The Congo: Reluctant to Reconcile

As the last 143 United Nations troops pulled out of the Congo last week, a departing Nigerian captain sniffed: “It’s high time the Congolese put on their thinking caps for themselves.” Actually, there were plenty of thinking caps being worn in that chaotic nation, but the thoughts they generated had little to do with one another. Everybody was certainly thinking the same question: Who could and/or would finally lead the Congo to stability?

Premier Cyrille Adoula hardly seemed the man. His government had been unable to suppress the vicious Communist-encouraged rebellions in

Kwilu, Kivu and North Katanga provinces that threaten total tribal anarchy. Indeed, Adoula resigned his premiership last week on the fourth anniversary of Congolese independence. And who was now touted to succeed him?

None but that onetime renegade Moise Tshombe of Katanga fame.

Wooed back to the Congo, Tshombe claimed the allegiance of every major faction. Wheeling and dealing as if every card were a wild deuce, Tshombe seemed to hold a royal flush ranging from Kasai’s rightist “King” Albert Kalonji through such “moderate” face cards as Army Boss Joseph Mobutu and Justice Minister Justin Bomboko to the Communist-backed National Lib eration Committee’s Andre Lubaya. But the N.L.C. could still prove a joker in Tshombe’s hand: Leftist Antoine Gizenga still languished in forced exile last week on an island at the mouth of the Congo River. Not until the conditions of his freedom are established can any new government count on genuine reconciliation.

Reluctantly recognizing Tshombe’s claims for broad-based support, President Joseph Kasavubu appointed him informateur—the man charged with sounding out all political parties on the possibilities of forming a new government. Such an appointment might only be an attempt to provide Tshombe with enough political rope to hang himself. One could not really say that the promises of allegiance that Tshombe was getting would remain firmly in his control. But even if he fails in his search for reconciliation, he still has his political base of Katanga to fall back upon. And mineral-rich Katanga is the linchpin on which the Congo’s economy hangs.