DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO: Sunday's polls are unlikely to end a decade of war and restiveness, writes Félim McMahon
"Congo for the Congolese! You should leave us alone. You and Louis Michel!"
The Democratic Republic of Congo township of Kingasani was a dangerous place for les blancs on Tuesday, as some of Kinshasa's poorest and most disenfranchised citizens demonstrated their discontent with the international community, the democratic process and their pitiful living conditions.
At a dusty crossroads a group of around 200 young men railed against all things foreign, as a constant stream of military aircraft roared overhead, bringing supplies to some 18,000 foreign troops stationed in the country.
The protesters were supporters of the Union for Democracy and Social Progress (known by its French acronym UDPS), which is boycotting elections scheduled for Sunday.
Yesterday Vice-President Jean Pierre Bemba, the Ugandan-backed warlord whose power base is in northern Congo, where he is suspected of involvement in war crimes, arrived in Kinshasa.
He was greeted by jubilant supporters - and violence on the streets. A house occupied by his bodyguards - he reportedly has a private army numbering 4,000 - went up in flames. Two children were reported dead in the incident, and at least one man was shot dead at the city's stadium.
Sunday's polls are supposed to draw a line under 10 years of war and restiveness in Congo, a failed state two-thirds the size of western Europe with a population estimated at 60 million.
This fractious country of more than 200 tribes has enjoyed just six months of democratically elected leadership in 45 years of independence, with tribally aligned strongmen backed by powerful allies abroad traditionally taking the lead.
The UDPS was founded in the 1980s, when Zaire was still a one-party state. Its leader, Étienne Tshisekedi, was once cold war dictator Mobutu Sese Seko's most formidable opponent.
Back in Kingasani, searching for the remains of what was once the country's democratic opposition, I was surrounded by a xenophobic mob in a part of town that my taxi driver, who lives there, calls hell.
I assured one protester I wasn't a personal friend of former Belgian foreign minister Louis Michel. Michel, the EU's Belgian commissioner for development and humanitarian aid, enjoys a close relationship with President Joseph Kabila and has close links with the political, military and mining clique that has called the shots in much of Congo since 1997. "We cannot accept this election process. This is not democracy," the UDPS man told me.
My search for Congo's democratic heirs ended with my taxi driver advising me to lie on the floor of his car as it sped away while being pelted with stones and bottles.
According to a local survey of 1,000 voters, 40 per cent of the electorate would like UDPS leader Tshisekedi to be the next president, but his party is contesting neither the presidential nor legislative polls. The unarmed UDPS pulled out of the process, claiming it favours those who fought their way into power.
It is true that the former belligerents were rewarded, by the 2003 peace accords, with the balance of power in a transitional government that was more like a feeding trough than a forum for democratic nation-building.
"Senior positions in the administration and state-run enterprises were shared between signatories [ of the peace accords], and state resources were siphoned off to fund election campaigns and private accounts," said the International Crisis Group in its latest report on the country.
The result is a crisis of confidence in the electoral process, which may translate into a crisis of legitimacy after the elections.
Most people in the war-torn east of Congo want this election, and would vote for the devil if he offered peace and prosperity.
An election planned for 1997 was shelved following a Rwandan invasion, supported by Uganda, which brought a little-known anti-Mobutu rebel turned smuggler to power. Laurent Kabila came from the mineral-rich eastern province of Katanga, and ruled by decree. His attempts to break from Rwandan tutelage led to the 1998-2003 war, which led to four million deaths.
Kabila was assassinated in 2001 and his son, Joseph (30), was persuaded to take over.
With his war chest swollen from the proceeds of years in government, Kabila is slogging it out with Bemba and 33 other candidates for the presidency.
Nine thousand are standing for election to parliament. With just four weeks of campaigning allowed, the public is confused.
Many Congolese cannot reconcile themselves to the fact that the upshot of the latest intervention here, which has cost the international community $5 billion, could be the reappointment of Joseph Kabila as president.