VZCZCXRO1478
PP RUEHBZ RUEHDU RUEHGI RUEHJO RUEHMR RUEHRN
DE RUEHKI #0102/01 0291557
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 291557Z JAN 07
FM AMEMBASSY KINSHASA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 5492
INFO RUEHXR/RWANDA COLLECTIVE
RUCNSAD/SOUTHERN AFRICAN DEVELOPMENT COMMUNITY
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHDC
RHEFDIA/DIA WASHDC
RHMFISS/HQ USEUCOM VAIHINGEN GE
RUFOADA/JAC MOLESWORTH RAF MOLESWORTH UK

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 KINSHASA 000102 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV KDEM CG ELECTIONS
SUBJECT: KABILA ALLIES WIN EIGHT OF NINE GUBERNATORIAL RACES 
 
¶1. (U) Summary: Candidates allied with the pro-Kabila 
Alliance for the Presidential Majority (AMP) won eight of 
nine gubernatorial contests January 27, including Kinshasa. 
Jean-Pierre Bemba's Union for the Nation (UfN) coalition won 
just one race, in Equateur province. Elections in the two 
Kasai provinces were postponed due to last-minute legal 
challenges against UfN candidates. The victories give the AMP 
coalition control over nearly every newly-elected government 
institution. End summary. 
 
¶2. (U) Provincial deputies elected governors and vice 
governors in nine of the DRC's eleven provinces January 27. 
Candidates allied with President Kabila's AMP coalition won 
six of the nine contests, in the provinces of Bandundu, 
Katanga, Kinshasa, Maniema, Orientale, and South Kivu. All of 
them are from the People's Party for Reconstruction and 
Democracy (PPRD). Two independents, both allied with the AMP, 
were elected in Bas-Congo and North Kivu. Bemba's Movement 
for the Liberation of Congo (MLC) won the gubernatorial 
contest in the former Vice President's home province of 
Equateur. 
 
¶3. (U) The AMP victories give the pro-Kabila coalition 
majority control over most of the new government institutions 
at nearly every level. It now has paper majorities in the 
National Assembly, the Senate and eight of the eleven 
provincial assemblies, and holds at least eight of the DRC's 
eleven governorships. Kabila ally Antoine Gizenga of PALU was 
designated as Prime Minister on December 30 and is expected 
to nominate an AMP-dominated slate of ministers later this 
week. 
 
¶4. (U) Elections were not held in Western and Eastern Kasai 
because of a last-minute legal challenge (septel). An 
AMP-allied party on January 25 called upon the Independent 
Electoral Commission (CEI) to invalidate the candidacies of 
Alex Kande and Dominique Kanku, who are running as MLC 
candidates in Western and Eastern Kasai, respectively. The 
challenge alleges the two possess dual nationality. According 
to DRC law, elected officials and candidates can only have 
Congolese citizenship. The CEI postponed the elections in the 
Kasais until February 10 to respond to the allegations and to 
a January 26 appellate court decision validating Kanku'scandidacy. 
 
¶5. (SBU) The AMP coalition victory i Kinshasa is surprising. 
The winning candidate, ndre Kimbuta (PPRD), a well-known 
sports and socer promoter, defeated heavily favored 
businessman Adam Bombole (MLC), head of the MLC's Kinshasa 
capter. The UfN controls the majority of the capita's 
provincial assembly, which on January 13 had lected an 
entire slate of UfN-affiliated deputie to the chamber's 
executive secretariat. Kinshasa residents voted heavily in 
favor of Bemba and Uf candidates in the July and October 
presidential legislative and provincial elections. 
 
¶6. (SBU)The results from the Bas-Congo election will likel 
be challenged by the UfN. An adviser to Leonard uka, the MLC 
gubernatorial candidate who lost byone vote, said the 
election must proceed to a seond round as no candidate 
received an "absolute ajority" of votes. (Note: The DRC 
electoral law states in gubernatorial elections a run-off is 
held if no candidate wins an absolute majority in the first 
round. End note.) Independent candidate Simon Mbatshi was 
declared the winner with 15 of 29 votes cast, while Fuka 
received the remaining 14. Fuka's camp claims that to win an 
"absolute majority" a candidate must have gained half of the 
available votes, plus one. In a creative interpretation of 
the law, Fuka's camp maintains this means 16 of the 29 votes 
(14.5 plus one, rounded up) are necessary. 
 
¶7. (SBU) In North Kivu, outgoing governor Eugene Serufuli, 
realizing he could not win, threw his support to the AMP 
candidate, Jean Chrysostome Vahamwiti. Serufuli's support did 
not prove sufficient for Vahamwiti. The winner was the mayor 
of Beni, Julien Paluku, who ran as an independent but is a 
member of Mbusa Nyamwisi's RCD-K/ML party, which is allied 
with the AMP. Paluku is an ethnic Nande and appears to have 
been elected based largely on that criteria in an effort to 
blunt Hutu influence in the provincial government. Paluku's 
election is also a victory for Nyamwisi both over his North 
Kivu political rival Serufuli and the AMP's national 
leadership, which had backed Vahamwiti. 
 
¶8. (U) The other gubernatorial winners are: provincial 
medical inspector Richard Ndambu (PPRD, Bandundu), former 
 
KINSHASA 00000102  002 OF 002 
 
 
Minister of Public Works and Infrastructure Jose Makila (MLC, 
Equateur), businessman and National Assembly deputy Moise 
Katumbi (PPRD, Katanga), Didier Manara (PPRD, Maniema), 
outgoing Orientale Vice Governor Medard Autasi (PPRD, 
Orientale), and Kabila adviser Celestin Cibalonza (PPRD, 
South Kivu). 
 
¶9. (SBU) Comment: The results of the Kinshasa gubernatorial 
ballot in particular are a clear sign that indirect elections 
by provincial deputies in no way represents the will of 
voters. The UfN holds 27 of the assembly's 48 seats, 
indicating that some form of vote-influencing took place. A 
pro-Kabila governor in a city that voted heavily in favor of 
Bemba, coupled with a pro-Bemba provincial assembly, is a 
recipe for gridlock and a source of tension. The result of 
this and other indirect elections risks popular 
disillusionment with Congo's new democracy. It should also be 
noted, however, that AMP "control" over the new institutions 
of government is less solid than it may appear at first 
glance. The AMP coalition has a variety of competing 
individuals and factions within it, and are not necessarily 
united on a variety of fundamental issues. There are a lot of 
politics to be played out in the weeks and months ahead. End 
comment. 
MEECE