Ever since the Congo became independent, foreign forces have been present. From Jadotville to Goma, the foreign foreces have taken many guises - peacekeepers, mercenaries, rebel armies and government forces of Uganda and Rwanda. But what would happen if foreign forces left?
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00:00Foreign forces have patrolled the Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo for the last three decades.
00:05Picture rebel groups, UN peacekeepers, the Congolese National Army, mercenaries and even special intervention brigades.
00:12But after years of endless violence and over 6 million deaths, many Congolese have grown tired and hopeless,
00:18and now want all foreign troops to leave so that for once and for all, the DRC would have true sovereignty.
00:25We also want to see all the rebels who have already occupied the different entities leave the Congolese soil.
00:34So what would happen if all foreign troops left? Welcome to the flip side.
00:39Congolese President Felix Tshisekedi wanted the UN peacekeeping mission MONUSCO to leave his country so badly
00:46that he made it an election campaign promise.
00:49But in early 2025, an alliance of rebel groups spearheaded by the Rwanda-backed M23
00:56captured Goma, the capital of North Kivu province in the mineral-rich east.
01:03The Congolese army, backed by pro-government militia, was unable to stop the rebels,
01:08which points to a fundamental problem.
01:11The weakness of the Congolese administration has created both insecurity and a political vacuum in the east of the country,
01:18which has then been manipulated by these foreign forces.
01:21Back in 2016, the DRC had already faced an insurrection in the southern Kasai provinces.
01:27We saw both the civilian administration and the national army able to go into the Kasais to put that insurrection down
01:34and also to maintain basic stability and services for the domestic population.
01:40So, when at once, the DRC can assert control.
01:43But the threat in Kasai was relatively minor compared to the situation near Goma.
01:49The present crisis is snowballing.
01:51It is impossible to control.
01:54It is what we define in the conflict studies as a collapsing situation.
02:00It is really that Kinshasa has refused to control this territory.
02:05They see it as too messy, too much of a distraction from other objectives of the state.
02:10Stopping rebel groups the Congolese government sees as a threat, like the Rwanda-backed M23,
02:15is why, historically, foreign troops from the Southern African Development Community, the UN,
02:20and the East African Community have been deployed to stabilize the eastern Congo.
02:25But with little success.
02:28While the outcomes have been mixed, we recognize that achieving a lasting stability is a gradual process rather than a single event.
02:37We express our deepest gratitude to the South African National Defence Force, SANDF,
02:43for their continued support and education to the peace in the DRC during this difficult period.
02:49So again, what if those foreign forces left the DRC?
02:53I'm not sure this would be a good idea.
02:55Because, you know, you have people without the presence of the state.
03:00Those troops, local troops, are created as the way to defend themselves in communities.
03:07So imagine now, if you have no government state and now all those international troops, the situation would be worse.
03:16And there's another risk.
03:17We would see the entire array of other rebel groups in eastern Congo that are opposed to the Congolese state rise up and fill that space.
03:29That's one of the things I think that's been forgotten in the context of the current M23 crisis.
03:34So if all foreign forces left the DRC, it would undoubtedly leave behind a chaotic power vacuum
03:41instead of the stability and sovereignty that the Congolese people desperately want.
03:46And that's the flip side.