The arrest last week of South African and other security operatives in Kinshasa has less to do with an attempted coup — as Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) officials allege — than the operatives’ remote link to veteran opposition figure Etienne Tshisekedi, say Western diplomats in the Congolese capital.
They put the furore down to muscle flexing by interim president Joseph Kabila ahead of presidential and parliamentary elections in the DRC on July 30.
In addition to the 26 security operatives — 19 South Africans, three United States citizens and four Nigerians — the DRC authorities briefly detained 10 Congolese opposition leaders, including four presidential candidates.
One of these, Joseph Olenghankoy, last week reportedly joined forces with Tshisekedi.
More than 1 000 supporters of Tshisekedi took to the streets of Kinshasa on Wednesday.
They are asserting that the interim government’s three-year mandate expires on June 30 so that further national political dialogue is required before the elections — the country’s first in four decades — can be held at the end of July.
They delivered a note to this effect at the embassy of the neighbouring Republic of Congo whose President, Denis Sassou Nguesso, is the current president of the African Union.
Tshisekedi is a mercurial figure with the potential to derail political progress in the country, particularly in his stronghold of Mbuji Mayi.
Angered at being left out of the transitional government after taking part in the South African-brokered peace deal in the DRC, Tshisekedi called for a boycott of last December’s constitutional referendum.
His supporters tried violently to prevent voting. At his bidding, his supporters did not register as voters last year.
So when he apparently had a change of mind about participating in the presidential election, Tshisekedi demanded a re-registration.
The interim government argued that with more than 25-million names on the roll, this was a logistical impossibility. Tshisekedi’s strategy has since been to stop the elections.
Diplomats in Kinshasa say the crackdown last Friday could well have been a show of force by Kabila ahead of the demonstration.
Department of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Ronnie Mamoepa says the South African government is still verifying the identities of the 19 South African passport holders under arrest.
Three of the men work as interpreters for the mining company Mirabulis and the remaining 16 are employed by Omega Risk Solutions to train security guards at three DRC ports.
These could well have been the three strategic sites referred to by Interior Minister Theophile Mbemba Rundu in his statement this week alleging that the men, ”most of whom come from Iraq”, were in possession of seditious documents and were mercenaries planning a coup in the DRC.
Omega does not address the allegation that some of its employees might have been among the thousands of South Africans who have at some time served as security personnel in Iraq.
A company spokesperson, Christo Roelofse, is adamant that none of them was involved in any mercenary activity in the DRC. ”To date, no charge has been laid and Omega is still unclear about the reason for the arrests.”
He points out that Omega is being paid by the DRC government — which would make it foolish of the company to be complicit in any plot to overthrow its paymaster. However, Omega has also consulted an American company providing logistical and administrative support as well as VIP protection for presidential candidate Oscar Kashala, a US-based doctor who is running in the upcoming poll.
In this capacity, it is believed that Omega had discussions with members of Tshisekedi’s Union for Democracy and Social Progress and other political parties to ascertain the volatility of the prevailing political climate.