Laurent-Désiré Kabila

23 years of mining Congo for profit Dan Gertler has been the subject of growing controversy since he first arrived in Congo-Kinshasa in 1997 just after Laurent-Désiré Kabila's rebel forces ended the 32-year dictatorship of Mobutu Sese Seko (AC Vol 38 No 9 Business at war)...

So far only Laurent Désiré Kabila and Patrice-Émery Lumumba have been designated as national heroes but presidential spokespeople have been briefing perhaps optimistically that Tshisekedi may yet also be given this honour...

Zimbabwe which was an important backer of both President Laurent-Désiré Kabila and his son Joseph was too embroiled in its post-election crisis to play much of a role although President Emmerson Mnangagwa and Foreign Minister Sibusiso Moyo were closely involved in Zimbabwe's military intervention in Congo-K from 1998 to 2002...

The ADF which has been based in North Kivu since the 1990s was once in alliance with Nyamwisi's late brother Enoch Nyamwisi as well as with Laurent Kabila's regime...

Shortly before that on 10 January Gabon's security services arrested General Faustin Munene Chief of Staff of the Congolese army under Laurent Kabila who also served in the Angolan armed forces and married a niece of former President José Eduardo dos Santos...

' Kabila's divide-and-rule tactics are inviting comparisons with the late President Mobutu Seso Seko who introduced multiparty politics in 1990 and promised democratic elections but spent years pitching his opponents against each other and clinging to power before being toppled by Laurent-Désiré Kabila's rebel army in 1997...

As Mobutu's rule approached its end in 1997 Goetz went into business with future President Laurent-Désiré Kabila's Alliance des forces démocratiques pour la libération du Congo-Zaïre agreeing a 1...

For Gertler who arrived in Kinshasa in 1997 aged 23 just after rebel leader Laurent-Désiré Kabila had marched across the country to take the city the usual rules have never applied...