ABSTRACT
In terms of geography and population, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is one of the largest countries in Africa.1 Despite great economic potential, poverty is endemic and the country has been described as the site of the world’s worst ongoing humanitarian crisis.2 Owing to its lucrative natural resources, the country was exploited by foreign interests even before Leopold II, King of Belgium, claimed ownership of the country in the nineteenth century. After becoming Leopold’s property, a system of terror and slavery was introduced in the Congo Free State (1885-1908) as a way to extract wild rubber, ivory and other natural resources. Leopold was forced to relinquish the Congo Free State to Belgium in 1908,
resulting in some improvements in the humanitarian situation in the Belgian Congo that followed (1908-60).3 The repressive system of class division, political repression and resource extraction, resting on the foundation laid by Leopold, continued. The Congo finally gained independence on 30 June 1960, but political chaos, mutiny, and violence resurfaced until General Joseph Désiré-Mobutu (Mobutu Sese Seko) seized power in November 1965.4
Mobutu achieved relative peace and stability at first. Nevertheless, during his 32 years of rule, made possible by the support of the US and its Western allies, his government was guilty of political repression, rampant corruption, and severe human rights abuses. Almost nothing was spent on maintaining national infrastructure, including the courts, which deteriorated dramatically. As in the Leopold era both executive and legislative power were in the hands of the head of state. With a corrupt and weak army and diminishing Western support, Mobutu’s authority declined at the end of the Cold War, as did his capacity to defend the Congo’s vast territory.5
