The Congolese people that want to keep the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) as one country have expressed misgivings about the idea of decentralization. While they are not totally against decentralization as such, they reason that decentralization presupposes the existence of a strong central state with viable institutions. In any state a certain amount of centralization is essential for the effective functioning of a large entity, be it a corporation or a state. On the other hand, over-centralization produces undesirable outcomes such as inefficiency and red tape. When this occurs decentralization is recommended in which minor decisions are made on lower levels of administration.
Since its creation as a state in 1885 in the wake of the Berlin Conference on the partition of Africa among European countries without waging war against one another, no efforts were made neither by king Leopold II who owned Congo Free State as a private property until 1907, nor by the Belgian government that assumed colonial responsibility for Congo from 1908 to 1960 when the country became independent as the Democratic Republic of the Congo, nor since independence as Zaire and now again as DRC since 1997.
For various reasons including minimizing resistance against colonial and post-colonial authoritarian rule, authorities decided not to construct a strong state. Accordingly, until now in 2010, for all intents and purposes, there is no meaningful existence of a single Congolese society and state. During the colonial period the existence of a unitary state was firmly denied, viewing Africans as a mosaic of autonomous tribal and ethnic groups, coexisting in antagonistic relations with one another.
To introduce and maintain the infamous divide and rule colonial regime, Belgian authorities identified or created local chiefs responsible for administering, on behalf of the Belgian colonial government, geographic entities that were demarcated on rigid tribal or ethnic lines. Belgian authorities who regarded Congolese as ‘children of the Belgian king’ believed that they would remain in a state of ethnic environment for a long time.
When independence arrived abruptly in 1960 due to circumstances beyond Belgian control including serious riots of 1959, the Congolese had not been prepared for a unitary independent country. Therefore to them independence provided an opportunity for the attainment of political self-determination along ethnic or regional lines. Thus ethnic royalties were strengthened when political parties were hastily formed in the few months prior to independence. Hence, the intensification of regionalism or tribalism began during this period and has not diminished.
Furthermore, during colonial rule a form of decentralization was introduced in the provinces and some of them with strong governments and leaders especially Katanga and Orientale operated fairly independently of the central government. It’s no wonder therefore that when independence arrived some provinces including Katanga, Orientale and Kasai temporarily seceded although their leaders were forced to back down after tremendous loss of lives and property.
Under Mobutu’s authoritarian regime of over thirty years, the colonial methods of divide and rule were continued along ethnic and regional lines. Since Mobutu’s departure in 1997, new disturbing elements have emerged that have raised eyebrows of patriotic Congolese. First, there is a perception that some external forces using Congolese groups and/or neighboring countries are attempting to divide DRC into independent parts. The proposed formation of a “Tutsi Empire” (which apparently has not been denied) covering Uganda, Burundi, Rwanda and DRC in the Great Lakes Region and its implications for DRC has been commented on and written about fairly extensively – so this is not a secret. Second, the argument particularly by foreigners that DRC is too large (please note that some 80 percent of the country is under internationally protected forest cover virtually uninhabited) implies the possibility of breaking up the country or allowing decentralization with comprehensive or semi-autonomous powers to provinces. Some Congolese believe that the inclusion of decentralization into the constitution was imposed from outside. Third, the fact that some development partners have decided to support individual provinces and/or sectors, without government concurrence, could lead to a scramble for and eventual disintegration of DRC. Fourth, there is a strong feeling among Congolese that because the military efforts launched in 1996 failed to break-up or enable foreign powers to take over DRC, other more subtle economic, diplomatic, political and administrative methods are being advanced to achieve the same goal. Fifth, there are stories that there is one ethnic group in eastern DRC that is applying the principle of decentralization to create an autonomous space specifically and purely for that particular ethnic group which has raised serious resentment from other ethnic groups that believe their land was and is being taken away from them at gun point by this particular group.
For these reasons, the increasing number of Congolese and others – individually or in groups – are beginning to reflect on the advisability of proceeding with decentralization in the absence of strong and viable state institutions at the central government level. They believe that strong state construction and integration must come first. All other efforts including sub-regional and regional integration or cooperation must strengthen – not weaken – efforts to realize state construction and integration first. In this regard, suggestions have been floated that the constitution needs to be revisited for possible amendments in view of these developments to avoid a regrettable repeat of what happened immediately after independence in 1960 when some political leaders opted for regional secession.