The Gathering Storm

This chapter sketches the politico-historical context in which Congo’s liberation movement, the AFDL, emerged and the circumstances that shaped its character and composition from genesis. It provides background on the nature of the Congolese state, the changing international relations of Africa and the rise to power of the RPF. Importantly, it situates the Congolese experience within the Pan-Africanist liberation project as it was dreamed and godfathered by Julius Nyerere. For the Tanzanian former president and his disciples, the ousting of Mobutu represented the next logical stop in the trajectory of Africa’s liberation politics. This was an analysis shared by the RPF whose natural ideological inclinations were supercharged by the security imperative of having the génocidaires on Rwanda’s doorstep: the Front identified waging war abroad as a precondition for being able to do nation-building at home.