By Chris Muhizi for MCN Friday June 30th/2023.

The 63rd anniversary of the DRC’s independence is this Friday, June 30, 2023. Although the nation formerly ranked among the most urbanized and well educated in all of Africa, it is now one of the most turbulent and impoverished.

On the eve of the 63rd anniversary of independence celebration, several historians who were interviewed by Radio Okapi made this statement. They compare the social lives of Congolese people living in the country before 1960 to those living there after that year.

Before January 2019, the Democratic Republic of the Congo had not gone through a peaceful transfer of leadership in its 62 years of independence. Following Joseph Kabila’s resignation in December 2018, Félix Antoine Tshisekedi Tshilombo, the winner of the election, took over as president. Etienne Tshisekedi is the longtime opposition leader of the nation.

Through the implementation of free primary education, more openness and public sector reforms, as well as a concentration on conflict avoidance and stabilization in the East, there are signs that a new social contract between the state and its inhabitants may be evolving.

However, despite efforts to avert conflict and stabilize the situation, some areas of instability continue to exist in the nation.

toward the east, in particular. Voter registration is now being completed in preparation for the late 2023 general election. But in recent months, fighting between the army and armed groups has drastically worsened the security situation in the provinces of North Kivu and Ituri, pushing hundreds to escape. If this election goes off without a hitch, the nation may be able to maintain its current level of political stability and go forward with the required reforms to provide the majority of its citizens access to the vast potential that the nation offers.

The largest nation in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) is the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), which is roughly the same size as Western Europe.Exceptional natural resources, including minerals like cobalt and copper, are abundant in the DRC.

The majority of DRC residents have not profited from this prosperity. A serious, ongoing humanitarian crisis has resulted from a protracted history of conflict, political upheaval and instability, and authoritarian governance. Additionally, populations have been forcibly displaced. Since the end of the Congo Wars in 2003, these characteristics haven’t changed all that much.

One of the world’s five poorest countries is the DRC. Around 60 million Congolese, or roughly 62% of the population, survived on less than $2.15 per day in 2022. In SSA, the DRC is home to around one in every six individuals who live in extreme poverty.

Large cities like Kinshasa, which has more than 20,000 unemployed, are affected by unemployment. As a result, the latter are housed with individuals who are still employed.

The city’s homes and plots grow overcrowded as a result, and little bars have been mushrooming up ever since.

The first elections are held in this tumultuous environment. Professor Mokonda Bonza regrets that the new parliament has done little to protect the middle class that the Belgians left behind, but rather has enshrined salary disparities.

He regrets that this causes a true break in society as the political class starts to get more and richer at the expense of other social classes.