DRC: ‘Our country is not for sale!’

Six bishops from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) have written an “assessment of [the country’s] pastoral and social situation,” following a meeting which took place in Butembo, from April 8-14, and which paints a desolate picture of the country, criticizing how “the dignity of the Congolese people” is being undermined. The eastern provinces of North Kivu and Ituri have been under martial law since 2021. Armed militias have surrounded the city of Goma since February.

In a message to the Congolese people and sent to Aid to the Church in Need (ACN), the bishops of the Ecclesiastical Province of Bukavu ask the leaders of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to serve the people, and to “stop running the country as if it was your private domain.” Furthermore, they ask the international community to “stop choking Africa” and to “understand, once and for all, that the Democratic Republic of the Congo is not for sale and cannot be lawlessly exploited.”

For more than 30 years, the eastern part of the country has been subject to violence carried out by 120 armed militias, who fight over territory and seek to exploit natural resources. These armed groups include the March 23 Movement (M23) and the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), which is affiliated with the Islamic State. According to the United Nations, the conflict in the eastern Congo has resulted in six million deaths since 1996. The Congolese army has been unable to deal with the situation, and the millions displaced by the fighting are the largest such contingent in all of Africa.

Due to frequent militia attacks, the provinces of North Kivu and Ituri have been under martial law since May 2021, giving the army additional power. And the city of Goma has been under attack by M23 rebels since the end of February.

In their message, the bishops denounce “the insecurity, which has become endemic, with its trail of murders, massacres and kidnappings,” as well as the “continued siege of the city of Goma by M23, which is backed by Rwanda,” and “the paralysis of the economy through a strategy of isolation and asphyxiation in large and small urban communities.”

The bishops decry that some parishes have had to partially or totally close, and that young people are being abandoned. They say there is a “breach in trust between the civil population and the military, […] and the civil population and the state authorities.”

The Congolese state is dead

Regarding the roots of the evils that afflict the DRC, the second-largest country in Africa, the bishops write: “When we hear our people speaking of the source of our interminable suffering, we conclude that all of this is happening because the Congolese state is dead; that we, the governed, have been left to our sad fate, and that there is no indication that our current leaders have any concern for the welfare of those they govern.”

But despite these difficulties, the bishops do raise a note of hope when they compare the destructive forces in their country with their faith in “the God of the living” and recall the words of Psalm 118:17: “I will not die. but live and proclaim what the Lord has done.” They also ask the faithful to pray for their own conversion and for that of their persecutors “both inside and outside” the country.

The Congolese Church leaders highlight the heroism of the priests and religious who carry out their mission in territories controlled by M23 and ADF and restate their confidence in the fact that most of the population sees the Catholic Church “as an institution that tirelessly defends the people’s interests.”  The Church continues to work “[with] the displaced, who exceed two million in the Dioceses of Butembo-Beni and Goma alone.”

The Vicar-General of Goma, Father Henri Chiza Balumisa, who is also an ACN project partner, explains that “the insecurity cannot keep the Church from doing its job; on the contrary, it should remind it of its mission. When nothing else is working well, the importance of the Church stands out. We are grateful to our brother priests who live in difficult situations, risking their lives and afflicted by fear. They remain here. They call me and the bishop to share their situations with us, but they never show the smallest intention of abandoning the People of God. They are here to share in the suffering of the people. It is in these moments of suffering that the Church wants to be the salt of the earth.”

Father Balumisa stresses that members of his diocese feel abandoned by the rest of the world, but not by ACN’s donors, and points to the aid they have received from the organization. “I would like to take this opportunity to thank ACN, which stands out for its support, for its presence and effort in supporting our pastoral work through Mass stipends, to improve the quality of life for our priests. Our faithful are aware of the support they receive from Christians in other parts of the world, and they are very grateful.”

The Democratic Republic of the Congo received about $3.7M from Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) in 2023. ACN’s aid went to 42 of the country’s 48 dioceses and funded a total of 251 projects. The foundation has made a special effort to strengthen the Church’s presence in regions abandoned by the government.

—Sina Hartert