The U.S., Congo and corruption

By Brian E. Muhammad | Last updated: Aug 31, 2009 - 9:15:07 AM

Why Africans can't just leave the past behind and move forward

Children being taught in a village in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Photo: MGN Online

(FinalCall.com) - The challenge to African governments to “reject corruption” and be “responsible” by the Obama administration is a legitimate call. Nonetheless, the outcome of U.S. foreign policy and past meddling in the continent's affairs begs another challenge that says, “He without sin should cast the first stone.”

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“True economic progress in Africa will depend on responsible governments that reject corruption, enforce the rule of law, and deliver results for their people,” said Secretary of State Hillary Clinton while in Kenya during a visit to the Motherland that started Aug. 4.

Mrs. Clinton used the anti-corruption and “Be Responsible” anecdotes in several countries during her 11-day visit to Africa. The tour followed President Barack Obama's historic trip to Ghana in July where he covered the same themes in a continental message. Few will disagree with the noble words of U.S. condemnation of corruption, but in the fuller context of U.S. geopolitical dealings with Africa, analysts can argue the U.S. arguments are also hypocritical.

An example of such hypocrisy shrouded in nobility was the $17 million pledge Mrs. Clinton gave toward the eradication of systematic rape in the war torn Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). According to a March 2005 Human Rights Watch report, during five years of armed conflict in the DRC, tens of thousands of women and girls were raped and subjected to sexual violence.

The report said victims whose cases Human Rights Watch documented were as young as three years old. In a number of reported cases, men and boys were also raped or sexually assaulted. In addition, the World Health Organization investigated incidents of rape in several DRC provinces and cities and concluded some 40,000 people had been raped, according to the Human Rights Watch report.

While visiting refugee camps for internally displaced people, including victims of sexual violence in eastern Congo, Mrs. Clinton was emotionally moved by accounts she heard from the victims themselves. The Secretary of State announced the financial aid package plus declared that those who commit rape are in violation of human rights laws.

Hardly anybody would argue against addressing sexual violence in the Congo, but a deeper look into the circumstances of the war that laid the groundwork for such heinous crimes brings you to the imperialistic doorsteps of America.

Since the 1990s the DRC has been involved in what has been described as “Africa's World War”—a horrific conflict for control of Congo resources that began with a coup against former President Sese Seko Mobutu, who ruled Congo as a personal fiefdom and U.S. client state for 32 years, when the country was called Zaire. The name was changed to Democratic Republic of Congo after his ouster.

From the early 1960s, Mr. Mobuto was America's ally and neo-colonial pawn the CIA empowered in the plot to overthrow and assassinate Patrice Lumumba, Congo's first prime minister after colonial rule.

Naturally the U.S. will argue, as both Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton have, that those were the times of yore and Africans must move forward. But the question is how can Africa let yesterday go, when justice has not been rendered for the U.S. role in crimes against the continent? Perhaps the U.S. government isn't interested in being held to the rules of transparency and accountability she boldly preaches to the world.

“The Obama administration is trying to stay away from that, but there is no way they can stay away from it fully because what they need is Congolese resources, they needed it before and they need it now,” said Bahati Jacques, an analyst on the DRC for the African Faith and Justice Network.

“The U.S. has gotten a lot of heat with regards to their responsibility in the tyranny of Mr. Mobutu in Congo because they protected him,” as they watched him oppress the Congolese people, Mr. Jacques noted.

But as it became apparent Mr. Mobutu's rule was slipping, the U.S. aided in the process of his elimination by backing Rwanda and Uganda with finances and arms—and using rebel forces led by Laurent Kabila, an anti-Mobutu leader since the 1960s.

Both Rwanda and Uganda were motivated to eliminate Mr. Mobutu because of his support for rebel groups who often attacked across border lines from bases inside Zaire. But furthermore towards the end, Mr. Mobutu simply became bad for business—production of staple minerals like diamonds were down by half, cobalt production plunged from 18,000 tons to 3,000 tons, and copper fell from 450,000 tons to 30,000 tons in 1994, according to “The Fate of Africa,” a book on the history of 50 years of African independence by Martin Meredith.

The events of Mr. Mobutu's fall sparked the current bedlam that killed a reported six million Congolese and drew in armies from Rwanda, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Burundi and Angola. The U.S. pursuit of Mr. Mobutu's removal helped fuel the mass killings, sexual violence, displacement and resource plundering. However, as Sec. Clinton shed a tear for rape victims and called the guilty to justice, the U.S. government must admit complicity in the conflict and add a full reparations deal to the $17 million in aid.

While U.S. “soft diplomacy” is welcomed by many quarters of the world, the U.S. must also be truthful about its own record and criminal past on the continent and fostering wars, corruption, instability and human rights violations.

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