By Gael
Masengi
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| Congolese protesters outside the magistrate court |
Under a blazing 20+ degree centigrade Pretoria sun, came
hundreds of men and women in support of their fellow community members wrongly accused
of would-be "putschists" in their second court appearance. However things didn’t
start smoothly at first when security guards tried to block dozens of angry and
noisy supporters who filed the corridor, from entering the court room. A brief
scuffle with the guards forced the South African Police’s Tactical Response
Team (TRT) to intervene and forcefully drove out of the court “rebels’” strong
crowd of sympathisers.
“Let me inside!,”
shouted a pregnant woman to the guards “my
husband is among the arrested, I want to see him”, she then was taken
inside after she was indeed confirmed to be a spouse of one of the men arrested as family members only were allowed.
Out on the main passage drama continued when a colossal man was
forcefully removed from chamber 16 –where proceeding was taking place, “Why am I being pushed?!,” exclaimed a
man wearing a Tshisekedi branded
fabric shirt.
“In a political sense, this
trial is a conspiracy, cabal and assassination against the people of DRC.” said
another protester to the media “We are
united in the goal of overthrowing Hypolite
Kanambe alias Joseph Kabila the
usurper. Our final goal is to
establish Dr. Etienne Tshisekedi Wa
Mulumba the elected President of the DRC gain power through revolution.”
Later, a court official spoke to Gael-On-Media on condition of anonymity, he said, the man was being
pulled away for an “obvious reason”, and the state which accuses the men of being
involved in rebellion activities might contradict itself if the alleged
suspects are to be associated with the image of a Congolese populist political
leader, such as Etienne Tshisekedi. The
300,000+ Congolese exile community in South Africa are undeniably strong
supporters of the charismatic eternal opposition leader Etienne Tshisekedi, who rejected the results of an internationally
criticised 2011 presidential election and subsequently ‘sworn-in’ as the
country’s new president. They do believe that South African government which
they again accuse of inheriting imperialist ‘foreign policy on the Congo’ act
in command of mineral resource- hungry westerns willing to keep Joseph Kabila
in power at any cost for their interests. Sentiments echoed by many Great Lake
region analysts, who in their turn also consider the Zuma’s administration as
not just a strong ally of the controversial Congolese government but a rather
'unconventional' mutual benefits.
Outside the court, a massive crowd of demonstrators chanted
anti-Kabila songs and displayed placards which contained antagonistic message to
the South African government and President Jacob Zuma himself. Under a cheerful
crowd the suspects were being driven back to Pretoria Central prison where they
have been detained –without trial –for 10 days now.
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| Protesters outside the Congolese embassy |
Unexpectedly the prosecuting authority –which failed again
to provide evidence against the suspects –is either confused or incompetent,
asked for two more weeks instead of one week as expected. Shaun
Abrahams, the state prosecutor asked the regional magistrate Maryke de la Rey
for final postponement until 27 February for the state to “prepare” its case in
the bail application.
A strong presence of
police officers were caught off-guard when the group of approximately hundred
of anti-Kabila demonstrators marched in the middle of busy Francis Baard Street
toward the Congolese embassy before
being forced off the side-walk. A fight broke in front of embassy
between protesters and a man who seemed not to politically agree with the crowd, eventually the police dispersed the demonstrators as it was considered an illegal rally, one man was arrested and taken
to Sunny side police station.
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