President Kabila Declared Winner of Democratic Republic of Congo Elections

Democratic Republic of Congo President Joseph Kabila portrayed in a campaign billboard. The national elections were held in late 2011 resulting in the re-election of Kabila., a photo by Pan-African News Wire File Photos on Flickr.

President Kabila declared winner of Congo election

By RUKMINI CALLIMACHI, Associated Press

KINSHASA, Congo (AP) — Congo's President Joseph Kabila won another term in office, the election commission said Friday, defeating the main opposition candidate whose supporters vowed to take to the streets. Plumes of smoke smudged the skyline as tires were burned outside tabulation centers.

Kabila won with 49 percent of the 18.14 million votes cast, while longtime opposition leader Etienne Tshisekedi had 32 percent, according to the final tallies released by election commission chief Daniel Ngoy Mulunda. The remaining votes were split among more than a half-dozen other candidates.

Hoping to forestall violence, Mulunda warned before reading the final results that "the candidates must understand that in every election there is a winner and there is one or several losers."

In a pro-Kabila neighborhood in downtown Kinshasa near the election commission, people hung out of balconies cheering after the results were released. A woman danced in the street as police in riot gear stood at attention.

In the Limite neighborhood of Kinshasa, where the 78-year-old Tshisekedi lives, the mood was dark.

"This is a total disaster," said Fabien Bukasa, a Tshisekedi supporter. "We are thinking about what to do. We do not know what will happen."

International observers said the vote was flawed but stopped short of calling it fraudulent. Most say irregularities across sub-Saharan Africa's largest nation weren't enough to change the outcome of Congo's second democratic election. But many opposition supporters believe Tshisekedi won, setting the stage for a confrontation.

The opposition accuses international observers and the international community of propping up the 40-year-old Kabila.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon called for "any differences regarding the provisional results of the polls to be resolved peacefully through available legal and mediation mechanisms," according to a statement Friday. The U.N. chief condemned any acts of violence, and reiterated his call for calm, urging "all candidates and their supporters to exercise restraint."

The French Foreign Ministry released a statement Friday urging "the candidates who context the provisional results to do so through legal channels."

"France calls on all Congolese political players to show restraint and a spirit of responsibility," it said. "France will condemn any incitement to violence."

Britain's Africa minister Henry Bellingham said in a statement Friday that he welcomed the publication of polling station data. "This is an important step towards ensuring the transparency of the process."

Even before results were announced, election violence killed at least 18 people and left more than 100 wounded. Most of the deaths were caused by troops loyal to Kabila, according to a report by Human Rights Watch.

Kabila's father Laurent Kabila had seized power of the nation, then known as Zaire, after overthrowing dictator Mobutu Sese Seko in 1997. Laurent Kabila was assassinated in 2001 and his son Joseph took over this vast, mineral-rich country in the heart of Africa. Kabila was then elected president in 2006 in a vote overseen and organized by the U.N.

Congo's enormous geography has proved challenging both for the electoral commission organizing it as well as for the country's government. Its rain forests in the east still harbor vicious rebel armies, including remnants of the Interhamwe, the militia responsible for Rwanda's 1994 genocide.

Congo has survived two civil wars, which together pulled in nine neighboring countries more than a decade ago. Even though Congo is the size of Western Europe, it remains one of the globe's most impoverished nations and was recently listed last on the United Nations' worldwide index of human development.

The election results must now be approved by the Supreme Court.

This was only the second democratic election in Congo's 51-year history, and the first to be organized entirely by the government instead of by the international community.

Associated Press reporters Jerome Delay in Kinshasa, Congo, Carley Petesch in Johannesburg, Jenny Barchfield in Paris and David Stringer in London contributed to this report.


9 December 2011
Last updated at 13:40 ET

Joseph Kabila: DR Congo's president in profile

Joseph Kabila campaigned for his second term in office as leader of the Democratic Republic of Congo with the slogan "for a united Congo".

But his victory, with 49% of the vote, underlies the tensions in the vast and chaotic country.

At 40, he is nearly half the age of his main rival Etienne Tshisekedi, who took 32% of the vote mainly in the west of country.

President Kabila enjoys most of his support in the east, where he was born in a rebel camp in the mountain forests where his father was leading the struggle against former strongman Mobutu Sese Seko.

He was a low-profile military commander when his father Laurent-Desire Kabila was assassinated in 2001, and was handpicked by the presidential inner circle to lead DR Congo as it was being torn apart by half a dozen warring armies.

Many opposition activists accused him, without proof, of being a national of neighbouring Rwanda, which had twice invaded its much larger neighbour.

Mr Kabila spent his childhood in Tanzania and spoke better kiSwahili and English than the languages most spoken in Kinshasa - French and Lingala, which he had to learn on the job.

Winning DR Congo's first democratic elections in more than 40 years at the tender age of 35 gave him the legitimacy to stamp his authority on the country and move out of his father's shadow.

'Debt to pay'

But he tends to keep a low profile, shying away from public speaking.

"Kabila is not shy, he is reserved. This is part of his Swahili cultural background," said his one-time personal secretary, Kikaya Bin Karubi, who is now DR Congo's ambassador in the UK.

This reservation is in sharp contrast to the usual Congolese effusiveness.

His smiling face, however, has been seen all over the country in the last few weeks, beaming down from huge advertising hoardings.

His campaign has been built around what he has called the "five building sites of the republic": Infrastructure; health and education; water and electricity; housing and employment.

Eight years after the end of the war, many Congolese complain that the pace of social development is too slow.

His power base of eastern DR Congo bore the brunt of the fighting during the civil war, which drew in other countries including Uganda and Rwanda.

Rebels and militias still roam the area despite attempts by the UN and army to disarm them, earning money from the area's rich mineral wealth.

The army itself has been accused of human rights abuses and profiteering.

DR Congo holds more than half of the world's cobalt, 30% of all diamonds, 70% of coltan - a vital ingredient in mobile phones - as well as huge deposits of gold, copper and various other minerals.

However, this year's UN human development index placed DR Congo bottom of the 187 countries surveyed.

The president has acknowledged the shortcomings, saying on the campaign trial that he had a debt to settle with Congolese voters, so they should give him another term to let him repay it.

'War bus'

According to Mr Bin Karubi, Mr Kabila often relaxes at weekends on his farm on the outskirts of Kinshasa, where he enjoys motorcross.

Just before the 2006 elections, Mr Kabila married his long-time girlfriend Olive Lembe di Sita. The couple have a daughter, born in 2001, named Sifa after Mr Kabila's mother.

His schoolmates at the Zanaji secondary school in Dar es Salaam nicknamed him "War bus" because of his enjoyment of war films and martial arts.

Still, they were all surprised when they saw the first pictures of him and his father fighting a real war, which ended when they seized power in DR Congo (then Zaire) and overthrew Mobutu in May 1997.

Correspondents say in order to avoid the attentions of Mobutu's intelligence service, he grew up in Tanzania pretending to be a member of the country's Fipa ethnic group.

"We didn't even know he was Congolese," recalls one of his contemporaries, who did not want to be named.

With his father installed as DR Congo's leader, Joseph Kabila was sent to China for military training and became army chief of staff before inheriting the presidency.

His experience as a general in the Congolese army helps him to keep direct control over an estimated 7,000-strong army unit known as the Republican Guard.

The five-year civil war led to shady business deals to mine its rich resources, but Mr Kabila has not been directly implicated in any.

The same cannot be said of "the Kabila boys", his close circle of advisers.

One of them, Katumba Mwanke, a minister at the presidency, was forced to resign because of accusations in a 2002 United Nations report that he was profiteering from the war through deals made with Zimbabwean officials.

With a second term in office, Mr Kabila has an opportunity to capitalise on cleaning up the mining sector.

He will also be keen to see the departure of the 19-000 strong UN mission in DR Congo, Monusco, within the next five years.

But his biggest challenge will be keeping a lid on the violence, with opposition supporters crying foul over the election results about allegations of vote-rigging.