At the SADC Extraordinary Summit in Harare (Zimbabwe) on Wednesday this week, they approved the extension of the mandate of SADC troops in DRC (SAMIRDC) by another year; that is until December 15, 2025.
It doesn’t take a genius to see that this is a go-ahead to DRC ruler Felix Tshisekedi, who has a campaign of ethnic cleansing against the country’s Tutsi communities in the east, to carry on with the crimes against humanity targeting the long-suffering people.
While SAMIDRC was initially deployed supposedly “to foster peace”, its actions in North Kivu have instead intensified persecution of the Tutsi communities native to the Kivus.
The SAMIDRC forces, in truth nothing much more than South African troops, have a record of collaborating with the genocidal FDLR militia, Wazalendo, Burundian troops, as well as Eastern European mercenaries, all in the service of Tshisekedi’s criminal enterprise.
Beyond the ethnic cleansing of Congolese Tutsis, the SAMIDRC deployment is a front for economic (read mineral exploitation) interests. A mineral concession deal between Tshisekedi and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa underpins SAMIDRC’s presence. This cynical business arrangement, underpinned by the blood of thousands of innocent Congolese Tutsi citizens, is in effect what the summit just endorsed.
Blood minerals indeed!
Something to remember is that when the SAMIDRC contingent was deployed last December, they jettisoned all pretense of “working for peace.” They exposed themselves when they begun to work with the genocidal FDLR and Wazalendo militias, while directing their hostility solely against the M23 Movement, as per Tshisekedi’s wishes.
SAMIDRC’s actions are in contravention of peace initiatives such as the Luanda Process, which stipulates that political dialogue is the only way to lasting peace, rather than attempts to military sort issues.
For the SADC summit to extend the SAMIDRC mandate, it indicates they aren’t that keen on peace processes.
SAMIDRC manoeuvres are very counterproductive to efforts to find a peaceful, sustainable solution put to the decades-long conflict of DRC.
What a scandal!
ellenkampire