DRC: Jean-Pierre Bemba Gombo, the washed-up and unproductive Congolese Transport Minister.

Jean-Pierre Bemba Gombo is a former warlord and ex-inmate of the International Criminal Court (ICC) prison, where he was held from May 2008 over charges of crimes against humanity committed in the Central African Republic by the troops of his rebel movement, the MLC.

After his release in 2018, Bemba first joined the Lamuka coalition, which had backed Martin Fayulu's presidential bid. In 2021 he threw in his lot with President Félix Tshisekedi and his Union Sacrée coalition, after Tshisekedi's break with his predecessor, Joseph Kabila.

On 23 March 2023 he was appointed Defence Minister. It was on his watch that the security crisis in eastern DRC deepened, as Kinshasa pressed on with its war against the Congolese politico-military movement AFC/M23.

Many observers of Congolese politics judged his record disastrous, including some in President Tshisekedi's own circle. What he did distinguish himself with were personal attacks on former president Joseph Kabila Kabange, whom he brands a Rwandan, on opposition leader Moïse Katumbi, and on the Congolese Tutsi community.

Bemba is also known for his hostility towards Swahili-speaking easterners. In 2006, during the run-off campaign against Kabila, he did not hesitate to urge the people of Kinshasa to bar the way to Swahili speakers.

A shadow of his former self at the Transport Ministry

In a government reshuffle on 28 May 2024, he left Defence to become Transport Minister, while retaining his rank of deputy prime minister.

Since taking over the portfolio, he has launched no reforms and no initiatives capable of modernising the country's transport sector.

Between June 2024 and September 2026, more than 570 people were officially recorded dead or missing in shipwrecks on the Congo River and its tributaries, victims of lax regulation, weak oversight and a general lack of rigour in river transport.

This September alone, the DRC has suffered two deadly sinkings. The MV MJP went down on 23 September, leaving 39 missing and 36 survivors. A later update, issued on 25 September, put the number of missing at more than 40 out of 84 people on board, 12 of them crew.

The most recent disaster struck on 27 September 2026 off Idjwi Island, in South Kivu province. The vessel had set out from Bukavu, heading for the north of the island. At least 12 bodies have been recovered and around 15 people rescued, while dozens remain unaccounted for.

Air disasters are, sadly, just as recurrent. The latest claimed the lives of two senior Congolese army officers at Kenge.

Each time, Bemba limits himself to issuing statements and suspending state services in his sector. Elsewhere, such failures would have cost a minister his job, if the Congolese elite had a shred of moral conscience and the country's leadership were a little more demanding and accountable.

Congo Airways, the airline founded under Kabila, is now bankrupt, as is the transport company Transco. As for the state of the country's railways, the least said the better.

Bemba is also heavily involved in mining in Katanga, particularly in Lualaba province, which is run by his former protégée, Fifi Masuka, once one of his close associates in the MLC and, according to several witnesses, more than just a political ally.

Until responsible governance arrives, the Congolese people have no choice but to count their dead, from one shipwreck and one plane crash to the next.