WEDNESDAY, 4.00PM
DEMOCRATIC Republic of Congo President Laurent Kabila has deployed troops in Goma in the northeast of the former Zaire to smother seething unrest which threatens to spill over into open conflict. Clashes between Kabila’s army and the well-armed Tutsis who helped it topple the dictatorship of Mobutu Sese Seko last May are costing at least two lives every day, according to an army source in the town.
Almost a year ago Kabila used Goma, near the border with Tutsi-ruled Rwanda, as the initial main base for his uprising against Mobutu, who died this month in exile in Morocco. The sheer number of gun-toting troops now deployed in the powderkeg town has led to fears of an escalation to a major conflict, according to western and local sources.
Disgruntled Tutsis who initially formed the backbone of Kabila’s drive for power in the seven-month civil war are blamed for increasing violence and looting, while other ethnic groups have been embroiled in the discontent, which has gradually replaced the euphoria of the early days of the new regime.
”Look at the street. Its six o’clock, people are in a hurry to get home. When night falls, there’s nobody out,” a Goma resident said. ”It’s worse than in Mobutu’s time. I twice fought Mobutu’s soldiers who wanted to rob me. But now, if you don’t do what they want, the soldiers shoot,” he said.
Many of the armed Tutsis have gone on looting rampages of businesses and private homes in recent weeks, according to locals. On Tuesday, a western official said that the Tutsis are probably unhappy at not being rewarded for their efforts during the war. ”The Tutsi soldiers who fought on Kabila’s side are looting houses and shops.”
Marcel Balingene, political adviser to Goma’s governor, dismissed the stories as ”disinformation”, but conceded there is a security problem, which he linked to ”uncontrolled elements of the army” and the surfeit of weapons and ammunition.