Republic of the Congo Independence Day: Call for a Unique Candidacy of the Liberal and Progressive Forces.
by Andrea NGOMBET
The Republic of Congo after more than 40 years of ideological monopoly of totalitarian and anti-capitalist forces has become the center of influence diplomacy from authoritarian powers in Africa. On the social and economic level, the statist options taken by successive governments have eroded the space of private initiative without reducing dependence on traditional partners, majors and oil traders while ruining local economic operators.
The liberal and progressive forces in the Republic of Congo on the occasion of the 2021 Presidential election constitute the only real systemic alternative to autocratic and anti-capitalist governance. They are part of a lineage with all the political and social forces which have always resisted political intolerance, often to the point of supreme sacrifice. Besides, the Republic of Congo in financial difficulty, and entirely subservient to the People Republic of China, is each day a little more in danger of dislocation.
The liberal international consensus of the fight against the influence of authoritarian powers in the world opens a window for the realization of the systemic alternation. Finally, the slight tendencies for reforms such as that of taxation, the current tax code dated from colonization, within the approach of the presidential election, only underline the extent of inertia and archaism in the governance of the country.
The constitutional confrontation of March 2021 is an opportunity. It should allow, through the union of liberal forces, to recall the central and strategic role that the Republic of Congo has in Africa. This union aims to move towards a dominant candidate with a programmatic basis. In our opinion, this is the key to the credibility of a systemic alternation. Indeed, the ethnic coalitions or the unions on the simple rejection of a person as an ethnic group will never be able to offer our country the profound change to which it aspires.
Faced with the electoral forfeiture in preparation: censorship of the Congolese internet with Huawei, a massive influx of arms from Turkey, hasty adoption of a law authorizing the early voting of the police, arbitrary imprisonment of opponents and ban on the activities of civil society, our disunity would be high treason.
Incarner l’Espoir for the 60 years of independence of the Republic of the Congo calls for a unique candidate of liberal and progressive forces in the 2021 presidential election.
Beyond the March 2021 election, this convergence will be called upon to drive change in all deliberative assemblies.
Deep down we all have the conviction that the Republic of the Congo has already waited too long, that there is urgency, that it cannot wait any longer, that reforms cannot wait any longer.
That is why, together, let us work toward a more perfect union and the advent of a better and more enlightened Congo.
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