Prof. Wamba Dia Wamba

-THE FAILURE OF PROFESSOR WAMBA DIA WAMBA-

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Then Wamba, (oops, "Professor" Wamba as an intellectual would have you say) returned to Kisangani.

Before the first rebellionWhen the first uprising in 1997, Wamba was living in the United States, just outside of Boston, Massachusetts.In fact, Wamba lived in the United Sates so long that when he went back to assume leadership of the RCD (Rally for a Democratic Congo), only the people who were in DRC since Lumumba 1960 knew who Wamba was.

Based in Kisangani (DRC), Wamba as head of the RCD was initially backed by Ugandans.Wamba was fighting (though he's never in his life handled or fired a weapon) for "democracy in Congo" while being backed by the very same people slaughtering the Congolese Hutu population.

But the only people he actually fought were his fellow Congolese in Kisangani, a fight that would lead to a split of RCD into RCD/Kisangani and RCD/Goma and create a "Uganda vs.Rwanda" scenario.

Wamba also was aware of the problem between the Ugandan president lso, Yoweri Museveni and Rwandan president Paul Kagame.
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Whereas Professor Wamba, appointed the relatively unknown Dr. Depelchin as his 2nd in command of RCD-Kisangani.
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So basically Wamba fought for and put the Ugandan interest before the interest of the Congolese.

Notice a pattern here?DOCTOR this, PROFESSOR that?Yes, we know that the Ugandan's and Rwandan's felt that having an academic as leader of the "rebel" movement would legitimize the movements, but so what!Congolese are dying because of these Intellectuals who need to first legitimize their Congolese heritage by turning their soldiers against the Rwandans and Ugandans, but that is a topic for another abstract, another "paper" if you will.

And what does Congo have to show as a result of these 4 intellectuals?3.5 million dead, hundreds of thousands displaced, and a population left at the mercy of foreign corporations, and the murderous Tutsi's of Kagame's army.

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Wamba honestly felt that Kampala would wholeheartedly support his ideals, but he was brutally mistaken.

"Quand vous faites une affaire avec le diable... "

(English translation)

"When you make a deal with the devil…"

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But had Wamba followed his own advice that he gave his former students and done his research, he would have discovered much earlier Kampala had struck a side deal to support J.P Bemba's rebel movement MLC (Movement for the Liberation of Congo) which was based in Equator province.

Wamba eventually acted on his negative feelings towards the Uganda deal to back Bembe's MLC by complaining to President Museveni himself (in Kampala mind you).But Museveni "convinced" Professor Wamba that the combined military might of MLC and RCD/Kisangani would help in their struggle to topple the Congolese government.

Unfortunately for Wamba, he was unaware that Kisangani would soon be the site of his greatest failure and greatly increase the suffering on the Kisangani population.

Amongst great dissention from his fellow "rebels", Wamba was one of the signatories of the Lusaka Accords.But Wamba complained about the lack of support from Museveni and the expansion of RCD/Goma's group into the Kivu's and their encroachment on Kisangani territory.And as the exploitation of DRC resources grew, as the foreign industrials hunger for Coltan and other mineral resources increased, international pressure mounted for both RCD factions to withdraw from Kisangani, to "demilitarize the city" as it were.

Wamba began to feel the pressure himself because several weeks after his forced unification with MLC, Wamba was arrested in Congo and deported (yes deported) to Uganda.

(Definition) DEPORTATION: The lawful expulsion of an undesired alien or other person from a state or country.

Now, I know that Wamba's wife is an African-American living in New England (and they have a son who is the editor and chief of Africana.com), but Wamba himself is Congolese (by birth only, mind you).How a foreign government can deport you from your own country to theirs is beyond me.

Museveni told Wamba to "stop complaining" and to "go along with program".Wamba agreed and returned to Kisangani just in time to see the fruits of his labor.

Kisangani, if you didn't know is rich in minerals and other precious stones, which is why Uganda and Rwanda wanted control of the city for themselves.But instead of using their proxy armies (i.e. RCD, MLC, CLF), Uganda and Rwanda fought the battle themselves, using artillery and soldiers to raze Kisangani to the ground like the Russians did when they advanced on Hitler's Berlin.

Hundreds of Congolese, men, women and children died, massacred as the city was shelled by the two foreign armies.The very people that Wamba never consulted with, never spoke to, to whom he never presented his ideas/programs/abstract/papers to, the people that he never included in his movement perished as a result of his over inflated ego and the mistake of "intellectualizing" the conflict.

And what did Wamba do?Nothing.No protest.He was the three monkey's rolled into one: "see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil".

Instead, incredulously, Wamba he went back to Kampala to complain to Museveni about the treatment he and his associates were receiving at the hands of the other rebel groups mainly the Congolese Liberation Front (CLF) which was an umbrella organization created by the newly formed alliance between RCD/ML and Bemba's MLC.

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Where is Wamba now?Living in Tanzania in comfort while the population of Kisangani suffers the misery he himself personally created.

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What could have Prof. Wamba done different?Observe the options he had at his disposal the time:.

Wamba knew the Ugandans better than anyone.Once he realized what the Ugandans were up to, he should have made a satellite phone call to Kinshasa and offer to "sell-out" Uganda if it was guaranteed that he would not be arrested and tried for treason against DRC.He knew where the Ugandansy ate, slept, where Museveni lived, and what road the Ugandans took to enter the DRC.This was invaluable information that he didn't put to the DRC government to be able to take profit of.

Wamba could have collaborated with the Mai-Mai and DRC (ala Hanoi, Vietcong and the North Vietnam Army during the Vietnam War) and militarily defeated the Ugandans.The DRC government had the Angolans, Zimbabweans and Namibians on their side so it's guaranteed that Uganda would not have interfered, especially if they knew that Ugandan rebel factions would have joined the battle.Rwanda and to a lesser extent Burundi would have retreated in an instant, because who knows the Rwandan's better the Wamba then the "ex-FAR", the former Hutu dominated army of Rwanda who are now camped out in eastern DRC.

Wamba could have rallied the population of Kisangani against the Ugandans once he saw what was happening, along with having his group turn their guns on Museveni's army who were (and still are) looting DRC.Take the Kivu's for example.The Kivu's is bigger then Rwanda, with a population of over 500,000.
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Wamba could have protested the destruction of Kisangani to the international community and confer with the Congolese intellectuals abroad to bring attention and pressure to the scenario that was unfolding in Kisangani.But let me add that Wamba isn't alone in this.Bembe, Onusumba, Depelchin, Wamba, Nyamwisi, Illunga and now Roger Lambala of RCD/Nationale didn't say or do anything either.
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Wamba and his army could have defended the Congolese of Kisangani.The Mai-Mai and other defenders of Congo would have surely joined the fray had he appealed to them.Bembe would not enter the fight on behalf of the Ugandans for fear of the DRC government moving in and occupying his area of "control".

It's understood that most of the options above are of a distinctive military nature.But you see this is a military operation.Dissertations, presentations, abstracts are killing the Congolese only as much as they are about "The Belgian State", "Life under Mobutu", "Life under Laurent Kabila", "What should be the national language of DRC", not about anything that involves taking a decisive action against the invaders.Those topics are irrelevant to the Congolese on the ground.

I mean, exactly what has the Lusaka Accords or the Illinois Congolese Intellectual conference accomplished for the DRC east population?
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Politically Wamba failed, as well as the other intellectuals involved in the conflict failed because they haven't and won't defend the Congolese people in the very areas they claim to "control".This