A VICTORIOUS M23 CAPTURED THE CITY OF GOMA

What many people expected to be inevitable is happening exactly as foretold: Goma is under the hands of the movement known as M23, recently renamed itself as the Congolese Revolution Army (ARC). It is now confirmed by various media outlets that “Heavy fighting intensifies in Goma as rebels seize the strategic Goma airport. Massive shelling reported as army tank speed in town”.

Although the M23 spokesman said that they did not plan to take the city of Goma when its army reached the outskirts of the eastern city of Goma on Sunday after pushing the government troops backed by U.N. peacekeepers.

Even the U.N. peacekeeping spokesman Kieran Dwyer said from New York that "the rebels bypassed Kibati and are in the general area of Munigi, which is about seven km from Goma and close to the Goma airport."  In fact, according to sources in place, it is confirmed that the Goma international Airport is now under the hands of M23”. There is a tremendous pressure from the U.N desperately demanding the M23 not to capture the city of Goma which is supposed to be under the protection of the so called “peace keeping” forces of MONUSCO.  

While many people had been claiming that the M23 movement was a dead born movement simply due to the fact that it had been silent for the last three months, now in only “four days of battles, M23/ARC has advanced closer than at any time in their eight-month uprising to Goma, the provincial capital of North Kivu and home to the headquarters of the U.N. peacekeeping mission in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo”. This is a loud and clear proof that a illequiped government force cannot and will not be able to protect any territory of the DRC when faced with a well determined force with a noble cause. FARDC, the government troops not only lacks any motivation to defend a corrupt, irresponsible and failed state, but is also incapable of holding its position when faced with rebel groups that are fighting for the restoration of a government for the people in the DRC. These troops go to war with only one goal in mind:  win and make a real change for the people that have been taken hostage of a long time tyranny regimes.

It was only yesterday Sunday 18^th, that Colonel Vianney Kazarama, spokesman for the M23, said fighters had advanced to within two kilometres of Goma”.  He added that “ We’re not going to take the airport, we are responding to an attack by the army ... We’re just doing this to break the capacity of the FARDC (Congolese army),” Kazarama told Reuters. In order to give the DRC government the chance to resume the dialogue,  M23 had promised that they would hold their position around five km outside the city of Goma and that fighting would stop for only 24 hours to allow the Kinshasa government to change their position regarding the dialogue.

Unfortunately, the DRC government has once again missed the opportunity to prevent its own embarrassment by refusing to hold a dialogue with M23. Its baseless arrogance has always cost the Kabila regime dearly. The Kinshasa government finds no shame in always whining against Rwanda for all its misery, including protecting its own people.

Curiously, the FARDC troops have been reported to throwing heavy artillery into Rwanda as acts of provocation in order to get an excuse to abandon the city of Goma claiming that it is the Rwandan troops that have captured the city of Goma as a result. Acting cautiously as always, the Rwandan government has purposely ignored these acts of provocation to avoid been once again used as a scapegoat by the failed state of Congo. In light of all these, one wonders why a well respected body such as the UN would choose to support such a corrupt government that has lost total support of its people, and even its military who only relies on the force of UN troops to hold on.

According to a recent defamatory and baseless UN report, it was clearly demonstrated how there are so many grass root based groups in Eastern Congo that are opposed to the current regime due to its inefficiencies, abuses, corrupt policies and practices, and other myriad problems that have resulted in its qualification as a “failed state”. Nonetheless, it is the same UN that instead of listening  and supporting the Eastern Congolese people it has been working hand in hand with the oppressive regime.

According to one UN staff, Dwyer "The United Nations peacekeeping mission, MONUSCO, engaged throughout the day supporting the FARDC to protect civilians and in self-defence, including carrying out sorties and firing from attack helicopter missions that have fired rockets and cannon rounds". Truth be told, MONUSCO is not and has never protected Congolese people. Supporting the Congolese army, it has; but not the Congolese people.

There are some organized peace oriented social and political initiatives aimed at bringing all groups together in order to find a peaceful and lasting solution instead of fighting in the Eastern Congo, that has suffered false labelling by the so called UN reports.  One such initiative is the Alliance pour la Liberation de l’Est du Congo (ALEC), which is an effort to bring together all the various antagonistic groups in order to protect the civilian communities, foster unity and reconciliation by forming joint peaceful actions that are based on the needs and political wishes of Eastern Congolese people. Instead of supporting these initiatives or at least investigating them first, the so called UN experts rush to government officials evidently intimidated and unhappy with the people’s initiated efforts to get a list of people involved and project to them bad intentions and name them in its dishonourable report.

It is important to state that after many consultative meetings with various armed groups, ALEC found that the common wishes and desires of over 85% of people in the Eastern Congo is having their own state. In other words, self-determination through a referendum was expressed by a larger majority as the only best alternative for the people in the Eastern Congo that will bring a lasting peace and development in the Eastern Congo.

However, the UN agency supposedly with a mandate to “protect civilians” with over ten thousand “peacekeeping forces” has turned against the same people it came to protect, and is being used by the Congolese officials to blame and hinder the community leaders promoting such initiatives. When a UN body loses its objectivity and becomes an instrument of a dictatorship regime, it loses its credibility and moral authority.

It is about time that the UN start treating Africans as humans with equal rights with other people. Why is it acceptable for other people in other continents to hold referendum for their self-determination, but not acceptable in Africa? Why do Congolese people who have suffered immensely enough under the western supported tyranny regimes cannot be allowed to exercise their right for self-determination without having to be forced to use violence?