In a speech delivered this Monday evening, the Congolese president denounced the “ tragedy » that his country is experiencing. Tomorrow Tuesday, he should get to the heart of this subject with his French counterpart at the Élysée.
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For his first official visit to France, the president Felix Tshisekedi arrived this Monday morning in Paris where he was welcomed by Secretary of State for Development Chryzoula Zacharopoulou. A ceremony of honor at Les Invalides took place shortly afterwards. A sign of the importance that Paris wanted to bring to this visit, the ceremony was followed by a meeting with the President of the Senate, and the President of the National Assembly.
This Monday evening, President Tshisekedi gave a speech at the Collège des Bernardins on the occasion of the presentation of his book For a Congo found, attended by Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the leader of the French radical left. “ This forum offers me the opportunity to share with your audience the disappointment of the Congolese people in the face of the ignorance of the injustice they have suffered for more than thirty years following a war that was imposed on them. “, declared Félix Tshisekedi.
“ I could not fail to express myself on the tragedy that my country is experiencing “, he added, denouncing the “ predatory and expansionist desires expressed by certain foreign powers “. Comments which echo those expressed this midday on RFI by the Congolese ambassador in Paris Émile Ngoy Kasongo, who castigated “ the guilty silence of the international community “. “ To our French friends, I would say that I am counting on your community to relay in all spheres constituting your Republic the aspiration of my people for a Congo rediscovered, a Congo strong in its diversity, strong in its wealth », added Félix Tshisekedi.
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This Tuesday, the Head of State will visit the military school alongside the Minister of the Armed Forces Sébastien Lecornu before a working lunch at the Élysée with Emmanuel Macron, after which the two presidents will give a conference on press. This will mark the highlight of this official visit.
“ What is important is the revival, the warming of cooperation, comments the Congolese Minister of Foreign Affairs, Christophe Lutundula. It is not that it has cooled down, but we must give new impetus in the economic field, in the field of security forces – we must not forget that France is one of the countries which form our army –, in the international domain, there is the whole problem of security in the east of the DRC. »
Indeed, during this bilateral meeting between the two heads of state, it will be mainly a question, once again, of the security situation in eastern Congo, which is prey to the violence of numerous armed groups, including the M23 rebels, supported Rwanda. Kinshasa has long called for retaliatory measures against its neighbor. “ France plays a role as a permanent member country in the Security Council. We expect France to continue to press its position to ask Rwanda to withdraw its troops from the DRC and to go so far as to initiate sanctions. »
Congolese and French business circles and ministers in Bercy
Mr. Tshisekedi’s visit also includes an important economic component. The Congolese president will close a forum on business and investments between France and the DRC this Tuesday afternoon at the French Ministry of Economy and Finance. The meeting is organized by the Movement of Companies of France, the employers’ union, where strategic minerals, energy and infrastructure will be discussed.
This is'” a crucial milestone » for economic diplomacy between the DRC and France, in the words of the director general of the Congolese Investment Promotion Agency, Anthony Nkinzo. French companies have fallen behind their competitors, he regrets. 46 projects and 800 million euros invested in twenty years is not much. But things are changing, he observes, with 500 million euros committed in just four years thanks in particular to the return of the Promotion and Participation Company for Economic Cooperation (Proparco), a French development financial institution. , a subsidiary of the French Development Agency.
Anthony Nkinzo: on the economic level, the relationship between the two countries tends to improve
The DRC is carrying out reforms to its taxation and the investment code, it can become a land of opportunities for SMEs and not only for large French companies, will underline the fifty Congolese companies and agencies represented, at the hundred French companies. Priority sectors for the DRC: transport, energy, water, health and the development of value chains in agriculture and mining. The Congolese Battery Council thus hopes to convince its partners to help it install a plant in the DRC to transform Congolese minerals into precursors for electric batteries, while waiting, it hopes, to manufacture the batteries themselves there. .
Expected alongside Félix Tshisekedi in Paris, the Congolese Minister of Finance Nicolas Kazadi will be absent, banned since this weekend from leaving the territory by the prosecutor at the Court of Cassation of Kinshasa, in a case of alleged overbilling.
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