The commander of a European Union force helping to provide security for elections next month in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) expressed confidence on Tuesday that his mission will be successful despite rising ethnic tensions ahead of the poll.
German Lieutenant General Karlheinz Viereck said the EU force will be robust and rapid enough to deal with anything it is likely to face in four months of polling and vote-counting from July 30 to late November.
But critics say the mission is largely a promotional exercise and that the role of troops will be limited with caveats imposed by their home countries. Germany only reluctantly agreed to lead it after months of pressure.
”Our forces are credible, we have good training and a good reputation,” Viereck told reporters in Brussels. ”What I would like to do is achieve enough deterrence so that we don’t have any spoilers in this election campaign.”
Six months after a United Nations request to help its peacekeepers police the elections — the first democratic polls in the war-wracked DRC in four decades — the EU has decided to mobilise a 2 000-strong contingent drawn from 20 member states plus Turkey.
About 800 troops, many of them Germans, will be based in the DRC capital, Kinshasa, and are expected to be fully in place on July 29, the eve of the first round of the presidential election.
About 1 200 will be based ”over the horizon” in Gabon with others on standby in Europe. The operation is controlled from Potsdam near Berlin, Germany.
No EU troops will operate in the eastern DRC where the UN mission in the DRC (Monuc) has about 16 000 personnel — enough, it says, to do the job.
”We are set with forces in Kinshasa, on-call forces in Libreville and strategic reserves in Europe,” said Viereck, adding that he wants to make the forces visible by deploying some troops and through aircraft surveillance.
Under their mandate, the troops will help Monuc ”stabilise a situation” should it face serious difficulties and protect civilians ”under imminent threat of physical violence in the area of its deployment”.
Rich in resources but mired in poverty, the DRC will from next month hold its first democratic elections — president, local, and legislative polls — since independence from Belgium in 1961.
But observers fear that the issue of who is a true Congolese may surface and revive ethnic conflicts, giving a violent and xenophobic turn to the elections.
”There is a very unhealthy atmosphere which we must try to control,” warned Aldo Ajello, the EU’s special envoy to the African Great Lakes region. ”It’s an atmosphere that could deteriorate and it would be worth taking the necessary steps to try to improve that atmosphere.”
His remarks came a day after the head of a UN Security Council delegation touring Africa warned against whipping up ethnic tensions ahead of the polls.
”We noted that a discourse on ‘Congolese identity’ could be very dangerous,” French ambassador Jean-Marc de la Sabliere, head of the delegation, said after a meeting with DRC President Joseph Kabila, who is seeking re-election.
Ajello played down fears that security might collapse in the DRC after the provisional election results are announced on about November 19 and the EU force, known as Operation Eufor RD Congo, pulls out on November 30. ”Eufor is not alone; it doesn’t mean that when we go there will be nothing left,” he said.
He said he also thinks that the most dangerous period will be from September 15 to October 15, during campaigning for the second round of the presidential poll and the legislative elections.
Ajello left open the possibility that the EU could play some further role if called upon. ”If there is any major problem, then we are prepared to re-analyse everything. But that’s a new discussion and everything can be decided,” he said. — Sapa-AFP