Tribalism, violence, intimidation and incitement to ethnic hatred: the hallmarks of the Tshisekedi regime

During their long years in the wilderness of opposition, the UDPS and Tshisekedi led Congolese people to believe they were the alternative to bad governance and to the vicious circle the DRC has been trapped in since 1960, a cycle marked by recurring crises.

The UDPS was originally founded by 13 parliamentarians united against Mobutu's dictatorship. Soon afterwards, one of them, Étienne Tshisekedi wa Mulumba, used extraordinary cunning and duplicity to seize control of the party and turn it into a family affair, drawing first and foremost on members of his own Luba tribe from Kasaï.

That is how the UDPS came to oppose Mobutu, Laurent-Désiré Kabila and then Joseph Kabila with fiercely questionable methods: insults, slander, defamation, violence and more.

Around 2015, UDPS activists were enlisted en masse into a militia known as Kamwina Nsapu. It committed serious human rights abuses in the Kasaï region and even murdered two UN experts, Michael Sharp and the Swedish-Chilean Zaida Catalán.

Around 2015, UDPS activists were enlisted en masse into a militia known as Kamwina Nsapu. It committed serious human rights abuses in the Kasaï region and even murdered two UN experts, Michael Sharp and the Swedish-Chilean Zaida Catalán.

To stifle dissenting voices and opponents who denounced bad governance, Félix Tshisekedi and his party turned to the methods written into their DNA. He began by placing members of his tribe in every strategic position of responsibility and jailing anyone who dared to speak out. He then engineered a veritable exodus, populating Katanga and Kinshasa with members of his tribe from Kasaï in order to smother any potential challenge there.

In Kinshasa, he also breathed new life into a militia called the UDPS Forces du Progrès, made up largely of members of his Luba tribe. It is behind much of the destruction and crime in the big cities: armed with knives and machetes, its members attack anyone who opposes the regime. It also runs a number of cells and levies taxes with complete impunity.

Beyond this, Félix Tshisekedi himself has encouraged the spread of hate speech of rare violence against Congolese Tutsis, as well as against Swahili speakers from eastern DRC. Some journalists and commentators close to the regime have gone as far as calling for the extermination of Congolese Tutsis and branding all Swahili speakers as agents of Rwanda.

Nor is it only journalists and commentators: government officials have also thrown themselves wholeheartedly into this campaign of hatred and incitement to genocide against Congolese Tutsis. Among those named are the ministers Muhindo Nzangi and Julien Paluku, the MP Justin Bitakwira, Augustin Kabuya, secretary general of the UDPS, and many others.

Even Kinshasa's army, the FARDC, allied to the Rwandan genocidaires of the FDLR, is today built on a hate-filled ideology towards Congolese Tutsis. Not a day goes by without this community suffering abuses at the hands of Kinshasa's forces in North and South Kivu. To this must be added several cases of mass killings of Katangan civilians.

Yesterday, Wednesday 21 October 2026, a senior figure in the ruling party, Fils Mukoko, said in a video that has gone viral that the Tshisekedi regime would arm people in churches, football stadiums, universities and elsewhere to hunt down Western nationals. His reason: the string of searches carried out by Belgian judicial authorities, who hold evidence of the plundering of the DRC by the Tshisekedi clan.

Following the outcry the video provoked on social media, the Congolese government condemned Mukoko's remarks, shedding crocodile tears. Yet in the recent past, this same regime sent young members of the ruling party to attack embassies in Kinshasa, setting fire to the Rwandan, Kenyan and Ugandan missions, which it wrongly suspected of backing the M23.

The statements and speeches from Congolese officials on the Mukoko video are nothing but hypocrisy. The upper echelons of the Kinshasa regime fund and encourage the spread of hatred against Congolese Tutsis and Swahili speakers, just as they fund and encourage threats and intimidation against Western embassies.

Like any cartel, Kinshasa's weapons are violence and intimidation against those who stand up to its barbarity and bad governance. Western embassies should take Mukoko's words very seriously: this was no personal zeal. He simply said out loud what the regime's officials are plotting behind closed doors.

This is state-sponsored hatred that no informed observer can afford to dismiss. Despite the country's vast wealth, the Congolese people remain mired in extreme poverty. The DRC is one of the poorest countries in the world, and its riches benefit only a handful of individuals, decade after decade. Yet a mediocre regime is clinging to power at any cost, even if it means setting the DRC on fire.