Do Not Interfere in Congo’s Election’ Say Russia, China, and South Africa to UN Security Council

by David Cherry – Executive Intelligence Review, 14 January 2019

In a UN Security Council (UNSC) meeting on Friday, Russia, China, and South Africa lined up against the unhappy combination of the U.S., Britain, France, Belgium and Germany, who requested the submission to the UNSC of the polling station data from the Dec. 30 election in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC)—apparently an unprecedented request.

By what authority does the UNSC make such a “request” of a sovereign nation? No foreign government or intelligence agency has such a right.

The DRC—a rich storehouse of strategic minerals such as cobalt, gold, coltan, manganese, uranium, and oil—has been largely “owned” by Europeans and Americans, under the British imperial umbrella. Recall, for example, the enrichment of the Bush family through Barrick Gold.

The DRC’s Independent National Electoral Commission announced on Jan. 9, as a provisional result, that Felix Tshisekedi—leader of the Union for Democracy and Social Progress party—had won the Presidency, outpolling current President Joseph Kabila’s preferred candidate, Emmanuel Ramazani Shadary. (Shadary was recently condemned by Reuters as “likely to continue the recent hard line with foreign investors.”)

But the uproar is about a third candidate, Martin Fayulu, suddenly the darling of the British and their European victims. Fayulu is a former oil company executive educated in France and the United States. The French and Belgian media (echoed in Britain) denounced the result, implying that Fayulu had been the winner. That is the view of the powerful DRC Catholic Church, which had deployed almost 40,000 electoral observers. The DRC Bishops’ Conference went so far as to say, “We know who the winner was,” without naming Fayulu.

Meanwhile, the daily of the Italian Bishops’ Conference, Avvenire, wrote that Tshisekedi’s victory should not surprise anyone. “Indeed, Tshisekedi was leading the [few] polls already last October.”

But the head of the DRC electoral commission, Corneille Nangaa Yobeluo, says he has no authority to give the data to anyone except the DRC Constitutional Court, which would consider any challenges.

Russia, China, and South Africa said the conclusions of the electoral commission should be respected and that the commission should not be pressured or interfered with.

There is evidence that Tshisekedi is an ally of Rwandan President Paul Kagame, a strong supporter of China’s Belt and Road Initiative. Kagame has substantial leverage in DRC.

This election, so far, has been the first transfer of power in DRC from one party to another without violence. The imperial powers have been meddling in its elections, with the aid of violence, ever since they fostered violence to provide cover for the execution in 1961 of Patrice Lumumba, prime minister in the first democratically elected government—ordered by the MI6 station chief. The British do have a long history of meddling in elections.

by David Cherry – Executive Intelligence Review