Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
In May 1999, the RCD took Lodja, the administrative center of the Sankuru region, and André
found himself a seat on the first plane there. He had never been able to reach Sankuru before; he'd
lacked the money and leisure, and the area had been cut off owing to the country's degraded infra-
structure and the
tracasserie
—soldiers harassing travelers constantly. For the first time, he observed
the forests broken with savannah, yellow clearings like puzzle pieces in the vast green covering that
thinned to the south until it gave way to open land. He recalled his father's stories, how he'd said
the region was full of wild animals like those in the Virunga National Park.
In Lodja, he spoke to the local people and explained the RCD's purpose, meeting with commu-
nity leaders and assuring them that they would not be mistreated. He tried to dispel the belief that
the RCD was a Rwandan invasion with no support from the Congolese. To the contrary, he told
them, thousands of Congolese had joined the struggle precisely because they wanted a democratic
state.
In 2001, when the RCD was putting a military governor in charge of Lodja, the people there
requested that André be given this position because they felt he understood their needs. The RCD
agreed to make him vice-governor, and he set about establishing better relations with the people and
punishing military abuse.
Once, he learned that a Mai Mai group had captured a village 110 miles away. Though the gov-
ernor recommended a counter-attack with one hundred soldiers, André insisted on taking fifty, since
there were only seventeen enemies in the village with light weapons, and he didn't want more sol-
diers than he could watch over. When he set out, he rode his motorcycle in front of the truck that
carried his troops. If they arrived before him, his soldiers might blame the villagers for allowing the
Mai Mai to enter, and there might be reprisals.
Once there, he discovered that the Mai Mai had left after killing the head of police. André's
soldiers wanted revenge, but he said that if they did anything, he would shoot them himself. From
there, he went to the neighboring village, where his father's family was from. André was scout-
ing the area with two bodyguards when seven Mai Mai approached, all of them local people who
had formed a rebel group. His guards wanted to shoot, but he ordered them not to. He saw the old
weapons the Mai Mai were carrying, and he doubted that they had ammunition for them. They got
within twenty yards, staring at him, and he just stared back, commanding his men to do nothing. As
André recalled, his two guards ran.
“I always focused on my goal,” he told me, “and made up my mind to achieve it. One of my
rules was to never allow myself to see anything negatively. I perceived all in a positive light so that
I would succeed.”
Staring at the advancing Mai Mai, he told himself that nothing bad could happen to him in his
paternal village—that he must know these men and that they must be aware of his reputation for
fairness. He put the power of his will into his gaze, commanding them not to attack. One of them
called him by name.
He spoke with them for a long time, listening to their grievances. Over the course of the next
week, he managed to get more than a thousand Mai Mai to come out of the forest. He explained that
they had to rebuild their country, to work together. He met with the chieftains, establishing relation-
ships that he would use again years later to create the reserve. The chiefs told him that they were
angry at certain abusive commanders, police, and administrators, and André had them removed
from the region.
