Colonel Daniel Lusadusu : The era of Joseph Kabila is now conjugated to the past
By Jean-Jacques Wondo -DESC
A graduate of the Royal Military Academy (ERM) in Belgium and doctor of medicine with an exemplary career in the Zairian Armed Forces (FAZ), Colonel Daniel Lusadusu discusses with DESC about security issues in DR Congo. This is the version of a man determined to act for a change in the DRC, and he describes it in the following uncompromising interview.
What was your motivation to join the military and what was your military background
The Army is one of the supreme organs and instrument of sovereignty of a State without which the State cannot exist. The men who compose it are trained with a sharp sense of rigor, respect, honour and discipline in the service of the nation. I felt carried by this vocation! I started my military career after being the winner of the entrance examination at the Royal Military Academy of Belgium. A very demanding contest!
It was then that I joined the FAZ with the rank of Sergeant in 1972.
In September 1972, I arrived at the Royal Cadet School (ERC) to prepare for my integration at the Royal Military Academy (ERM).
From 1973 to 1975, I applied for my doctorate at the University Faculties of Namur; Then the Doctorate in Medicine at the Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB) from 1976-1979.
I obtained my Doctor of Medicine degree in June 1980 with the rank of 1st Lieutenant. It should be remembered that I was doing my medical studies in parallel with my basic military course at the ERM. From September 1980 to June 1981, I had done Tropical Medicine at the Prince Leopold Institute in Antwerp and the Royal School of Medical studies (ERSM) in Ghent.
In February 1982, I returned to the country where I was posted to the health post of the Ministry of National Defence and General Staff, in Mont-Ngaliema, Kinshasa. From September 1982 to July 1983, I was assigned to the School of Health Service, ESS, and consultant in Internal Medicine at the Combined Hospitals at Kitona Military Base (BAKI).
In August 1983, I joined the Republican Guard Battalion of the Presidential Special Brigade (BSP), in charge of presidential security. From 1983 to 1984, I was a doctor in charge of Kibomango Training Center, I had followed the paratrooper training at the 31 th Brigade of the Airborne Troops Training Center (CETA) with the rank of Captain. From 1984 to 1994, doctor at the Tshatshi Medical-Surgical Center, of which I was Second Commandant and then Commander and Medical Adviser of the Special Presidential Division (DSP), who succeeded the BSP.
I was appointed Major in 1986, Lieutenant-Colonel in 1989 and Colonel in 1992. I also was holder of the honorary title of Knight of the National Order of the Leopards in 1989 and an Officer of the National Order of the Leopards in 1993.
In August 1994, following my request, I was allowed to go to Belgium for specialization 3rd cycle at ULB. I get the Cardiology degree in 1999, Specialized Studies Diploma in Acute Medicine in 2000, the Training Diploma Resuscitation Cardiopulmonary (ROE) in 2002 as Advanced Trainer.
For over 20 years you ended up abroad rather than pursuing a medical career military? Was it your choice?
NO, not at all and with much frustration from a career “accidentally” broken. It was a nightmare for me to see myself forced to be far from my homeland, my thirst for service within the army to defend my country has remained insatiable. I had always dreamed of returning and continue serving my country. I think the time has come to do it publicly.
In Belgium, you are known to be very active in promoting ideas and actions aimed at the creation of a national and republican army in the DRC. Why this particular activism?
“By trying to chase the natural change their spots!” I was sworn in as a military and as a doctor. Those who know the values and requirements of these two lofty trades that are dedicated to saving and protecting human lives, understand the meaning of my commitment. I will never betray my country or its people! With a clear vision of the future of our country. After the arrival of the AFDL regime, I tried as President of the Union des Patriotes Militaires Congolais (UPMC) to contribute to the efforts of establishing the Congolese national army with a republican vocation. The revival of the Congo, as a stable and prosperous state, which we dream of cannot be conceived without a national and republican army, and thinking of our sovereignty and guarantor of our unity and our independence acquired at the price of the supreme sacrifices of our ancestors for the Independence. This is a priority and indispensable requirement for the reconstruction of the Congo of tomorrow. A dissuasive army that secures and reassures the people, defends the territory and contributes to development. I absolutely want to bring my expertise, skills, know-how and experience in a highly patriotic spirit.
If I understand you correctly, the DRC has never had a national and republican army? Yet you are an ex-FAZ, who is more of the DSP who did not leave that good memories? You are, then, in one way or another, a pure product of this army, which I describe in one of my works as perverted? How do you plan to do that? Can we make new with old?
An important fringe of the ex-FAZ military had a very good training. At the time, our country had probably the best military in sub-Saharan Africa, trained and distinguished in prestigious academies around the world, like you and me. Before the Rwandan-Ugandan invasion of 1996, our country was also a nursery of African officers trained at the Kananga Formation School (EFO), an African reference.
In the FAZ there was undoubtedly a spirit of corps worthy of a good army. “Tozali ba Masuwa” which meant, “We are passengers embarked in the same ship!” All the ingredients were combined to make our country, through the operational capability of the FAZ, which had distinguished itself in Chad or Rwanda as continental military power. It was by no means the fault of the men who composed this army, which, unfortunately, was not republican. Is not it the generals, peace to their soul, as Ekumu Mbanze said “Mbuza Mabe” or Lucien Bahuma Ambamba who distinguished themselves within the FARDC against the aggressors of the Congo are not the pure products of the FAZ and the DSP ? The fault and heavy responsibility lay with the political and military hierarchy “infected” with the virus of nepotism, kleptocracy, patronage, tribalism, courtiers, and the various mafia practices that have diverted the
army from its traditional mission. Creating militias there and abandoning the soldier to his sad fate. The sequel was only logical. It is now up to us to rectify the shooting and that is what we have decided to do now.
20 years after the fall of Mobutu, the DRC is continually an unstable country, how do you explain this?
Congo after Mobutu is anything but a state, it’s a real jungle, a world upside-down! The army, police and security services are being used by the authorities to maintain widespread insecurity and terror. Justice is also under power. There is a deliberate will of the regime in place to keep the country indefinitely in this situation of permanent instability. This is the primary reason for the aggression of the DRC and the installation of the Kabila regimes and this situation will never change as long as the same regime remains in power. The latest developments in the country bear witness to this. After 20 years of Kabila, the country is not only in great security, social, political and economic instability, but risks disappearing with the policy of the scorched earth established by Kabila who knows at the twilight of his regime.
The cruelty maintained by the power reached its paroxysm, with mass graves where our compatriots are buried like garbage. Unimaginable! I challenge you to cite me a single country in the world where such barbarity maintained by its leaders.
Even the minimum basic social needs of the population are not guaranteed. Water and electricity are rare commodities. Health care is of illusory quality, very expensive and inaccessible to all. Quality education becomes a luxury, the unemployment rate is constantly changing and when they have a job the employees and officials line up months of unpaid, economic recession is dizzy. The DRC, our country, is in a pre-explosive situation of socio-economic impasse. The country is experiencing haemorrhagic price inflation of goods and services more than 33%, according to forecasts by the Congolese Central Bank, up compared to 25% last year. Moreover, the Congolese franc continues its fall against the dollar. It is currently trading at more than 1,600 Congolese francs in certain places. The insignificant state budget, less than six billion dollars, is very far from meeting the basic social needs of the Congolese population. To this must be added the collapse of the central bank’s reserves, economic growth in free fall, rising from an average of 7% in 2015 to an average of 2.4% at the end of 2016, according to estimates by the Congolese Central Bank. The decline in external financial support to support the state budget and the collapse of investments following a dual economic and political climate that is very unstable. All socio-economic and political indicators are now gathered to make the DRC a bankrupt state, facing serious problems that compromise its national cohesion and its survival. Moreover, there is no promising future for youth which is hobbled and abandoned to itself; No credible election prospects with a CENI instrumented by the Kabila regime. Voters’ cards and driver’s licenses act as an identity card …. Imported counterfeit medicines with the complicity of power abound in the market.
On the other hand, the commerce of death is booming with many hearses and few ambulances …. The country is ruled by a mediocre, self-serving, greedy political class, who does not care about the people who are were taken hostage! It is time to act quickly to end this ultimate bad taste. That is what we are committed to.
What are the evils of the present army?
The FARDC, in spite of the quality of certain soldiers of which it overwhelms is anything but an army. It is a militia army, a partisan and fanatic army, without a unit of command! An army infiltrated to weaken it by foreign forces to serve foreign interests! An army with a majority of soldiers badly or very poorly trained, badly supervised, poorly maintained, poorly equipped and not close to the civilian population. In short, let me put it this way a real “Mexican army”,.
If you were asked to reorganize the armed forces in the DRC, how are you going to do that?
The late General Paul Mukobo said : “The strength of an army, its power, is neither determined nor fixed by the military. It is a political option that a State must lift … “. I believe that the DRC has enough experts and skills to conceptualize a thorough reform of the army and security services. We are working hard for it. We cannot disclose certain technical details of a strategic nature here , I invite you, at the right moment, to judge us on our initiatives . I also like this expression of General de Gaulle who said at the end of the Second World War which France was bled out, “It is because we are no longer a great power we need great political because, if we do not have great political, as we are no longer a great power, we will not be anything. ” It is this strategic vision of the rebirth of a Grand Congo I invite you to follow through my actions, interventions and various initiatives I intend to take in the meantime.
Today, the future of the DRC is more than compromised than Joseph Kabila wants to cling to power by force. Do you think that the army in A role to play in promoting alternation to power and consolidating the democratic culture through strict observance of the Constitution?
The DRC is a special case. If this country was normal, with a republican army, we would not be there at all. The army would have intervened in a role of arbitrator to neutralize it and to promote alternation as provided for by the Constitution with an interim President to organize the elections within the constitutional deadline.
Who are the Congolese personalities who have marked you in general in the history of the Congo and in the course of your professional career and your patriotic commitment?
First of all, President Kasa-Vubu with his family, who in June 1965 as I was at the end of my fifth year of primary school, received me with gifts in the garden of the presidential palace of Mont-Ngaliema with the best pupils of the other primary schools Of Leopoldville. I remember my fellow student Faustin Olubwa Who was a part of it, and with whom I had evolved until the end of high school and who like me now is a doctor and works in Kinshasa. Second Lieutenant Léopold Tita, then a finalist in Polytechnique at the Royal Military School in 1972, who had marked me by his visits to the Royal Cadet School to encourage us and who radiated exemplarity, a model to follow! Cardinal Etsou who embodied a model of respect, love of others, justice, solidarity and truth! When he received me in December 2006 with two other officers, he confided to us like a testament, “You must never betray your country.
With you, after my death, I would survive for a very long time! “
President Etienne Tshisekedi, who had trusted me, and with whom I had shared my vision and my plan for the army and the security of the DRC of tomorrow, after an intimate discussion in October 2010 or before presidential election 2011. I remember his Testament phrase, “If the small Kabila was bent on defying the will of the Congolese people, I will oppose him by all means and he will have kill us all “. Army General Likulia Bolongo, then Secretary of State for National Defense for Territorial Security and Veterans for his contribution to my project to modernize the medical infrastructure of the Presidential Guard, the Camp Kokolo Medical and Surgical Center, The Civil Guard and the General Hospital of Kinshasa. (Should I specify year?) Grand Admiral Mavua Midima, then Deputy Minister of National Defense who had acceded to my request for a specialized training of five military nurses at the Laveran interarms hospital in Marseille, France.
Dr. Denis Mukwege, a distinguished colleague with an exceptional and radiant career, whose patriotic struggle for the suffering of the Congolese girls and women who are victims of rape as a weapon of war to destroy the active Congolese society.
You quote Etienne Tshisekedi. It is amazing for an officer who has evolved in the Mobutu DSP. How do you explain this proximity?
Nothing suprising! Besides, he himself was very happy to receive me with a delegation of ex-FAZ with former DSP Colonel Ngoy Loponde, former commander of the DSP security battalion who reminded him of their meeting in 1984 In execution of the Marechal’s order to arrest him. They laugh With the memory of his uppercut on the sergeant who had dared to shake him. I have good memories of the old man, a pleasant man and a role model for me!
What was your collaboration with Tshisekedi ?
As I have said, the “Patriarch” choose me to reorganize our defence and security forces. He relied heavily on me and the team I put in place.
Do you feel that you are the bearer of the continuation of his struggle ? Can you infer that you want to embark on a political career?
Etienne Tshisekedi is dead, we regret it ! The struggle he has left is not only his, but the struggle of the people for the republic.
We can only continue it, and this strong of the intrinsic values of which it is the bearer. Every citizen is a politician, a state of mind confronted with the management of society : Who am I ? In what space do I live ? How do I live ?
If I were to embark on a political career to influence the destiny of my country which is compromised, I would not hesitate for a moment, especially with the disorder knowingly maintained by a mediocre, mafia, corrupt and predatory class. We would have to put things in order.
I have taken two oaths in my life; once, as a military officer, to defend and protect my nation, and a second time as a doctor to save lives. I want to be the bridge between the civil and the military. From now on, every step of my struggle will be guided e by this dual patriotic spirit of sacrifice and altruistic humanism.
How do you intend to do this? With what resources?
For obvious reasons of sensitivity and efficiency, I cannot, unfortunately, expose my strategy at the current stage because it is not the place to explain it. However, with my dual civil and military cap, I first engage myself to gather all the positive political and social forces, integrity and patriotic of our nation, qualitative and not quantitative. Secondly, I would like to act in such a way as to ensure the protection of these social forces in order to enable them to achieve the objectives of change and alternation desired by all. We are working on it very seriously and it is only a matter of time. For the time being, I call for unity of the Nation Forces, which also includes the military and the security service. I remain very confident.
how do you see the future of the DRC and how do you position yourself in relation to this? Do you plan to embark on a political career?
The situation in the DRC is very precarious, very unstable with a population exhausted in the nightmarish expectation of a peaceful democratic political alternation! I am really afraid that this people, known for their lethargy, will wake up and revolt in an uncontrolled popular uprising that would be a catastrophe like a “tsunami” that could devastate the country, the sub region and our continent.
Since you worked with Etienne Tshisekedi, can we conclude that you continue to collaborate with his son, Félix Tshisekedi, the president of the Rassemblement ? In what capacity ? As the military arm of the Rassemblement?
I keep a fraternal, respectful and very friendly relationship with Felix Tshisekedi without any taboo, in the same sense of the fight despite some differences not being in the Rassemblement. Our exchanges are as warm as they are relevant. Our people are wounded enough, there have been enough wars, we don’t need anymore. I would never embark on this logic, but if we were forced to do so, we would have no choice but to defend our country and its people and we will surely win !
What is your view of the Congolese politician as a whole?
The recent evolution of the socio-political situation in the DRC offers us enough clues to describe Congolese politicians in general, with a few exceptions: inconstant, selfish, irresponsible, non-visionary, lacking the sense of the State, incompetent, Even antipatriotic … This is not my conclusion but of national and international public opinion. The Congolese politician has failed in his mission and has been unworthy, the era of Joseph Kabila is now conjugated to the past. It must imperatively report its balance sheet to the Congolese people. Without compromise, the political space must be renewed by a leadership of excellence, bringing together and promoting the Congo’s renaissance project for a better future. I can say without being contradicted that in Congolese collective memory, in view of the current mess, the Congolese politician embodies Congolese evil.
Therefore, it does not seem to me to be currently the best actor of the profound change for the revival of the DRC. We note this with the limits of political action in the context of the New Year’s Eve. We must think of alternative, multiform and global solutions in which we cannot exclude a priori the military factor. Beyond the alternation to power, we need to propose a new alternative to the current political system in the DRC where the vast majority of politicians in power and opposition have spread their limits and their inability to offer the Congolese Well-being and peace. Look at the show that the Congolese parliament delivers daily to understand that it will be difficult to make new with the old or the same. There is a need to change the paradigm by bringing an innovative vision of public action in the DRC with competent, patriotic and hands-on actors. On reading your description of the Congolese politician, I feel dubious about a purely political solution.
Can we infer that you opt for a military solution for the outcome of the Congolese crisis?
I opt for a revolutionary solution, led by civil society, accompanied and protected by patriotic elements of the army and the security forces. We must be honest to note that a purely political solution is no longer possible in the present situation. We must act differently by using all the means imposed by article 64 of the Constitution. It is this global approach to the current crisis that differentiates me from other Congolese political actors whose fight I hail. The time for political reconciliation is over, we have to move on to strong actions.
The patience of the Congolese people has reached its limits. The people are tired of unsuccessful dialogues, even the Catholic Church whose message I greet today has emerged from its silence to call for general mobilization. In my opinion, this national popular mobilization concerns first of all the military men whose republican character imposes the duty to defend the Constitution and the country.
Do you have any contacts with the Congolese army?
I am a public man for two purposes, as an officer and as a doctor. I have always kept my patriotic fibre by regular contacts with my military compatriots active or not ,and the civilians of the country as of the diaspora. That’s all I can say for now.
What do you plan to do in the next few days?
I was trained and evolved in our army in the heyday of Israeli, American, French, Belgian and Chinese military cooperation. I kept good contacts with them. Moreover, I have lived for several years in Europe and have built up good relations. I decided to put myself in action and move in order to mobilize friends and international partners who will not fail to support us in our commitment. You will be informed soon. I also continue to work closely with the Congolese patriotic masses from within.
What are your current priorities and perhaps a last word to DESC readers?
I intend to become more involved in the search for appropriate solutions to the crisis in my country. I call on my compatriots to overcome our egos, to unite ourselves so that together we organize and bring our skills and our pluralistic and complementary expertise for the rebirth of a better Congo, more beautiful than before we bequeath to our Sons and daughters as well as future generations.
Thank you.
Dr. Daniel Lusadusu
Follow me at : @DanielLusadusu
Interview by Jean-Jacques Wondo for DESC
One Comment “Colonel Daniel Lusadusu : The era of Joseph Kabila is now conjugated to the past – Interview with JJ Wondo”
Mani Kongo MK
says:Yes enough is enough. someone had to take a stand, given the Red silence cloud lingering above our beloved land. Kongoland is what our ancestros bequeathed us. It’s mythical. only the real sons and daughters can resolve its current problems. trying to impose anyone else can only prolong the suffering. Who know what tomorrow bring? Natelema deja Bongo yo?