A New War in Eastern DRC?
blurb:isstoday:260908drc
26 September 2008: A New War in Eastern DRC?
This past month saw an escalation of the conflict between rebel leader Laurent Nkunda’s Congrès National pour la Défense du Peuple (CNDP) and the Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (FARDC). Nkunda’s CNDP launched an offensive against the government army - an army which is still not unified and is not credible, neither operationally nor as an instrument for restoring the authority of the state.
The FARDC, without the support of the United Nations force in the DRC (MONUC) does not have the capacity to prevent Nkunda’s CNDP from taking up new positions contrary to what was agreed at Goma on 23 January this year. The Actes d’engagement à la paix, known as the Goma-agreement, provides for ceasefire lines in both North and South Kivu. Nkunda signed the agreement but he is not implementing it. The renewed fighting has resulted in the displacement of thousands of people in North and South Kivu and international aid organisations have withdrawn because of the violence.
To try and find a solution to the present crisis a workshop was arranged in Goma under the leadership of President Laurent Kabila on 17 September 2008. Also present were the president of the National Assembly Vital Kamerhe, the DRC ministers of Foreign Affairs Mbusa Nyamwisi, for the Interior, Denis Kalume and for Defence Chikej Diemu. In addition, the workshop was attended by the coordinator of Program Amani Reverend Malu Malu, the Special Representative of the UN Secretary General in the DRC Alan Doss, accompanied by MONUC Force Commander General Babacar Gaye, as well as the EU Special Representative for the Great Lakes, Roeland van of Geer and Mr. Samuel Brock, advisor for the US Embassy in the DRC.
At the conclusion of a working session the overall disengagement plan envisaged by the Goma Acts of Engagement, prepared by MONUC, was approved by the Congolese Government. In his declaration, the president of the National Assembly insisted on the importance of the immediate consolidation of the ceasefire, which must be immediately be followed by the creation of effective zones of separation of all the forces under the control of MONUC, and then disengagement itself. On the ground, the situation remained tense in several zones in North and South Kivu. On 17 September MONUC forces had to exert pressure to put an end to clashes between the troops of the CNDP and the FARDC, in the areas around Rubaya, 20 km west of Masisi in North Kivu.
The same issues prior to the signing of the Goma agreement will challenge the approved disengagement plan. They include:
• The lack of political attention to the local dimension of the DRC conflict by both the international community and the Congolese government;
• The lack of a political solution for the central issues of citizenship, intercommunity tensions and access to economic resources (land);
• The continued presence of foreign armed groups, mainly the ex-FAR/Interahamwe/FDLR and the Lord Resistance Army (LRA) offering a continuous excuse for Rwanda and Uganda to remain involved in the internal affairs of the DRC;
• The lack of progress in the DDR and SSR processes as critical elements in the extension of state sovereignty over the national territory of the DRC;
• The lack of an effective management system for the region’s natural resources, including regional trade agreements, border control and taxation systems.
The question is what to do to get the process going again? The answer lies in the implementation of both the Nairobi and Goma agreements as well as the MONUC/Government stability plan. The problem is that the parties to the agreements, including the Government of the DRC are not implementing what they have signed. Some of the promises made by the government of the DRC are not adhered to because of the weak state of the FARDC and the slow training and lack of equipment to execute its duties. Instead the government of the DRC is looking at MONUC to intervene. MONUC has intervened at certain stages when its own people or civilians were endangered in terms of its mandate. MONUC is willing to give support to the FARDC in military actions by the FARDC against the rebels but will not get directly involved independent of the FARDC. This raises the issue, if FARDC cannot act against the rebels because of a lack of capacity and MONUC doesn’t act because of not having the mandate, who could? The possibility of an intervention force was raised in DRC earlier this month. An intervention force from where, SADC, the African Union or the European Union? None of these seem plausible given the situation elsewhere in Africa and in Europe. The answer lies with continued pressure on all the role players that have signed the Nairobi and Goma agreements and the implementation of the Stabilisation Plan of MONUC and the government of the DRC.
The international community must put real pressure on the Congolese signatories of the Goma Accord to put their commitments into practice and put pressure on Rwanda to cut off all support to Nkunda from its territory. Without these measures the Goma Accord will no longer exist. It will be reduced to what Kris Berwouts, director of the NGO-network EurArc calls ‘a parenthesis in the history of the “Somalification” of the DRC’.
Henri Boshoff, Military Analyst, African Security Analysis Programme, ISS Tshwane (Pretoria)
