Security forces laid a siege on the residence of DRC presidential candidate Moise Katumbi on Monday, sparking outrage from supporters, who chanted political slogans, his aides said.
Armoured military vehicles took strategic positions around the home of the opposition candidate who emerged third in the presidential election which has been slammed by some as fraudulent.
Katumbi, a former Governor of Katanga Province, emerged favourite in his home turf where he scored majority of the votes, but won only 18% of the national vote against incumbent president Felix Tshitsekedi’s 73.3%.
The opposition leaders have joined hands in calling for an independent investigation into the “vote fraud”, which has seen the National Electoral Commission (CENI) cancelling results in some areas.
According to Katumbi’s political camp, the CENI has confirmed through its own investigations that government representatives committed fraud by being in possession of electoral material and voting kits.
“There is nothing short of an annulment that would restore the legitimacy of the process,” Katumbi said in a statement.
While the Provincial government in Katanga, southern DRC, denied a siege on the home of the opposition politician lasted hours, aides said the military laid a siege on the home for hours on Monday. The armed forces were armed with rocket launchers. “There has been an urgent development.
The armed forces are surrounding the home and the candidate has not been allowed to leave his plot,” an aide said in a statement sent to PANA.
The Constitutional Court is expected to validate the provisional results.
Katumbi’s party, however, said the “crisis of legitimacy” of the one that will be declared by the Constitutional Court no longer casts a shadow of any doubt.
“It will not only lead to a new outburst of predictable violence but to relaunch a Congolese armed opposition on which Corneille Nangaa, the former president of CENI and close to Joseph Kabila, has just made a winning takeover bid,” Katumbi’s allies claimed.
Nangaa led the electoral commission when President Tshesikedi won a controversial first term against favourite Martin Fayulu, a former executive of an oil company.
Nangaa is reportedly working on an alliance with the Congo River Alliance, an armed group which has joined forces with the M23, another armed group which was on the verge of seizing Goma before it was stopped.
Katumbi party said DRC is in the context of unprecedented political and security crisis, a plot was underway to have Katumbi arrested.
The party claimed allies of the Belgian government were working secretly with the military to get the opposition leader arrested. The former governor of Katanga is suspected of attempting to foment a rebellion in Katanga.
The government has reportedly impossed an exit ban on Katumbi, so he is unable to leave Lubumbashi, the regional capital.
The security forces have been instructed to block all his aircraft on the ground.
Several residences of the former governor of Katanga are currently under close surveillance by the national intelligence services, military security and the police.
