{"id":303753,"date":"2025-09-29T12:00:39","date_gmt":"2025-09-29T11:00:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=303753"},"modified":"2025-10-06T14:26:40","modified_gmt":"2025-10-06T13:26:40","slug":"congos-6-billion-heist-lawmakers-feast-teachers-starve","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2025\/09\/congos-6-billion-heist-lawmakers-feast-teachers-starve\/","title":{"rendered":"Congo\u2019s $6 Billion Heist: Lawmakers Feast, Teachers Starve"},"content":{"rendered":"

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24 Sep 2025\u00a0<\/em>–\u00a0In Kinshasa, thieves don\u2019t hide in shadows\u2014they wear suits, sit in Parliament, and call themselves \u201cleaders.\u201dWhat follows is not rumor. It is a record of organized plunder that has crippled one of Africa\u2019s richest nations.<\/p>\n

Since Mister F\u00e9lix Tshisekedi took power in 2019, the Democratic Republic of Congo has been looted with a brazenness that shocks even by Congo\u2019s long history of kleptocracy. If you want power here, the qualification isn\u2019t vision, it\u2019s theft. If you want reward, you don\u2019t serve\u2014you steal.<\/p>\n

A brief timeline of Betrayal<\/h3>\n
    \n
  • 2019<\/strong>: $15 million siphoned in kickbacks, implicating Vital Kamerhe, then Tshisekedi\u2019s chief of staff. Today, he is rewarded\u2014now presiding over the National Assembly.<\/li>\n
  • The \u201c100 Days Program\u201d<\/strong>: $600 million stolen.<\/li>\n
  • Prefab Housing Scam<\/strong>: $57 million gone.<\/li>\n
  • Francophonie Summit<\/strong>: $324 million pocketed.<\/li>\n
  • Chili-Gelou Project<\/strong>: $102 million looted.<\/li>\n
  • COVID-19 Relief<\/strong>: $300 million siphoned while Congolese choked on poverty and disease.<\/li>\n
  • RAM Project (cellphone tax)<\/strong>: $600 million bled from citizens.<\/li>\n
  • National ID Scheme<\/strong>: $697 million evaporated\u2014leaving Congo the only nation on Earth where citizens still lack official ID cards.<\/li>\n
  • Arms Procurement<\/strong>: $722 million gone, while eastern Congo continues to burn.<\/li>\n
  • Mercenaries, \u201cCivil House,\u201d Satellite Project<\/strong>: Hundreds of millions more scattered like ashes.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    In total, over $6 billion<\/strong> has vanished since 2019.<\/p>\n

    Ghost Projects, Ghost Justice<\/h3>\n

    Roads promised, hospitals announced, schools inaugurated on paper only\u2014nothing on the ground but dust. Even Tshisekedi\u2019s hometown of Mbujimayi saw $14 million vanish without a single trace of development.<\/p>\n

    The scheme is simple: announce a project, siphon the money, abandon the site. A nation robbed in broad daylight.<\/p>\n

    And the judiciary? Silent. The Minister of Justice, Constant Mutamba, spends more energy attacking journalists and activists than investigating thieves. Parliament, the Inspectorate, the Court of Accounts\u2014paralyzed and complicit.<\/p>\n

    Fat Salaries for Thieves, Hunger for Workers<\/h3>\n

    The theft is not only in projects, but in paychecks.<\/p>\n

      \n
    • A parliamentarian in Kinshasa pockets tens of thousands of dollars a month\u2014often with bonuses and perks\u2014while a teacher survives on wages so low they can\u2019t cover food for a week.<\/li>\n
    • The President surrounds himself with a swarm of advisers<\/strong>, each paid more than the nation\u2019s doctors, while hospitals crumble for lack of supplies.<\/li>\n
    • Police officers patrol without salaries for months. Soldiers die at the front lines underfed, their families abandoned.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

      This obscene imbalance makes the robbery starker: those who steal are rewarded; those who serve are starved.<\/p>\n

      The Presidential Family Empire<\/h3>\n

      The scandal doesn\u2019t stop with ghost projects. The President\u2019s own family has quietly secured mining concessions across Congo\u2019s resource-rich provinces.<\/strong> In just a few short years of Tshisekedi\u2019s presidency, they have gone from political outsiders to billionaires.<\/p>\n

      While children study under trees, the presidential clan profits from cobalt and copper deals signed in secrecy. While soldiers die unpaid, the first family counts dollars from concessions carved out of the nation\u2019s soil.<\/p>\n

      It is not simply corruption. It is dynastic plunder\u2014the transformation of public power into private fortune, with Congo\u2019s minerals as collateral.<\/p>\n

      An Institutionalized Theft<\/h3>\n

      Former Finance Minister Nicolas Kazadi himself exposed the rot: project funds were shared among presidential insiders before the first brick was ever laid. He admitted it openly\u2014yet walks free. Why? Because he too stole for the palace. Tshisekedi even defended him, calling him \u201ca father of family,\u201d as if family status grants immunity.<\/p>\n

      This is not corruption. This is systematic state capture<\/strong>\u2014a theft so normalized it masquerades as governance.<\/p>\n

      The Human Cost<\/h3>\n

      While the elite dine, the people choke:<\/p>\n

        \n
      • Children study under trees.<\/li>\n
      • Mothers give birth in clinics without electricity or clean water.<\/li>\n
      • Police beg in the streets.<\/li>\n
      • Soldiers fight wars without food or ammunition.<\/li>\n
      • Teachers, the backbone of any future, earn starvation wages.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

        Congo is not poor. It is being robbed.<\/p>\n

        A Call to Break the Silence<\/h3>\n

        This is betrayal at the scale of nations. The figures are not rumors. They are facts. And yet silence rules Kinshasa.<\/p>\n

        The Congolese people\u2014and the world\u2014must refuse this silence. Journalists, activists, lawyers, students, and the diaspora: this is your fight<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

        The truth cannot be hidden under presidential carpets. Not while $6 billion has been shoveled into private pockets. Not while thieves wear medals and teachers go hungry. Not while the presidential family grows fat on mining concessions as the nation sinks deeper into poverty.<\/p>\n

        This is the Congo today: a country rich enough to build the continent, crippled into begging for survival.<\/p>\n

        But truth endures. And until justice is done, until dignity is restored, until Congo stands upright\u2014we will not stop speaking.<\/strong><\/p>\n

        Congo is not poor.
        \nCongo is being robbed.
        \nAnd the thieves are in power.<\/p>\n