ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on former president Joseph Kabila, who led the Democratic Republic of the Congo for 18 years, from January 2001 to January 2019. Joseph Kabila succeeded his father Laurent-Désiré Kabila, who was assassinated by one of his bodyguards. When Laurent-Désiré Kabila and his son initially took power, the unarmed opposition held difficult political talks to end the dictatorship of their predecessor Mobutu Sese Seko. Instead of offering a new social contract to the Congolese upon the death of his father in 2000, Joseph Kabila installed his own dictatorship and turned the Congo into a kind of personal property for his enrichment and that of his family. The fortune he was able to accumulate enabled him to set up a system of patronage, which served him as a tool to control the Congolese political system and maintain his political power beyond the two terms he was allowed to serve as president according to the Congolese constitution.
