A difficult and chaotic electoral process: press violations soar

General

Chaotic elections in December 2023

Months before the elections were held in December 2023, in a context marked by violent conflicts, increasing hate speech and civic space restrictions, civil society organisations denounced the opaque and exclusionary electoral process. CSOs also reiterated their commitment to play their part to ensure a free, inclusive and transparent process. Despite the CSO commitment and the considerable logistical and political challenges in organising the elections, the Independent National Electoral Commission (CENI) failed to engage seriously with civil society observer missions, meaning the consensus required for elections to run smoothly was sorely lacking.

The voter registration from December 2022 to April 2023 was filled with irregularities. Fighting in many areas has left more than a million citizens without voter cards. The 2023 elections were not held in parts of Nord-Kivu, which has been affected by conflict linked to the 23 March Movement (M23). The M23, accused by DRC authorities and the UN of being backed by Rwanda, continues to fight the Congolese army. Due to the conflict, continuing tensions and atrocities, this region of the world is largely undercovered by the media. Ahead of the elections, Human Rights Watch documented clashes across the country between supporters of rival political parties that have resulted in assaults, sexual violence, and at least one death.

In their midterm report letter of 15th December 2023 to the Security Council, the UN Group of Experts on the Democratic Republic of the Congo wrote that the provinces in eastern DRC and Mai-Ndombe province were affected by episodes of intense violence, exacerbating the humanitarian crisis, in particular in North Kivu, Ituri and Mai Ndombe provinces. The number of internally displaced persons (IDP) reached nearly seven million across the country, one of the largest IDP crises in the world.

On 20th December 2023, the DRC held general elections – presidential, national and provincial legislative elections, and municipal elections. There was a 48.8 percent turnout of the 44 million people called to vote.

President Felix Tshisekedi’s Sacred Union of the Nation coalition and its allies won a total of 450 seats out of 477 confirmed seats in the 500-member National Assembly. In the presidential elections held in parallel with the parliamentary polls, President Tshisekedi was re-elected with 73% of votes in the poll’s first round, defeating, among others, Mr. Moise Katumbi of Together for the Republic, which won 18 seats in the National Assembly.

The polls were marked by chaos and reports of electoral rigging. Due to logistical problems, many polling stations opened late, which is not allowed by Congolese law, and voting was extended into the following day. Several opposition candidates, including Mr. Katumbi and Mr. Fayulu, rejected the results. Results from several constituencies were annulled due to allegations of fraud.

Opposition candidates and civil society called for an annulment and re-run of the elections. An opposition protest demanding a re-run on 27th December 2024 was banned and then dispersed by the police with tear gas (see under Peaceful Assembly).

Opposition candidate Theodore Ngoy, who finished with less than 1% of the vote, filed a petition with the Constitutional Court, asking that the vote be annulled. The Court rejected the petition and upheld the results declaring President Felix Tshisekedi the winner. Tshisekedi was officially inaugurated on 20th January 2024.

Peaceful Assembly

Pre-electoral rallies hindered

On 23rd November 2023, activists and supporters who had come to welcome presidential candidate Moïse Katumbi, were not allowed access to the facilities at Goma international airport. According to Marys Mambo, Ensemble pour la République executive, the order came from a General of the Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, who asked the Republican Guard soldiers at the airport gate not to allow anyone entry to the airport facilities.

On 25th November 2023, the police reportedly used firearms and tear gas to disperse supporters of opposition coalition Lamuka during their campaign rally in Kinshasa. A few days later, on 28th November 2023, during a rally for presidential candidate Moïse Katumbi in Maniema province, the campaign procession was violently attacked, with stones thrown at its members. This incident resulted in the death of a youth activist.

Opposition protest banned

As the reports of electoral irregularities continued to emerge, opposition leaders, such as Martin Fayulu and Denis Mukwege, called for a protest on 27th December 2023 to demand the cancellation of the 20th December polls and a re-run of the elections.

Ahead of the planned protest, during a press conference on 26th December 2023, deputy prime minister in charge of the interior and security Peter Kazadi and the governor of Kinshasa, Gentiny Ngobila, banned the march, saying the demonstration is aimed at undermining the electoral process and warned that the security forces would be mobilised to ensure that the protest would not take place. Organisers of the protest responded by saying that “no ministerial order or communiqué has formalised this decision” which is unconstitutional and an abuse of power, and therefore maintained the plan to protest.

​​On 27th December 2023, police surrounded the headquarters of one of the incumbent's main challengers, Martin Fayulu, where protesters were meant to gather. Some police officers were in riot gear while others held rifles, and fired tear gas to disperse the crowd.

Expression

Report on press freedom violations

The press freedom CSO Journaliste en danger (JED) published a report on 3rd November 2023, taking stock of the state of the press under the administration of Tshisekedi. The report documented at least 160 cases of arrests of journalists and at least 130 cases of threats or physical violence against journalists.

Journalists arrested or attacked during the election campaign

In the weeks leading up to the 20th December 2023 elections, at least nine journalists were subjected to arrest or attacks:

● On 20th October 2023, radio coordinator and okapinews.net correspondent Blaise Mabala was arrested by an officer of the National Intelligence Army and brought to a military camp in Inongo, in the Mai-Ndombe province. He had been warned by the National Intelligence Army not to play a song criticising the governor of the Mai-Ndombe Province, which he ignored, and played the song during a radio programme he hosted on 18th October 2023. He was accused of insulting a provincial government official. He was still detained at the end of January 2024.

● ​​On the night of 2nd November 2023, journalist Jonas Kasula was attacked at his home in Goma, North Kivu province. Kasula covers crime and violence in the city in a political news programme on Hope Channel TV. Four armed masked intruders reportedly tied him up, stole his equipment, and threatened to come back and kill him if he did not stop working as a journalist, according to RSF.

● On 9th November 2023, national intelligence agents arrested Raphael Ngoma Mabonzo, a journalist from the Moanda Community Radio in Moanda, Kongo Central province. He was detained on orders of the territory administrator, Amina Panda, who accused him of broadcasting false information on an opposition rally. He was released the next day without charge.

● On the night of 9th November 2023, three armed masked individuals forced their way into the home of Nerry Ushindi, a journalist with Radio Télévision Ishango (RTI), a community radio station based in Kasindi, a small border town in Nord-Kivu. Armed with a gun, machetes and a hammer, the intruders demanded money and Ushindi’s journalistic equipment, and threatened to prevent him from continuing to work for RTI. Before leaving, the perpetrators stabbed him in his arm and beat his mother, who was present at the time. Ushindi is known for his criticism of the prevailing insecurity in the region.

● On 27th November 2023, Jerry Lombo Alauwa, a reporter for the Canal Congo Télévision TV channel and radio Liberté Kisangani, was attacked by around ten members of the political party Union for the Congolese Nation (UNC) in the northern city of Kisangani, while he was covering a rally by opposition presidential candidate Moïse Katumbi. Alauwa was hit in the head, his hand was injured, and his camera was damaged.

● On 5th December 2023, the home of Neyker Tokolo, a reporter with the privately owned Radio Liberté in Lisala, was the target of an attack. Four armed soldiers fired their guns into the air, and threw four tear gas canisters inside the house, according to Tokolo, and the president of the local human rights organisation Youth Action for Social Welfare (AJBS), Roger Nzumbu, who both spoke to CPJ.

● On 9th December 2023, Mao Zigabe, a correspondent with the privately owned television broadcaster Digital Congo, was attacked and punched at a hotel in Goma by a large group of supporters of the Union for Democracy and Social Progress (UDPS), Tshisekedi’s political party, according to CPJ, who spoke with Zigabe. The attackers carried UDPS party flags and wore t-shirts with images of Tshisekedi, who was scheduled to visit the city the next day. The UDPS supporters reportedly accused him of regularly publishing information favourable to the opposition.

● On 16th December 2023, René Mobembo, editor-in-chief of the private radio station Liberté Makanza, which broadcasts from Makanza in Equateur province, was violently attacked during a meeting of the Agissons pour la République (AREP) political party. AREP supporters beat him on the orders of Reagean Mata Likenge, the president of the youth league of AREP, on the grounds that his radio belongs to the current Minister of Defence. The journalist had to be taken to hospital.

● On 20th December 2023, the day of the election, Pascal Mulegwa, a correspondent for the French broadcaster Radio France International (RFI), was on assignment covering voting in Kinshasa, the capital. Supporters of the Union for Democracy and Social Progress (UDPS) political party—which is led by current president Felix Tshisekedi—punched, dragged, and threw Mulegwa into a gutter, accusing him of working for a French outlet that was critical of Tshisekedi. The attackers broke his glasses and injured the journalist, who was brought to the hospital.

Censorship: suspension of radio station, TV station signal cut

On 6th October 2023, the mayor of the northwestern Congolese city of Lisala, Desi Koyo, issued an order indefinitely suspending broadcasts by Radio Top Lisala. The order said that the station had defied the mayor’s reporting ban, issued in August 2023, on journalist Anicet Moleka for using “insolent, immoral and defamatory” language on the current affairs programme Tic Tac which, according to local authorities, undermined the dignity of Mongala Province authorities. Mayor Koyo told CPJ that he had laid a complaint of criminal defamation—the penalty for which is up to five years in jail—against the journalist. An arrest warrant was issued the same day. Koyo accused Moleka and Radio Top Lisala of making slanderous remarks against provincial authorities in their weekly broadcasts. He described the ban as a “precautionary measure that we have taken to maintain peace in the province” ahead of the presidential and parliamentary polls. Moleka denied insulting local authorities. Press freedom organisation Observatory for Press Freedom in Africa (OLPA) wrote a letter to the governor of the province, requesting the reopening of the radio station. It stressed that the mayor had violated not only the provisions of the Constitution, but also those of Ordinance-Law No 23/009 of 13th March 2023 laying down the conditions for exercising freedom of the press, as well as the Organic Law of 10th January 2011 on the composition, remit and functioning of the Higher Council for Audiovisual and Communication (CSAC), the only authority mandated to take such disciplinary sanctions against media.

After 39 days of being closed, the station resumed its activities on 14th November 2023. However, on 28th November 2023, the mayor of the Mongala province’s capital, Lisala, issued a new order banning all programmes of the private Radio Top Lisala broadcaster for “incitement to hatred and serious harm to the process of current elections in the DRC,” this time because Radio Top Lisala had broadcast information suggesting Rwandan influence over certain political parties.

In another incident, on 20th December 2023, the night of the election, the national media regulator, the Higher Council of Audiovisual and Communication (CSAC), reportedly ordered a technician to cut the programming signal of Perfect Télévision in Kinshasa, according to CPJ. Peter Tiani, the media outlet’s director, told CPJ that the order stemmed from Perfect Télévision’s reports on polling stations not opening on time and missing electoral kits at several voting centres in Kinshasa and across the country.

Prevention of journalists

On 23rd November 2024, a group of journalists covering the arrival of Moïse Katumbi in Bunia were prevented from entering the airport by agents who had apparently been ‘instructed by the hierarchy in Kinshasa not to let anyone in’, according to information gathered by RSF. On the same day, soldiers denied other journalists access to Goma airport, where Katumbi was holding a political meeting.

Journalists threatened

John Kanyunuy Kyota, a reporter for Deutsche Welle’s Kiswahili service and editor of the ‘Nouvelles à la Une’ WhatsApp news group, reported receiving online death threats on 24th November 2023 after he had received death threats from alleged members of the Sacred Union of the Nation, the coalition that supports President Félix Tshisekedi’s reelection campaign. They accused Kanyunuy of campaigning for Katumbi, an allegation he immediately denied.

Jailed journalist receives support from opposition candidates

As reported previously on the CIVICUS Monitor, renowned journalist Stanis Bujakera Tshiamala was arrested on 8th September 2023 on charges of spreading false information. He remained in detention at Makala central prison in Kinshasa. His case became a part of the election campaign. On 22nd September, Martin Fayulu, president of the Engagement pour la citoyenneté et le développement party, visited Stanis Bujakera Tshiamala in the Makala prison. He demanded the release of the journalist on his social media account, denouncing the absence of cause for detention. On 9th December 2023, during a rally in Kinshasa, the candidate Moïse Katumbi pledged to have the journalist released. On 14th December 2023, the candidate and Nobel Peace Prize awardee Denis Mukwege visited Tshiamala and assured him of his ‘psychological, political and moral’ support. At the end of December, RSF wrote that if the initial aim of this arrest and detention was to exclude the journalist with the biggest social media following from media coverage in the final months of the presidential campaign, it has been achieved. During a hearing on 12th January 2023, a court adjourned his case to 2nd February.

Law on the protection of human rights defenders could have the opposite effect

Law No. 23/927 on the protection and responsibility of human rights defenders adopted on 15th June 2023 was a significant step forward for the protection of HRDs in DRC. On 30th November 2023, human rights organisation Protection International issued a statement outlining several challenges in this piece of legislation that still need to be addressed for human rights defenders to operate freely. For example, the obligation to register administratively and to report their activities annually creates a significant risk to their protection. Similarly, a number of articles could be misinterpreted and be used against HRDs, such as article 8 which stipulates that HRDs are to contribute to upholding national sovereignty and territorial integrity, and article 9 according to which HRDs are bound by the respect of good morals.

Disinformation during the campaign

In the lead-up to the elections, false narratives amplified and marred the information landscape, sparking concern about the potential for hate speech and polarisation. Between 1st June 2023 and 30th November 2023, Code for Africa (CfA) conducted media monitoring and social media analysis of key electoral actors in the DRC to assess the prevailing trends and dynamics shaping public discourse during the pre-election period. According to CfA, the following were the noteworthy trends that dominated the DRC’s information landscape leading up to the 2023 election: a coordinated amplification of scepticism about the Independent National Electoral Commission, in particular about its transparency and its capability to facilitate free and fair polls; homophobic allegations against presidential candidate Denis Mukwege; and finally, hashtags being used to discredit opponent candidates.