisis. The SADC office “provides an avenue for closer collaboration with stakeholders in the DRC, in the continued efforts by…
At least three people have died and dozens more were reported injured following Sunday’s marches for democratic reforms in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Two were confirmed dead in Kinshasa and a third person died in Mbandaka, according to the Comité Laïc de Coordination (CLC), an arm of the Roman…
For the third time in as many months, peaceful protest marches are planned for Sunday in Democratic Republic of Congo – leaving many concerned because of the crackdown by Congolese security forces, sometimes inside churches, that claimed at least 14 lives in Kinshasa during marches in December and January. The…
Sunday’s announcement that long-deferred elections will take place in December 2018 in Democratic Republic of Congo is meeting with some hope, confusion and rejection. President Joseph Kabila’s ruling party welcomed the decision in a statement released Monday. The Parti du Peuple pour La Reconstruction et La Democratie (PPRD) acknowledged the…
Congolese opposition leader Felix Tshisekedi says he was prevented Tuesday afternoon from leaving a hotel in Lubumbashi, where he has stayed since the weekend arrest of activists meeting at the headquarters of his Union for Democracy and Social Progress (UDPS) party. “I am prevented from leaving the hotel to go and…
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) says alarm is ever-growing over extreme violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo and the number of refugees now fleeing into neighboring Zambia. Some 3,360 refugees poured across the border in September, more than doubling the total number who have sought safety…
President Joseph Kabila, whose term as president of Democratic Republic of Congo expired last December, shows no signs of moving toward the delayed presidential elections he has refused to hold. He has shrugged off any commitment to a December 31 power-sharing deal with the country’s Rassemblement political opposition coalition, one…
Three international experts have been assigned to investigate allegations of mass killings and other grave human rights violations in the Kasai provinces of Democratic Republic of Congo. The appointments of Bacre Ndiaye of Senegal, Fatimata M’Baye of Mauritania and Canadian Luc Côté were announced Wednesday by the United Nations Office…