Faults of the Kabilas

New Internationalist, August, 2004 by Stephen Pratt

Re: 'The looting of the Congo', Wars for Africa's Wealth (NI 367). As someone who has spent two years in Rwanda, I would like to give the Rwandan version of what caused Laurent Kabila to turn from ally to enemy. Having arrived from Kinshasa after his victory in 1997, he found that he had other interests leaning on him and other considerations than those of the far east of his vast country. He became allied to friends of those who had carried out the 1994 Rwandan genocide, and after his failure to stop incursions into Rwanda by Interahamwe militia from Congo, Rwanda and their ally Uganda invaded and established a buffer zone. Of course, Rwanda and Uganda have their snouts in the trough as well, but they are not the only ransackers: others include Robert Mugabe's Zimbabwean forces, many thousands of independent individuals, and people close to Laurent and Joseph Kabila. It is worth looking at the fairly low opinion that Che Guevara and his Cuban associates had of Laurent Kabila when they fought together briefly in the 1960s. Colette Braekman's article rightly condemns the West, but comes down too hard on Rwanda and Uganda's actions, without acknowledging the faults of the Kabilas.

Stephen Pratt Wincanton, England