The Congo Action Group held a meeting in Manchester at the Central Reference Library, as a part of the Black History Month events which were sponsored by Manchester City Council. The theme of the event was ‘The Congo a history of Greed and Terror’
The Guest speaker was Marie-therese nlandu, a former lawyer at the DRC’s Supreme Court of Justice and leader of the Parti pour la Paix au Congo (Congo Peace) political party and her husband Professer Noël Mbala Nkondi,
Marie-Thérèse Nlandu was a former Amnesty International prisoner opf conscience after she was arrested during the 2006 presidential elections in the DRC.
The two rounds of the DRC presidential elections on 30 July and 29 October 2006 had been attended by acute tension and outbreaks of violence in Kinshasa, and by a sharp increase in politically-motivated human rights violations. The second-round results were announced on 15 November and gave Joseph Kabila (the outgoing president) 58 per cent of the vote, and his rival Jean-Pierre Bemba (outgoing vice-president) 42 per cent. Jean-Pierre and his political party alleged significant fraud and appealed to the Supreme Court of Justice to overturn the results. As the Supreme Court began began to hear the complaint on 21 November, violence broke out outside the Court between Bemba supporters and police. Shots were then fired, allegedly by soldiers loyal to Bemba, and the police dispersed. The Supreme Court was then set on fire and partially destroyed by protesters before order was restored.
Marie-Thérèse was arrested on 26 November 2006 while she was engaged as a lawyer representing DRC Vice-President Jean-Pierre Bemba’s appeal before the Supreme Court of Justice in Kinshasa against the results of the second round of presidential elections.
Marie-Thérèse Nlandu had herself stood as a presidential candidate but after her elimination in the first round of voting, her political party switched its support to Jean-Pierre Bemba’s candidacy, she was charged with organizing an insurrectionary movement (“mouvement insurrectionnel”) and illegal possession of firearms (“’détention illégale d’armes de guerre”).
After an international campaign for her release Marie-Thérèse Nlandu and her co-defendant were acquitted on 30 April 2007 by a Kinshasa military court.
Professer Noël Mbala Nkondi gave a history of the Congo from the time of the first encounters with the Portugese explorers and missionaries who introduced slavery to the Congo and then Marie-Thérèse Nlandu spoke about the recent history of the DRC leading up to the current tragedy in the east of the country following the outbreak of hostilities between Governmment forces and a rebel group the NCDP led by Laurent Nkunda.
Marie-Thérèse Informed us about the way in which the conflict and destabilisation of the east of the congo had been brought about by militia groups in the DRC being armed and sponsored by ther neighbouring states of Uganda and Rwanda in order to allow western corporations to plunder Congolese resources. We heard details of the suffering of the civilians caught in the conflict and the thousands of refugees who have been internally displaced.
Graphic visuals were shown during the talk, these were provided by the NGO Medecins Sans Frontieres through a website called condition critical which is solely dedicated to reporting the conflict in the DRC.
