Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
Ugandans he knew wanted Zairian coffee, so he drove it across the border and brought veterinarian
supplies back in the empty vehicle. His greatest challenge was negotiating with soldiers who tried
to extort amounts that exceeded the value of his goods. His fame as a soccer player no longer pro-
tected him, and business became a constant struggle. When a friend in Uganda offered to introduce
him to André Kisase, a fellow Tetela from Kasai and a known rebel Zairian leader, André accepted.
He met Kisase in his home near Kampala. Kisase was reserved but clearly happy to speak to
someone who knew his tribal language. They discussed the situation in Zaire and their shared hatred
of Mobutu. For André, who'd struggled for so long to feed his family while being robbed daily and
seeing his society deteriorate into anarchy, Kisase's talk of war made sense. There was no other
solution, he realized, and so, when Kisase proposed that André begin military training in Uganda,
he agreed.
A few months later, in 1996, when the RPA invaded Goma to push the Hutu leaders out and re-
patriate the refugees, Kisase told André that this was the time to liberate their country. With the en-
tire border destabilized, the Alliance des Forces Démocratiques pour la Libération du Congo-Zaire
(AFDL), led by Uganda-backed Kisase and Rwanda-backed Laurent-Désiré Kabila, invaded. André
was Kisase's aide-de-camp, but not long afterward, early in 1997, Kisase was killed.
“You were there when he died?” I asked.
He shook his head, looking down slightly. “That I cannot speak of.”
History topics do not offer a clear account of Kisase's death. He was the only rebel with a
force of any size before the Rwandans began courting Zairian leaders. Their immediate reason for
wanting Mobutu removed was his support of the Hutu
génocidaires
. Whereas Kabila followed the
Rwandans' orders closely, earning himself the nickname
Ndiyo Bwana
(“yes sir” in Swahili), Kisase
wanted a revolution for the Congolese, and frequently challenged the Rwandans. Some accounts
state that as he departed his military camp in North Kivu, Kabila's bodyguards accompanied him
and killed him on the road, but there has been no definitive report.
If André shifted his allegiance to the Rwandans, he told me, it was only because he wanted
Mobutu removed. Zairians were flocking to the cause, Mobutu's soldiers fleeing west. The people's
frustration had at last been harnessed, and they supported Kabila because they were hungry for
change. But the decay of the Zairian state was far greater than anyone could have imagined, and the
war went quickly to Kinshasa. André arrived there the day after the capital fell.
His joy was short-lived, however, as Kabila's nepotism began immediately. The country's new
leader named relatives and friends from Katanga to positions of power. Nothing that André had
fought for was happening.
“Everyone kept asking Kabila if they could have elections and a multiparty state, and he said
no. We saw another dictator in the making. We wanted to eliminate Kabila before his dictatorship
took root.”
André was working for the Conseil National de Sécurité in Kinshasa, or National Security
Council (CNS). The Rwandans had followed his activities during the war, and when Kabila ex-
pelled them and the new war started in 1998, they asked André to come back. They saw that he
had the makings of a leader, speaking French, Lingala, Tetela, Swahili, and Mashi, as well as some
Kinyarwanda and Luganda, the languages of Rwanda and Uganda. They gave him further military
training in Rwanda and placed him as a technical consultant for Ernest Wamba dia Wamba, a soft-
spoken professor who had spent years in academic institutions in the United States and now was the
president of the Rally for Congolese Democracy (RCD), the rebel force opposing Kabila.
