Congolese government takes shape

Thursday, 17 July 2003 8:08 PM

The Democratic Republic of Congo will have four new vice-presidents from today, as the leaders of rebel groups are sworn in to the transitional government.

It is hoped that the ceremony in the capital, Kinshasa, will mark the end of the civil war that has raged in the country for the last five years.

The power-sharing authority will comprise representatives from all the rebel groups, as well as from the government of current president, Joseph Kabila, who will remain head of state.

The ultimate goal is to run free and fair elections within the next two years.

The violence started in 1998, when Rwanda and Uganda supported Congolese rebels in a bid to overthrow the then-president Laurent Kabila.

The political situation within the DRC is still extremely volatile, and despite the tentative peace process, fighting is continuing in Ituri and Kivu in the East.

A senior UN peacekeeper claimed back in May that he needed four times as many troops in order to keep control in the region.

The Ituri capital, Bunia, is now being monitored by French-led UN peacekeepers but they are still struggling to disarm the local rebels.

There are also concerns that Uganda's economic interest in the north-eastern area will mean that they continue to encourage the Lendu and Hema militias there to fight, as well as the ethnic Tutsis in eastern DRC who are controlled by Rwanda.

The failure to involve these groups in the power-sharing government, and the decision to exclude the extremist Hutu militia could, according to commentators, lead to a continuation of the violence.

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