There are phrases that endure because they are true. Whereas others survive because they are elegant. And then there are those that survive since they provide comfort to people who do not wish to challenge themselves.
When veteran Belgian journalist—Colette Braeckman wrote in Le Soir on 2 November 2022 that “The Congo Has No Friend but Itself,” she focused on something painful as well as important. But she stopped halfway.
Because if one follows her argument fairly to its conclusion, another sentence emerges—more uncomfortable, less romantic, and substantially more useful: The Congo has no other enemy but itself.
That phrase may sound harsh or malicious. Yet, it is not. Cruelty is letting a nation continue believing that all its disasters arrive from elsewhere. Meanness is telling a patient with a chronic illness that every symptom is triggered by the weather. Malice is confusing diagnosis with consolation.
In addition, if there is one country that merits diagnosis instead of solace, it is the Democratic Republic of Congo. For many years, DR Congo has been treated concurrently as victim, battlefield, opportunity, symbol, laboratory, calamity and accusation.
Every Tom, Dick, and Harry has explained Congo. Until now, very few have demanded that Congo explain itself. Also, that is where Braeckman’s editorial becomes both perceptive and incomplete.
She began with a question: “When will the Congolese finally understand that their country is too vast and too rich to have sincere friends?” It is a memorable line that sounds somehow wise. But then—please, look closely. The question softly assumes that Congo’s tragedy starts with dishonest friends.
Supposing the tragedy begins elsewhere? What if the profounder problem is not that Congo has bad friends but that Congo constantly confuses dependency for strategy and victimhood for politics? Isn’t the real enemy not outside the gates but inside the house?
Because if Congo’s misfortune is described primarily by the absence of sincere friends—then one has already started from a dangerous premise: that Congo’s main misfortune lies outside itself.
She continued: “Today, we know that Leopold II did not send Henry Morton Stanley to secure a colony because he wished to carry out a civilizing mission.” Maybe, correct. King Leopold’s project was perhaps one of the greatest exercises in organized hypocrisy in modern political history. Progress, civilization and Christianity. Only three lovely words draped around forced labor and mutilation.
She writes: “We know that if Belgium accepted the colonial inheritance, it did so only on the condition that the venture would cost it nothing.” Also generally right. “And if independence was granted—too quickly—it was mainly to avoid costly unrest…” Yet again, hard to dispute.
But then the argument gently shifts. From there emerges a broader thesis: Congo over and over again trusted outsiders, and outsiders repeatedly deceived Congo.
Such a reading is emotionally satisfying but incomplete. Since there comes a point where explanation turns into exoneration.
And no country—especially one of Congo’s geographical size, mineral wealth, population, strategic importance and historical depth—can forever survive on explanations that ultimately become excuses.
*The King Who is DRC’s Original Sin*
There should be no nostalgia in debating colonial Congo. King Leopold II did not land carrying civilization in one hand and development in another. He reached with contracts, quotas, soldiers and accounting books.
The Congo Free State, established in 1885 under Leopold’s personal ownership, remains one of the most extraordinary political scandals in modern history. Yes, a Belgian king owned a country larger than western Europe. He owned—not governed.
Millions of Congolese became variables in extraction of rubber and ivory. He enjoyed forced labor and heartless punishments. He symbolized mutilation and fear.
Adam Hochschild’s King Leopold’s Ghost—remains among the most available reconstructions of that dreadfulness. Depending on missionary records, diplomatic archives and eyewitness testimonies—we know what happened to the Congolese under this monarch.
Entire Congolese communities became production units. Hands were chopped and converted into receipts. The severed hands turned out to be one of history’s most outrageous administrative symbols. That, not because amputations were unique to King Leopold’s Congo—but because bureaucratic cruelty was normalized.
Congo did not arise from colonialism, simply poor. It emerged structurally defaced. The country’s institutions were never intended to empower Congolese citizens.
They were designed or planned to move wealth outward. Railways connected mines to ports. Administration secured low paid labor. Education remained purposefully shallow.
Colonial administration did not prepare Congo for self-government because self-government was never the point. And, here—Braeckman is right to remind readers that Belgium’s transfer of power was never entirely noble.
Belgium withdrew in 1960 in fright. Not because Congolese had abruptly become governable—but because colonial governance had become untenable. The transfer of power happened with shocking irresponsibility. At independence, there were very few Congolese university graduates.
Which is why bureaucracy remained Belgian. They made sure the military remained unstable— and the economy externally controlled. Then came the cataclysm.
*The Punishment of Independent Congo*
If there is one episode that negatively transformed Congo’s future more than any other, it was not just independence. It was the removal of Patrice Lumumba. For the Belgians and the West, Lumumba represented something dangerous.
Not communism or radicalism. Not even nationalism. Lumumba represented unpredictability. He was a politician who appeared unenthusiastic to remain manageable by outsiders. Besides, in Cold War politics, that was often treated as a greater crime than a corrupt and cruel dictatorship.
The record of what happened is now extensive. Belgian officials’ involvement. Western intelligence apprehensions. There were internal Congolese rivalries, and some regional calculations.
Lumumba was isolated and ultimately murdered and his body dissolved in a container of acid. His death became the symbolic birth of a Congo constantly told that sovereignty existed—but only within approved parameters. Then came Mobutu, a dictator the whole world pretended not to notice.
Braeckman quotes Mobutu’s late reflection: “I was expecting friends; I found accountants.” It is such an authoritative phrase. But perhaps not for the reasons intended. Mobutu himself had once been one of history’s most costly accounting projects.
For all the years in power, Brussels tolerated him. Washington supported him and Paris accommodated him. And, remarkably—international financial institutions financed him.
Why? He was not very useful against communism. Mobutu was valuable for a semblance of stability and for business. Particularly, dubious deals. He remained useful until he became inconvenient.
Mobutu was not simply an organic national outcome. He existed in a system of mutual benefit. He ruled through patronage, where foreign actors gained access to the country’s resources.
As Mobutu accumulated wealth—the population paid. The result became kleptocracy elevated into political philosophy. Railways and roads collapsed.
Health services deteriorated as schools weakened. State authority became theatrical as the Rumba music industry boomed. Nonetheless, remarkably—Congo remained extremely rich in terms of natural resources.
The oxymoron deepened. People many times asked: How can one of the richest countries in natural resources continue to be among the poorest? The normal answer is exploitation. But exploitation only can’t elucidate over six decades of failures.
At some point one must ask tougher questions. Where did the state capacity go? Why do institutions repeatedly flop? Why do militia groups increase in numbers? Why did political accountability disappear? Why does corruption endure as regimes change? These are painful questions because they move responsibility inward.
*Looking for Foreign Villains*
Braeckman writes that Mobutu’s successors repeated the same mistakes. She observes: “Laurent-Désiré Kabila believed he could rely on neighboring countries…”
This may sound true. But the statement risks understating something important. Laurent Kabila did not simply rely on regional actors. His alliances emerged through regional military and security realities.
When relations worsened, confrontation followed. Once more—not uncommon. History is full of coalitions collapsing. But DR Congo established something more perilous. They made it a political habit.
Every single crisis eventually became somebody else’s conspiracy. Colonialism or imperialism. Then Rwanda, Uganda or China. At some point multinationals; regional alliances or hidden enemies.
DRC is a country with always someone to blame. Certainly not enough self-examination. For sure, neighboring countries did not create Congolese corruption. Neighbors did not design parallel administrations or invent ghost payrolls.
There is no foreigner who invented the country’s military fragmentation. Neighbors did not invent bureaucratic rent-seeking. And, undoubtedly—did not invent the normalization of armed groups as political instruments.
This is where difficult honesty commences. A state cannot over and over again tolerate parallel authorities, sponsor militias including genocidal FDLR, negotiate with mercenaries and then claim sovereignty has been violated only from outside.
There is a paradox there. A deep one. Apparently, Congo’s tragedy increasingly lives inside that illogicality.
Every Congolese failure holds a foreign passport. If the colonial period disfigured Congo’s institutions, the postcolonial years improved something equally destructive: the habit of externalization.
Externalization is political pseudo-science which turns failures into conspiracies. It converts accountability into victimhood. This provides emotional relief while creating institutional paralysis.
Besides, nowhere has this become more visible than in present-day Congolese political discourse.
The outline is familiar. If communication infrastructure collapse—someone else did it. When armed groups multiply—someone else sponsors them. When elections fail—there is foreign interference. In case corruption flourishes—international exploitation. When communities turn against one another—external manipulation.
Unquestionably foreign interests exist. No serious person rejects this. All governments pursue interests. Just as business companies pursue profit. Certainly, regional actors pursue security. That is not outrageous. It is the order of international politics.
The shame commences when leaders behave as if outsiders are in charge of governing Congo. They are not—at all. Braeckman’s editorial captures this paradox without entirely challenging it.
Braeckman observes of Félix Tshisekedi: “who had not emerged in first place in the elections, multiplied foreign trips in search of external legitimacy…” That observation deserves expansion and attention.
Some states, especially DRC—seem to believe legitimacy is like a mineral that can be imported. Since legitimacy brought in from abroad rarely endures domestic realities. International round of applause cannot pave or repair roads.
Diplomatic handshakes can’t substitute functioning institutions. Photo opportunities in Washington or somewhere in Europe do not defeat insurgencies. Similarly, external commendations cannot build national cohesion. A state survives because citizens believe in it. Not because foreign ambassadors do.
*Congo’s Curse is Mismanagement*
Among the most tireless myths about DR Congo is that its natural wealth itself is the problem. Individuals repeat versions of the phrase: “Congo is too rich to know peace.”
This may sound graceful, but it is equally misleading. Natural wealth doesn’t produce failure— mismanagement does. Countries rich in resources don’t inevitably become disasters. The difference lies in national institutions.
Congo possesses enormous reserves of copper, cobalt, coltan, gold, diamonds, other strategic minerals, forests and fertile land. These resources attract attention, which is common. What is abnormal is acting surprised that valuable assets invite competition.
The question must never be: Why do others want Congo’s resources? The real question should be: Why has Congo again and again failed to transform its resources into broad national prosperity?
Braeckman writes: “Today, cobalt, coltan, and lithium enable Chinese companies to dominate the energy transition while the people of Katanga breathe dust.”
There is truth in that image. Indeed, dust is visible. Mineral mining leaves marks. Mining towns have social and environmental costs. But there is something historically selective about invoking dust only now.
Katanga did not start breathing dust when Chinese investments came. Lubumbashi did not all of a sudden discover mining. Kolwezi did not become industrial in 2022. And, Likasi did not wake up one morning and discover cobalt mining.
For decades, under Belgian corporate dominance, mining proceeded with little or no concern for social justice. Whole economic geographies developed around moving value outward.
The mines enriched others long before Chinese companies appeared. The Uranium which was used to make atomic bombs which destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki came from Katanga.
If reproach starts only after new investors arrive, history becomes discriminatory. Such selective memory looks like political nostalgia disguised as concern. The issue is not whether Chinese companies should be criticized. Of course they should—when necessary.
Every major actor has a duty to. The problem is consistency. If minerals’ exploitation is objectionable—it should remain insupportable regardless of language, flag or investment model.
But even that does not answer the fundamental questions: Who administers the provinces? Who allocates the mining concessions? Who negotiates and signs the contracts? Who audits institutions or taxes the operations? Who appoints officials to follow up the mines? And, finally—who benefits?
Those answers point inward. They expose the convenient layout of blame. For instance, Braeckman turns toward Congo’s neighbors: “Rwanda became the leading producer of coltan, Angola an oil power, Uganda inaugurated Africa’s largest gold refinery, and Kenya acquired the country’s major banks…”
This statement is rhetorically effective. However, logically— it creates a misleading comparison. Countries developing sectors are not automatically evidence of theft.
Rwanda producing processed exports does not enlighten Congolese institutional weakness and failure. Angola’s oil production does not explain administrative downfall in the DRC. Uganda refining gold does not explain military fragmentation. Kenyan banks operating regionally do not explain local corruption in Kinshasa.
The hurting truth is that DRC’s neighbors didn’t create Congo’s inability to control violence or the steadfastness of armed entrepreneurs. Neighboring countries did not create the long-lasting inability to convert demographic size into state capacity.
Those are internal political problems. And they become even harder when genocide ideology from FDLR enters national governance.
Perhaps the most serious paradox in modern Congo is this: The loudest defenders of sovereignty— at times weaken sovereignty most.
Any state claims exclusive authority over force. Once force becomes outsourced, negotiated or delegated to mercenaries and genocidaires for an indefinite period, sovereignty weakens.
Eastern Congo illustrates this dilemma repeatedly. Armed groups arise. Some are local while others have regional dimensions. Some, purely pursue profit—when others invoke community defense. Some invoke identity—while others raise grievances.
Nonetheless, over time a perilous vocabulary develops. Militias become “self-defense” or “patriots.” When violence grows into nationalism—criminality acquires moral prestige.
*Congo’s Mirror and Advice from Belgium*
Braeckman concludes: “In reality, the Congo’s only ally is its own population.” This may be the strongest statement in the editorial. It deserves applause, but also examination because it raises another question.
Because if Congo’s population is its only ally today, one may reasonably ask: who helped ensure that institutions capable of serving that population remained weak, centralized and extractive?
Belgium’s wealth did not emerge in isolation from Congo. No thoughtful economic historian disputes that colonial minerals like diamonds and gold enriched Belgium. So is rubber, ivory, timber…extraction contributed materially to Belgian development.
However, that does not mean modern Belgium owes explanation for every Congolese failure. It does mean moral consistency needs admitting how historical structures shape present realities. Still, even this truth has boundaries.
Although colonial history elucidates much, it explains neither everything nor forever. Otherwise one comes to an absurd conclusion: That Congolese born over sixty years after independence remain administered entirely by ghosts.
It is right that history influences—but, it doesn’t govern. Otherwise no postcolonial society could ever recover. The unfathomable question therefore is: what does a nation do after acknowledging historical injustice?
Should it continue narrating injury, or build functioning institutions? The answer to this matters a great deal. They turned this memory into an ideology of an excuse not to govern properly.
If the population is the only ally—who has repeatedly failed that population? Colonialism undoubtedly did. Foreign powers certainly, negatively did. However, independence introduced new actors—but did not nationalize virtue.
A flag doesn’t automatically produce competence integrity. The harsh truth is that most of Congo’s deepest wounds have increasingly become self-inflicted. Not because outsiders disappeared.
But for the reason that—internal systems learned to benefit from dysfunction. That is where Braeckman’s title deserves completion. Sure. The Congo has no friend to trust but itself. But it is equally true that Congo has no enemy but itself. No outsider can damage Congo as unfailingly, efficiently and confidentially as Congolese politicians.
*Conclusion*
There is a form of advice more dangerous than hostility. It is flattery. Hostility can provoke resistance. Truth can provoke reflection, but flattery sedates. And that may be where Colette Braeckman’s otherwise important editorial becomes suddenly dangerous.
What is hazardous, isn’t because her historical opinions are incorrect, or her intentions are insincere, and certainly not because foreign actors have not played devastating roles in Congolese history. What is perilous is the framework which risks giving DR Congo something it has received in too many quantities for decades. Which is—comfort without correction, empathy without accountability, and emotional relief in place of political analysis.
To continually tell a country that its primary tragedy is caused by deceitful friends, greedy neighbors, predatory investors and never-ending external treachery is just emotionally satisfying. It encourages, consoles and promotes national feeling. But socially and politically, it is intoxicating.
Since, as soon as a nation becomes addicted to exterior explanations, it slowly develops immunity to introspection. Every displeasure becomes proof of conspiracy. Every single observed weakness becomes evidence of sabotage. Each institutional failure becomes confirmation that enemies are too powerful.
The result is extraordinary: failure itself becomes psychologically comforting because it no longer requires reform. If others are always responsible, then accountability comes to be unnecessary.
Just imagine a physician probing a patient whose habits are destroying him. The patient drinks poison every day—refuses treatment, disregards prescriptions and rubbish discipline. Yet every time he visits the clinic, the physician avoids difficult conversations and instead says: “I think the weather is very bad.”
The patient leaves at peace. He feels understood and innocent. Weeks later his condition deteriorates. Again he visits the physician who avoids diagnosis and says: “I think your neighbors are stressing you.” Once more, the patient feels vindicated. Months and years pass, as the disease advances. The doctor becomes appreciated for kind-heartedness and sensitivity. The patient becomes admired for patience—without improvement.
The above hypothetical example of a patient doctor relationship shows where kindness can become negligence, and when empathy becomes malpractice. At a certain point refusing to tell hard truths becomes participation in decline. That is the risk of certain forms of political analysis. They act like anesthesia or a strong painkiller. They take away pain without removing disease. They create relief without recovery. One feels better—yet nothing actually gets better.
And Congo has received this anesthesia for decades. It was administered by colonialism, cold war geopolitics, international diplomacy and regional politics. And each has its own versions. Certain intellectuals and journalists continue to administer it today. All and sundry explains Congo’s suffering in ways that preserve its moral innocence—assuring the country that its pain proves its virtue.
While all these explanations circulate and repeat themselves, roads vanish, corruption becomes administrative culture, institutions weaken—and citizens adapt to dysfunction as though instability were climate rather than politics.
There is something more or less narcotic about perpetual victimhood. It makes someone feel emotionally elevated without material transformation. It generates the sensation of movement while standing still. It rewards pomposity more than reform. It allows politicians to sound revolutionary while governing administratively exhausted systems.
Soon the entire political culture starts behaving like an individual under the influence: animated in speech, determined in declaration, passionately charged, always mobilized—and yet basically unable to change the conditions of life. Very high on narratives—but very low on results.
Then again, nations don’t make progress through intoxication. They recover through painful clear-headedness. Sobriety means asking questions that rarely produce applause and never generate standing ovations. Who looked away? Who normalized armed intermediaries? Who changed public office into private opportunity? Who repeated the same blunders and retitled them patriotism?
Such questions are painful because they can’t be outsourced. They don’t permit easy enemies. Those questions are not anti-Congo—but enormously pro-Congo because they force people to look inward. A genuine adviser is not someone who protects national feelings— but the one who protects national potentials.
The friend who says, “Nothing is your mistake,” may feel empathetic in the moment, but the friend who openly says, “Look carefully and at what you are doing to yourself,” may actually save your life.
And maybe that is the challenging phrase DRC most needs to hear: stop searching for enemies in neighboring and distant capitals while ignoring the ones sitting in public offices. Stop imagining that sovereignty consists of accusing others while postponing reform. End mistaking explanation for transformation.
Because if Congo truly has no friend but itself, then it must also accept the harder possibility that no enemy has damaged it more consistently than the parts of itself that learned to survive without changing.
Here are important facts: No foreign government can institutionalize corruption without local participation. No investor can sign contracts alone. No neighboring state can permanently replace domestic responsibility. No outsider can sustain dysfunction ad infinitum where internal discipline exists. Nations do not become sovereign by mastering accusation. They become sovereign by mastering self-correction. And the day Congo stops treating honesty as hostility and flattery as solidarity—that may finally be the day recovery begins.
The future of DR Congo will not be determined by Brussels. Not by Washington or Beijing. Not by Nairobi or Kigali. And, not by Luanda or by Kampala. Those capitals may influence results, but can’t replace agency. The toughest guidance DR Congo needs, is where Braeckman’s deduction becomes toughest. She wrote: “Instead of rushing from one foreign capital to another, begging for ambiguous support and squandering resources, Congolese leaders would urgently do better to invest in their own people…”
Absolutely. But the phrase shouldn’t end there. Real investment in people is not simply rhetoric. It is political, social and economic. Investing in people, means building a state that does not classify citizens by convenience. It means rejecting myths whether colonial or nationalist.
