The controversial elections in the Dominican Republic of the Congo continue. The elections have been long delayed, since President Joseph Kabila refused to step down from office. After serving as the President of the DRC for two years longer than constitutionally allowed, the elections have been delayed a total of three times. Although the presidential elections were finally held, there has still been have a series of widespread issues. From access to polling stations, ebola outbreaks, to the re-count of the presidential votes, the elections have proved to be a difficult task. Many suspect that Kabila has been more involved in the election than he should be. Felix Tshisekedi won with 38.57% of the vote, versus Martin Fayulu (who was confident he won) with 34.8%. Third was Kabila-backed Emmanuel Ramazani Shadary, with 23.8% of the vote. Surprisingly, many think that Kabila struck a deal with Tshisekedi to avoid any backlash for supporting Shadary if he had won. In addition, 288 pro-Kabila candidates have so far won seats in the 500-seat national assembly, giving them a clear majority. These candidates have control over Parliament for the next 5 years. Citizens have been suspicious of Kabila interfering behind the scenes of the elections. The outcomes of the election has brought protests and violence- at least one casualty has been recorded.
I was honestly not that surprised to hear that there has been even more problems arising with the DRC elections. In my last regional report, I had two articles (and an analysis post) on the presidential elections, and learned about all the problems there have been in order to hold fair elections. Although I talked mostly about the background of the presidential elections rather than the national assembly elections, I feel that the two elections are very similar and are creating suspicion for the same reasons. I can see why the citizens are so skeptical of Joseph Kabila- after all, he refused to give up his position as president longer than their constitution allows. That by itself shows that he does not care about breaking laws to ensure his own power. I thought it was interesting that he would back one candidate and let them lose on purpose to avoid the citizens having suspicions about him (which clearly did not work). I don’t know if he actually was involved either in the presidential elections or the national assembly ones, but I wouldn’t be overly surprised. However, I was shocked that people are dying in the protests. I can’t even imagine something like that happening here, and I hope that somehow a re-count of the votes will at least end the protests.