Thread by @eobilo

HE WAS THE SCOURGE OF THE CONGO

Mobutu Sese Seko (1930-1997) was the Scourge of the Congo. He was a military officer who connived with the West to murder Congo’s first Prime Minister, Patrice Lumumba in 1961. He became a darling of the West following his role in the killing.

In a second coup in 1965, he overthrew the government of Congo and ruled the country until he was forced out in 1997. He governed with brutal arbitrariness as he changed the name of Congo to Zaire. He killed those who opposed him without blinking - a cold eye murderer.

When the going was good, the United States and Zaire now the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) led by Mobutu, challenged the Soviet Union’s influenced communism in the horn of Africa. Mobutu had access to American weapons and CIA’s intelligence reports on African states.

He was the first African head of state to be received by President George Bush Snr at the White House in June 1989.
Bush lauded him as one of America’s most valued friends. To show its appreciation, the US announced that the Zairian leader had taken the constructive step of

signing an economic policy reform agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The body doled out a 187 million dollar loan to Zaire. America also ensured that the World Bank released 87 million dollars to Mobutu, thus lifting Zaire’s cumulative debt at the time to the

bank to more than 900 million dollars.
You recall that in 1987, the US had cajoled the IMF to approve a loan to Zaire despite a report revealing the impossibility of control over frauds in Zaire. The report states that there was no indication that the numerous creditors of Zaire

will recover their funds. Despite the revelation, the US went ahead to pressure the body to satisfy its friend. This prompted the resignation of David Finch, Director of the IMF’s Exchange and Trade Relations Department.

Finch publicly derided the intrusion of political factors into fund lending and warned that the balance of payments assistance in such conditions is tantamount to political support. Years later Michael Camdessus, Managing Director of the IMF, told a newspaper that much of the

debt problem of developing countries was due to corruption.

Note that researchers discovered that capital flight from Zaire during Mobutu’s regime amounted to 12 billion dollars, a sum nearly equivalent to the total external debt passed on to the successor government of the DRC.

However, America demanded for Mobutu’s head when he was no longer useful to its interest in Africa. He was driven from power in May 1997 by a rebel army led by Laurent Kabila. He fled the country and died 3months later in Morocco. He had prostrate cancer. He must have stolen

between 4 billion and 15 billion dollars of Congo’s wealth. His shameful deeds produced the First and Second Congo Wars that consumed the lives of more than a million people.

#Scourge
#RudderlessLeadership
#StateAffairs