The Imperialists Have Their Claws in the Congo

Edited by John

The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is a resource-rich nation that has been kept underdeveloped by the imperialist bloc of the US, Europe, and their allies. This underdevelopment facilitates the extraction of cheap labor and raw materials for the imperialists. The working class of the DRC, who have been exploited and suppressed by imperialist-backed comprador regimes, deserve to have the right to determine their own country’s destiny, free from imperialist meddling and plunder. On May 19, 2024 a coup was attempted, with the goal of overthrowing the democratically-elected president of the DRC, Félix Tshisekedi. This failed coup was an attempt to keep the DRC firmly under the imperialist yoke and quash any notion of Congolese self-determination.

The full details of May 19th have not yet come to light, but what is known is this: the leader of the coup was a man named Christian Malanga, a Congolese-American businessman living in Utah. Malanga, along with approximately 50 others, initiated fighting with police and security forces at both the Palais de la Nation (the presidential palace) located in the DRC’s capital, Kinshasa, and the nearby residence of Vital Kamerhe, the DRC’s Deputy Prime Minister of Economy. The attempted coup was a resounding failure, ending in the death of Malanga himself and the apprehension of the attackers.

Malanga, 41, was born in the DRC and moved to the United States with his family as part of a refugee resettlement program in 1998. His father, Joseph Itejo Malanga, was a supervisor at a General Motors plant prior to his family’s departure from the country. In 2006, Malanga returned to the DRC and participated in military service there, achieving the rank of captain. In 2012, he returned from the DRC and founded the United Congolese Party, working to garner support within the Congolese diaspora for DRC elections. According to his LinkedIn profile, he ran several small businesses and NGOs operating in the DRC. Catholic, he also participated in a convention for the International Religious Freedom (IRF) Roundtable, a coalition of NGOs in DC. In 2016, he took part in the African Leaders Program in Tbilisi, Georgia, with the backing of the British government. The following year, in 2017, he founded the New Zaire Government in Exile, a supposed replacement for the DRC government, and declared himself to be the President of New Zaire.

To some, this incident may seem like a random act of terror, an alarming but overall aberrant event. Others would correctly identify this as an outcropping of imperialist interventionism, as a political act motivated by US and European interests in Africa. Imperialism is the stage of capitalism where finance capital dominates industrial capital. Capital investment is sent overseas once the domestic market has become oversaturated. This truth is the underlying reason behind the attempted coup; but how specifically, and why?

After decades of colonial rule as Belgian Congo, the DRC gained independence on June 30, 1960. The driving body behind independence was the MNC (Mouvement national Congolais, or the Congolese National Movement in English) led by Patrice Lumumba. Victory for Lumumba would be short-lived, however, as the US and Belgium engineered a coup d’etat led by Mobutu Sese Seko, the chief of staff of the country’s army, on September 14 that same year. Lumumba was executed in January 1961. Mobutu would serve as dictator of the country, renamed Zaire, until his death in 1997. Mobutu’s government enjoyed warm relations with the US and Europe, and the nation’s comprador bourgeoisie profited from massive exports to the countries of the imperialist bloc – exports such as cobalt, diamonds, and copper.

In 1997, Laurent-Désiré Kabila, a guerrilla leader who had worked with Che Guevara, succeeded Mobutu as president. He was assassinated in 2001, and his son, Joseph Kabila, served as president from 2001 to 2019, when he was succeeded by Félix Tshisekedi in a peaceful transition of power.

The contemporary history of the DRC is one marked by destabilization and underdevelopment to serve the economic interests of the imperialist powers; a history interwoven with the instability of Central Africa as a whole. Even a cursory study of African history makes clear that the ‘violence’ and ‘chaos’ of the continent, the civil wars and so on, are the direct result of colonization and genocide at the hands of the US and Europe. In this way, the attempted coup of May 2024 is neither an aberration nor somehow an inevitability, a drop in an ocean of warfare and strife. It is the result of imperialism, and thus is grounded in political economy.

The 2018 elections in the DRC, in which Félix Tshisekedi succeeded Joseph Kabila, were hotly contested and surrounded by controversy. Tshisekedi was rivaled in the elections by Martin Fayulu, a Congolese politician who previously worked for ExxonMobil, serving as the director-general of their operations in Ethiopia. Fayulu, amid accusations that the vote had been fraudulent in favor of Tshisekedi, declared that the elections were illegitimate and that he was the rightful president of the DRC. The Catholic Church, which has a powerful presence in the DRC, was also a strong proponent of claims that the election had been illegitimate. At a 2022 event hosted by the Atlantic Council, a US political think tank, Fayulu discussed the business involvement of China in Africa. The following is an excerpt from an article put out by the Atlantic Council about the event and contains quotes from Fayulu himself.

"In discussing the increasing prevalence of Chinese firms in Africa, Fayulu urged greater US private investment. In recent years, Chinese firms have continued to occupy the African space; however, Van Dam Falk noted the “catch-22” of African countries being hesitant towards Chinese interference. “I think it’s an all-Africa problem,” stated Fayulu, “because the Americans have given away the place.” He discussed the need for US private enterprises to recognize the value of investment in Africa. “With the soft power of the United States, with the technology, with the change of technology, I think we need [the US].”"

The current president of the DRC, Félix Tshisekedi, is the son of Étienne Tshisekedi, who died in 2017 and was one of the primary leaders of the opposition to Mobutu. Now in his second term of office, Tshisekedi has vowed to make the DRC the “Germany of Africa”, pushing for a greater focus on the country’s domestic sphere and keeping more money within its borders rather than being funneled to elsewhere. His biggest first-term endeavors include introducing free primary schooling for Congolese children, and beginning a rollout of free birthing services at hospitals. In the international sphere, Tshisekedi has called for the removal of foreign troops and UN peacekeepers from the DRC, provoking the ire of Rwanda, which has a large military presence there.

From the Marxist perspective, the situation is as follows; the current government of Félix Tshisekedi is seeking to develop the economy and productive forces of the DRC for Congolese benefit, rather than extraction by imperialist powers. At present, the DRC serves as a source of cheap raw materials and the labor to extract them, and the low cost of this labor is dependent on Congolese underdevelopment and impoverishment. This situation is felt by both Congolese workers and some of the country’s domestic bourgeoisie who seek to be able to compete with larger international capitalists. However, the push for decreased reliance on foreign powers has been concerning both for the imperialist powers and for the comprador bourgeoisie of the DRC, the element of the country’s capitalist class who align themselves with the international.

Martin Fayulu is among the comprador bourgeoisie, whose allegiance to ExxonMobil necessitates action on his part to prevent the increase in Congolese economic independence. As is common in elections in the Global South where imperialist interests are threatened, Fayulu and his supporters claimed that the elections were illegitimate and that the government of Tshisekedi must be removed. Some parallels can be drawn between this situation and that of Salvador Allende, President of Chile from 1970 until his overthrow in a 1973 CIA-backed coup. Allende and his government sought to bring progressive and social-democratic reforms to Chile, an effort that was similarly displeasing to both the Chilean comprador and imperialist bourgeoisie.

We can also employ a Marxist analysis of Christian Malanga and his actions. As a businessman living in the United States, Malanga’s class interests aligned with those of the imperialists. His political work with the United Congolese Party and his involvement with Western NGOs are evidence that his goals did not include economic and political self-determination for the DRC. Rather, they point to an allegiance to the imperialist bloc and the continued imperialist domination of the DRC.

The history of imperialist intervention in the Global South is one of imperialist agents facilitating coups and rebellions. From the 1965 CIA-backed coup against President Sukarno of Indonesia and the subsequent massacre of communists, to the 1973 overthrow of Salvador Allende in Chile and the installation of the fascist Pinochet regime, the imperialists are well known for their willingness to employ state power violently in securing their economic interests around the world. Malanga’s public Facebook profile reveals that in August 2023, he met with US politicians in Washington DC. Among them were John Price, former United States Ambassador to Mauritius and the Seychelles, and Robert Bishop, a former US Congressman.

The level of US involvement in the attempted coup is currently unknown. What is clear, however, is that the events of May 19th were in the interests of the imperialists. Had this coup succeeded, any progress made by the people of the DRC to develop their country for their own benefit rather than for the profits of the imperialists, would likely have been undone. The coup, regardless of all the parties involved, served as a probing attack on the defenses of Tshisekedi’s government, to test its resilience.

As Marxists, it is not enough to simply know what events have happened or even to gain an academic understanding of why. We must also try to understand what comes next. For the situation in the DRC, this suggests that similar events and political intensity can be anticipated in the region in the near-to-intermediate future.

What, then, can workers and organizers in the US do about this? How can we act in solidarity with the people of the DRC in a meaningful way? And, how does this situation ultimately impact us? The struggles of the people of the DRC and the struggle of workers in the US are not separate. They are part of the same process. The capitalists that exploit the labor of the proletariat here are the same ones oppressing and exploiting the Global South. They are a common enemy, one that must be defeated to improve both our circumstances. To show solidarity with the Congolese people, the working class of the US must be organized, not just economically but politically. Advancing political consciousness while building worker organizations such as workers’ councils is the way for the proletariat of the US to increase their power relative to the capitalist class.

Ultimately, at scale, this high degree of organization will allow US workers to conduct both economic strikes to improve their own conditions and political strikes for political demands. As is the case with labor and Palestine, organizing workers is necessary to bring the workers’ movement to a point where it can exercise its power by shutting down ports, rail lines, and industry to hinder the material ability of the imperialists to conduct their oppression abroad. This is the building of Revolutionary Democratic Control by the Working Class; we must weaken the beast both by denying its ability to extract resources around the world and disrupting operations within the imperialist core.

Christian Malanga’s attempted May 2024 coup in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is a case study in imperialism, that provides us a window into the economic and political necessities of the imperialist machine. Through this study, we can understand our own tasks and continue the fight for revolution.