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>THE
WESTERN MEDIA'S COVERAGE OF THE CONGO INVASION: IN THE FOOTSTEPS
OF WESTERN INTERESTS? By
Lokongo Bafalikike
In 1997, Laurent Désiré Kabila, a long time Congolese
guerilla fighter against Mobutu's dictatorial and kleptocratic
regime, took advantage of the geopolitical change in the region,
when Congo's neighbours in the east and Angola decided to do away
with Mobutu who was harbouring rebel groups against them. It was
the end of the Cold War and America had already decided that Mobutu's
time was up! They readied their military and logistic support
to Kabila who overthrew the most bloody and kleptocratic regime
on 17 May 1997, less than a year after launching what he called
the war of liberation. The Western media was ecstatic. Laurent
Désiré Kabila, the new president of the newly re-baptised
Democratic Republic of Congo (from Zaire) was voted "the
man of the year" by the German Press in 1997. The British
media was equally magnanimous towards the former rebel leader.
Early on 16 April 1997, a Daily Telegraph editorial already read:
'Decades of misrule in Zaire have turned it once again into Africa's
heart of darkness. It is therefore natural that Laurent Kabila
should be welcome as a messiah in the towns which his rebels have
taken from President Mobutu's forces…Mr Kabila has shown
himself no fool. He recognises the importance of regional sensibilities
and has tuned his message accordingly…Too great a reliance
on an ethnic minority and the governments of neighbouring countries
will impede the formation of a broadly-based administration.'
The Times subsequently on 19 May 1997, wrote: 'Mr Kabila, 58,
a member of the Luba tribe's offshoot in Katanga Province, has
enormous personal credibility - he had been fighting the Mobutu
regime for 32 years…A former Marxist and friend of Che Guevara,
Mr Kabila has clearly given up the idealism of his youth. Before
he took power [on 17 May 1997], he had already signed multi-million-dollar
contracts with foreign mining companies to exploit Congo's staggering
mineral wealth.'
Why did Kabila reign only for 44 months. Did he become a man
'you cannot do business with'? Congo after all is a very rich
country and to have access to those riches, you need a leadership
in Kinshasa that you can remote control to serve your interests.
As Kabila's rebellion was capturing one town after another from
Mobutu's ill remunerated forces, Western governments and multinationals'expectations
were clearly outlined in an article published by The Times on
22 April 1997, and which read: 'Mining multinationals have signed
billion-dollar deals for mineral rights with Laurent Kabila, Zaire's
rebel leader, to get ahead in what is being billed as 'the second
scramble for Africa'.
'Mining giants such as De Beers and American Mineral Fields have
signed contracts, which are worth at least $3 billion a year,
to develop Zaire's copper, cobalt, gold, zinc, and diamond deposits
with [Kabila's rebel] forces, cutting the legally recognised government
[of Mobutu] out of the picture.
'Executives with the companies said that they are [sic] happy
to be doing business with the rebels who control all of Zaire's
mineral resources other than its offshore oil fields, because
they do not ask for bribe.
'De Beers has also ditched its relationship with the fast crumbling
regime of President Mobutu and signed up with the rebels to get
involved in $500m a year diamond business.
'The unusual alliance between big business and revolutionaries,
many of whom were Chinese-trained Maoists and Marxists in their
youth, has been accepted by Western governments, who see Mr Kabila
as a man to lead Zaire out of three decades of corruption and
staggering poverty.
'This week, American Mineral Fields signed three contracts worth
$885m which would give the mining house access to the vast metal
reserves of Katanga Province. Other multinationals have been asked
to offer satellite telephones to the rebels, who have argued that
without them they would be unable to negotiate mineral rights
deals internationally…
'Kenneth MacLeod, president of International Panorama Resource
Corporation of Vancounver, [Canada] said: 'We are going to capitalise
on the current strife by increasing our presence and our land
holdings in the country'.
'Another mining magnate based in Johannesburg [Anglo-American?
Zinchor?] gave the second scramble a historic twist" 'Cecil
Rhodes must be spinning in his grave at the opportunities he is
missing.'*****But Kabila did not bite to this Western governments
and multinationals'appetite for 'a second scramble for Africa'.
As soon as he settled in Kinshasa, Kabila started to articulate
clearly the aspirations of his people and summoning them to take
their own destiny into their own hands, politically and economically.
This was perceived by his sponsors as a covert declaration of
independence. Kabila's nationalist stance immediately clashed
with their interests, as he eventually reviewed all the contracts
he had signed with American and South African mineral companies
when he was a rebel, demanded that they pay upfront for decades
of future profits and subsequently nationalised all the mines.
Earlier on he had enlisted the support of Zimbabwe to enlarge
his circle of friends, should he fall out with the first ones,
prompting President Thabo Mbeki to say: 'The more time goes, the
more we will loose control of Kabila.'
The people of Congo enjoyed a short-lived time of respite during
Kabila's first year in power. They could eat three times a day
again as prices of essential commodities drastically dropped,
roads and bridges were repaired, public transport restored, electricity
extended to the suburbs of Kinshasa and people liberated from
Mobutu's ill paid soldiers'ransoming (67 members of the new army
who resumed with the practice were arrested and jailed). The new
currency, the Congolese franc was launched and the inflation rate
dropped from 8.828% in 1993 to 6% in 1997. Embezzling were thrown
to jail. Corruption was severely combated. All this was achieved
in the absence of any help from the IMF and World Bank who conditioned
their financial support to Congo normalising its relations with
the institutions of Bretton Woods and pledging to pay all the
debt the old regime contracted. Such was also the position of
the 'Friends of Congo' (private investors) meeting in Brussels
in December 1997.
The new government embarked on an ambitious three year programme
of national reconstruction and during the third summit of Comesa
(common market community of central and southern African countries)
held in Kinshasa on 29 June 1998, Kabila clearly tabled out what
role Congo would play within the common market and in Africa as
a whole.
He explained that 'more than 40 years of African independence
have offered to the world a sad spectacle of a continent looted
and humiliated with the complicity of its own sons and daughters'.
He expressed the wish 'to see Africa entering the 21st century
totally independent of foreign interference' and declared that
the battle for Congo's independence and sovereignty is fought
in the interest of Africa as a whole.
'Our country,' he said, 'has a vocation of exporting peace, development
and security to the rest of Africa. A weak Congo means a vulnerable
Africa from its centre, an Africa without a heart.' The stakes
were then raised! America, long suspected of having used Uganda
and Rwanda as a front to get rid of an 'intransigent' Mobutu,
branded Kabila a 'loose canon that had to be restrained. But as
Colette Braeckman, an expert in Congolese affairs, who reports
for the Belgian daily, Le Soir, wrote in her book, l'enjeu Congolais
-l'Afrique Centrale après Mobutu, this 'sudden animosity
against Kabila could only be explained by the fact that his nationalist
stance collided with or frustrated their economic interests in
Congo…Kabila opposed all forms of investments that did not
represent the interests of the people of Congo.'
On the political front, the new government promised free and
fair elections but did not liberalise political activities until
an national assembly was set up, charged with the task of setting
the rules of the game stipulated in a new constitution. On the
day he was sworn-in as president, Kabila gave a precise calendar
of the democratic process which would have culminated with general
elections on April 1999. And the people gave him the benefit of
the doubt. A front page headline on Focus on Africa magazine,
produced from Bush House read: 'Kinshasans celebrate, but for
how long?' As if they knew what was going to follow.
Consequently, the Democratic Republic of Congo has been ravaged
by four years of what Kabila 's allies of yesterday turned aggressors
have called a war of correction; and which the Western media have
dubbed 'the first African World War', in which Zimbabwe, Namibia
and Angola have supported the government of the assassinated President
Laurent Désiré Kabila in Kinshasa - now led by his
son General Major Joseph Kabila - against Congolese rebel forces
backed by Rwanda, Uganda, Burundi and elements of Angola's Unita
rebel movement.
As the Congolese people on 2 August commemorated the day the
war was launched, (nearly five years now), it is very frustrating
to still notice that the same media has not shifted from its 'distorted
perception' of the war, despite the fact that - as time has shown
and events have proved - this war is an aggression against the
Democratic Republic of Congo and its people by a Rwandan-Ugandan-Burundian
coalition, logistically supported and financed by well known superpowers
and multinationals, as well as with the complicity of the so-called
Congolese 'rebels'. They are systematically looting Congo's fauna
and flora, natural and mineral resources and destroying or transferring
what is left of Congo's infrastructure to their own countries.
It is hard for anybody to believe that Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi,
three small and poor countries who only produce coffee, tea leaves
and bananas, can afford to aggress an immense country such as
the Congo, so rich in minerals and which can mobilise its 60 million
inhabitants to kick them out. It is also well known that these
three countries ultimately depend on IMF/World bank loans and
handouts to supplement their national budgets. One wonders how
and where they have managed to sustain the war for almost three
years now. They have dared to do so because they are looting Congo's
wealth and enjoy the backing of external forces.
According to Wayne Madsen, an American investigative journalist
and intelligence specialist, author of 'Genocide and Covert Operations
in Africa 1993 - 1999', the US military has been covertly involved
in the war in Congo. Madsen on May 17 told the US House subcommittee
on International Operations and Human Rights, the US was using
Private Military Contractors (PMCs). Madsen said American companies
including one linked to former President George Bush Snr are stoking
the Congo conflict for monetary gains.
The British Media have relentlessly demonised Mugabe over the
issue of land reform which Britain should have funded 20 years
ago and have cited Zimbabwe's intervention in Congo as the source
of destruction and near collapse of Zimbabwe's economy. The Labour
government even threatened not to sell hawk jet spare parts to
Zimbabwe because they reckoned Zimbabwe was involved in an unnecessary
and costly adventure in Congo.
What about British companies such as Knight Aviations which transport
soldiers and military equipment to and from Congo for Uganda as
revealed by The Guardian?
However, no such a thing is said about Uganda's economy. In fact,
the Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni boasted in New York during
the UN Special Session on Congo war held on 24 - 26 January last
year, that the Congo war has not negatively affected his economy.
Yet the French daily, La Liberation, revealed on 25 January last
year that 55% of Uganda's military budget is financed by money
coming in as 'development aid' from abroad.
In addition, Zimbabwe's intervention in Congo is not popular
with some sections of society at home.
The privately owned Standard newspaper caused national uproar
when consorting with 'foreign intelligence', it published a story,
alleging that a Zimbabwean soldier killed on duty in Congo was
buried with his head missing. The story caused such uproar that
the government was forced to exhume the decomposed body and display
it to the world cameras to prove that the allegations was false.
It was a double blow to the bereaved family - they lost a breadwinner
only to be compelled to exhume the body and put it on public display,
something that affronts African customs.
The presence of Rwandan, Ugandan and Burundian troops in the
Congo under the pretext of suppressing Hutu militia extremists
(Interahamwe) responsible for the 1994 genocide in Rwanda is an
alibi as time has shown. But this is the mantra the western media
always repeat.
As The Independent put it is a feature article published last
January, 'Rwanda is the driving force behind the battle in [Congo].
Its Tutsi leadership wants to track down and kill the perpetrators
of the genocide that wiped out a million Tutsis. Secretly funded
by the CIA, Rwanda has military operations in [Congo] far above
its means. [It has 30,000 troops in Congo.'
Colette Braeckman said the media often follow the lead set by
their home governments in deciding how to cover this war.
'As this crisis unfolded,' she said, ' you had the bad guy [Laurent
Désiré] Kabila. It is easy to go back and find how
many stories demonise him - some with good reason, some bad, but
all exaggerated. And because Kabila did not bite…the rest
is history! It is no surprise that Kabila's head cost $30 million
financed by American agencies, according to the Belgian weekly
Le Solidaire in its edition of 9 May 2001.
'When [Laurent Désiré] Kabila came to Belgium,
we had a briefing from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs which said
that [the Belgians] were not ready to give him a red carpet treatment,
so the [media] were influenced enough o demonise him, and I wonder
if that happens in other country too.
'I wonder who set the agenda, it was not just the press. The
political leaders usually say this a good guy, this a bad guy.
At the moment, Joseph Kabila is a good guy, but maybe tomorrow
he will be a bad guy,' said Colette Braeckman.
'The world community,' she continued wanted to get rid of Kabila
for so many reasons, also for reasons of those economic interests.
Sadly the media have positioned themselves on the side of economic
interests. Proof? Every time Rwanda, Burundi and Uganda announced
the capture of a major Congolese locality, the media [especially
the Financial Times] hurried to state precisely its economic importance.
And people have closed their eyes for what is really going on…,'
she added.
What is going on? Both Amnesty International and the International
Rescue Committee (USA) have confirmed a genocide of more than
3.500.000 Congolese by the invading troops. Often people are buried
alive, shot dead or chopped with machetes, their bodies thrown
into rivers or forced down the latrines. That is higher and worse
than what happened in Kosovo and Rwanda itself. Isn't it? Why
does all this go unreported? Is it because stakeholders have managed
to suppress the story and to protect the perpetrators from accountability?
Can one genocide be condemned (1994 genocide perpetrated bu Hutu
extremists known as Interahamwe, meaning those who kill together)
and another condoned (perpetrated by a Rwandan-Ugandan-Burundian
coalition occupying half of the Congo)?
The BBC reporter, Nick Gordon, after intense investigation into
the matter and upon returning from the Great Lakes Region, revealed
that under 'Manpower Operation 2000', 1,500 Rwandan Hutus and
captured Congolese were burned alive in the Rwandan district of
Bugesera, curiously near a military camp occupied by the Americans.
'It is impossible to say that the Americans in that base can
neither hear the cries of distress of the victims, nor get to
know what is happening,' Gordon said.
Despite the burden of war, the people of Congo have kept their
morale high, and are not ready to let themselves be humiliated.
They know that there is only one Democratic Republic of Congo
and it cannot be divided. Congo's national sovereignty and territorial
integrity are non-negotiable!
The Mai-Mai warriors, loyal to the government in the east have
taken the resistance into the very heart of rebel-controlled territories
where the Congolese flag is still flying in many localities. The
aggressors control only the main cities, towns and road junctions,
but they dare not go to the interior because they know what fate
awaits them. Surprisingly, the Mai -Mai are being subjected to
a negative campaign by the Western media as well as by the MONUC,
the UN mission in the DRC. They are being labeled as 'negative
forces' and put in the same box with the Interahamwe.
A headline on the Daily Telegraph on 9 August read: 'Terror reign
of the 'magic water militia', accusing the Mai-Mai of atrocities
to the delight of Rwandans, Ugandans and Burundians, the true
perpetrators of massacres and a genocide in Congo.
No! No! No! The Mai-Mai are native Congolese fighting against
occupation. They held one Kenyan, one Swedish and 27 Thais hostage
for over two months after they caught them red handed while harvesting
timbers for a Ugandan-Thai forest company called DARA-Forest.
Another proof that multinationals are very much involved in the
looting of Congo's resources. It went unreported.
Upon Laurent Désiré Kabila's assassination, Michela
Wrong, a former correspondent for Reuters, BBC and Financial Times,
and author of 'In the Footsteps of Mr Kurtz, Living on the Brink
of Disaster in the Congo', wrote in the Financial Times: 'Laurent
Kabila…alienated Western powers and African allies in his
three-and-half years in power…He was welcomed as a liberator
when his rebel forces marched into Kinshasa in 1997, toppling
the late Mobutu Sese Seko, but diplomats and statesmen had come
to view him as a man impossible 'to do business with', a key factor
in central Africa's growing instability…The World Bank and
the IMF found him so obstructive, talks on new aid were abandoned.'
Yet as I said above, in his first year in power Kabila proved
that Congo, a nation with everything does not need to live on
aid all the time. His death has deprived the Democratic Republic
of Congo and its people of what they had of precious value, as
Alex Duval Smith summed it up when covering Kabila's burial for
The Independent on 24 January 2001:
'A nation with very little seemed yesterday, once more, to have
lost all it had. As the mausoleum door was shut on the three-
and-a-half-year reign of Kabila, assassinated last week, Congo
entered a new phase of fear and uncertainty…Then as the
coffin, drapped in the republic's yellow-starred blue flag, was
transferred to the mausoleum at the palace of Nation, thousands
ran alongside the cortege, It was as if they were holding on to
the only figure who - albeit through war - had given the nation
an identity.'
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