Congo Inc

by In Koli Jean Bofane

  “Hey, Omari, eeeh!” Shasha la Jactance exclaimed, clapping her hands once only. She was sitting on one of the tables close to Isookanga. “You should’ve seen him when I first met him, Old Isoo. Right here at the market. He had just escaped from the army, was sitting somewhere.”

  “Why do they call him Double-Blade?”

  “You don’t know why, Old Isoo? Because when he was in the war he once caught a prisoner in the tall grass. He took away the man’s rifle and they returned to the camp. Omari kept him moving with his hands up, threatening him only with daggers, one in each hand. His own in his right hand, his enemy’s in his left, not even needing the Kalashnikov. That’s why the child soldiers called him Double-Blade.”

  She turned pensive. “Omari was weird at first. Always in his own little corner, got angry over nothing. I was the only one who understood him. He was like my brother. We had our own little secret. One evening the two of us went off to throw the AK into the Gombe River. He wanted to forget everything. You know, Old Isoo, this war has done a lot of damage. He was eleven or twelve at the time, just a little older than Trésor is now. It was already late in the day by then.”

  Actually, there was no need for a Rolex that day to know that it was well past noon. Empty stomachs and a merciless sun reminded the frenzied crowd going about its business at the Great Market that the daily race for survival had long been started. Focused on their mission, people didn’t seem to notice the boy on the low wall, holding his AK-47 in the crook of his left arm the way you rock a doll. His much too large uniform led some folks to carefully give him a wide berth. His shoulders shook from his heavy sobbing, and every now and then he’d raise his head toward the sun as if he were trying to dry the tears that were burning his face. The little guy seemed not to hear the cries from the women vendors heatedly bragging about the quality of their wares. Men carting heavy boxes made their way through, ranting and raving, and yet the child’s ears didn’t pick up on it. Omari, the young kadogo, couldn’t stop weeping. Perhaps his spirit was trying to forget the heroic journey he’d made under the most awful suffering for the conquest of Congo, the forest-lined roads so valuable for ambushes, the training in terror that paralyzes or that you inhale, the iron discipline.

  After the rebels of the AFDL had taken his town in the eastern part of the country, after the gunshots and the cries in the night, everyone left home. Children like him were the first to approach these liberators whom they’d been waiting for in both fear and hope. Then the wind of freedom had intoxicated him, and one day of great ecstasy made him leave his home and family. They immediately thrust a rifle in his hand, an AK. They advised him to treat it with the utmost respect, to care for it as if it were the apple of his eye. He learned to take it apart and put it back together again. He came to handle it so well that in the end, he and the gun were one. Firing off many rounds, he told himself that the smell of the powder spreading around surely made for stronger warriors. During one operation, the first time he’d ever pointed his weapon at a man and felt the machine jump in his hands three times, he measured the range of its power. From then on Omari never laughed again.

  The kadogo stopped sobbing for a moment and glanced at the crowd in astonishment as if he were waking up from a nap in public. He stuck his hand in the folds of his faded uniform and took out a transparent aqua-blue plastic gun, flashy, magnificent. The boy contemplated it for an instant as it lay in the palm of his hand like an offering. He picked it up by its butt and aimed at the sky. Slowly he turned the toy at different angles to watch the sun’s rays creating iridescent streams of light. He let the rivulets of water playing inside the transparent mechanism subdue him. He aimed carefully and gently pulled the trigger. As the pin went down, his heart swelled with a feeling he was unable to identify. A thin stream of water squirted up to the sky with force, then fell back down on the child’s face like rain. Omari lowered his arms, then his head, as new tears gave expression to all his sorrow.

  That morning he’d left Camp Kokolo with his unit. They carried out some routine missions on the riverbank. When he saw the water pistol at the Great Market he stopped. He fell behind the squad as he made an about-turn to look at the toy again and maybe buy it. The vendor accepted a small price. Coercing a man who was selling fresh water, Omari immediately filled the little weapon. When he pulled the trigger, an irresistible urge to laugh came over him, which he quickly repressed. He pulled it again and then couldn’t stop laughing anymore. Afterward he could no longer find his unit. He had seriously broken the rules and the military code. This was desertion and would be severely punished: whippings, jail time, maltreatment. Distraught, Omari circled the market over and over again. It seemed the crowd had swallowed up his comrades. Now he was sitting on a low wall, the Kalashnikov in the crook of his arm, his young soldier’s heart raw; while some ignored him like a stone on the roadside, others carefully avoided him like the skin of a snake drying in the sun.

  1. Clandestine bars.

  2. A dance originating in Congo; here the bar where it is danced.—Tr.’s note

  3. “They killed Omari!”

  4. Automatic firing position, while position S refers to the semi-automatic position.

  5. Urban gangs of Kinshasa.

  6. Small kiosks that sell everything.

  7. “Let him through, let him through! Let him go through!”

  8. “My Old Man.”

  9. “We’re going on a mission!”

  10. “Totally, Old Man!”

  11. “Your mother is burning in hell!” in The Exorcist of William Friedkin.

  12. Urban gangs.

  13. “Death, death, my mother brought me into the world to die.”

  14. “Death, death, my mother brought me into the world to die. The corpse is still warm, the corpse is still warm.”

  15. “Let’s go!”

  16. Werrason is the stage name of Noël Ngiama Makanda, a musician from the DRC.—Tr.’s note

  17. “Excuse me.”

  18. “Man, drop her off at the Avenue de la Libération.”

  THE WOMEN THEY KILL

  被杀的女人们

  Kiro Bizimungu’s 4 × 4 was parked on a street next to the Great Market. The doors on the passenger side were open to let some air in. In the front seat, a soldier in fatigues had one boot on the ground as he absentmindedly grabbed a cigarette. Another was standing outside, his back against the car, the barrel of his weapon pointing down. In the backseat, Kiro Bizimungu was forcing himself to read a newspaper, looking up frequently to check the crowded street. He hated coming here, but his wife’s car was at the service station and he certainly needed to accompany her. An unspeakable multitude, as always in this part of the city, made one doubt some of the convictions about this city one might otherwise hold. All the slightly intelligent polls describing it were at their lowest point. They all confirmed that this group of people was done for, that the country’s poverty was deep-rooted even though the stores and the stalls at the Great Market were collapsing under nothing but stuff and merchandise bought, paid for mostly in currency that didn’t show up on any World Bank listing. It even seemed as if there was a shortage of everything, but at first sight it went unnoticed.

  At the same time, the population that permanently compared itself to Job at his worst moments, arrived each day with its Congolese francs, its dollars, its “wounded soldiers”;1 in cash, in wads, held together with rubber bands hidden in the folds of a pagne, slipped inside bras, stuffed in socks, carried in traveling bags; to buy, to sell, depending on the supply and demand, always going up. The people formed something like a herd of wildebeests having nothing to do with one another, each moving in its own direction in utter disarray.

  Near every self-respecting herd there were prowlers known as the inevitable scavengers, such as hyenas, jackals, vultures, embodied by delinquents and the otherwise uncivil who, at their own risk, were in the business of pickpocketing; snatching small gold chains and earrings, that would leave a mutilated ear
lobe or a neck lacerated by the precious metal. Above this food pyramid were the great predators, the policemen and military men in civilian clothes attempting to get out while the going was good. They attacked as a group while isolating the quarry, showing their teeth, only to finally leave the victim undone from part of his nest egg and frustrated because there was nothing he could do about it. It was the law of the jungle of the Great Market, where everyone inevitably had to pass through sooner or later. The enormous racket, the car horns, and the noise of the motors conveniently covered up the complaints of those who in broad daylight were held ransom this way.

  Kiro Bizimungu was busy reading an article on shégués who had fomented a riot. It mentioned a Pygmy; you could see him shaking the governor’s hand. Because the photo of a shadow standing next to a pillar wasn’t very clear, they claimed he had the support of China. Kiro had seen the guy on television two days earlier. A member of the police had accidentally killed a shégué and the street children had run amok. They’d taken one police officer and two soldiers hostage. They did have guts, those kids, the former rebel concluded. Then a Pygmy had come to negotiate with the authorities and apparently had handled it very well, because Kiro remembered seeing him smiling broadly on the screen and the hostages being released without a fight.

  Kiro began to cogitate. After all, this was the first time that one of his citizens had appeared in the media since he’d been named the director of the Conservation Service of Salonga National Park. And what an appearance! This guy was good. He and the man certainly had a few things in common. First of all, they each belonged to a minority misunderstood by other people. Granted, Kiro thought, in a country of more than four hundred ethnicities everyone was ultimately a minority, but some more so than others. He was a Tutsi and the other was a Pygmy, which somehow established a parallel between them. The other common point was the position of the rebellion they had successfully managed to adopt. Neither of them tolerated anyone else having control over their life. The guy hadn’t said anything of consequence in front of the camera except for a phrase about fresh water from Switzerland; perhaps he wanted to mention his ethnic neutrality—Kiro wasn’t sure. But everyone was set free, and the Pygmy had accomplished it without any bloodshed while almost all the demands they’d made were satisfied, and all of it within an hour or two. It was an extraordinary feat not everyone could have pulled off.

  “Pure Swiss Water!”

  The first thing Kiro Bizimungu saw was a large polystyrene container with red measles-like spots, strolling around by itself and, underneath, a diminutive creature who at the top of his voice was shouting himself hoarse: “Pure Swiss Water! Mayi yango oyo!”

  It was him, all right, Kiro realized—no doubt about it. “Hey, you!”

  Isookanga stopped in front of the 4 × 4.

  “Give me a packet of water.”

  The young Ekonda glanced at the bodyguard leaning against the vehicle, who grabbed the container and put it on the sidewalk. Isookanga opened the box, took out a plastic bag filled with water, and through the window handed it to the former commander, who accepted it, bit off one of the corners, sucked, stopped, nodded his head, and said, “Not bad, that water of yours. Does it really come from Switzerland?”

  Isookanga smiled. “Why shouldn’t it? We live in a globalized world, Old One. Today we shouldn’t ask where things come from anymore. If Louis Vuitton has its bags made in Guangzhou, what do they say? Paris, right? That’s all. Free circulation of goods. Is it good? You like my water?”

  “It’s great! Give some to my men.”

  Isookanga was only too happy to oblige. The guy leaning against the car grabbed a packet, bit into it, and then, with his large hand right in front of the AK slung across his shoulder, he squeezed it the way you squeeze an orange. The contents vanished into his mouth in no time. He flattened out the plastic to catch the last drops and threw it in the gutter as if it were an old banana.

  “Where are you from, Little Man?”

  “From Tshuapa, mwan’Ekanga pire.”

  “You know who I am?”

  “No, Old One.”

  “I’m your boss.”

  Seeing the surprised look on Isookanga’s face, he added, “I am the new director of the Conservation Service of Salonga National Park. I’m in charge of that area now. You know it?”

  “I do, but now I’m a Kinshasan, and what goes on down there is no longer of concern to me. What is a forest, after all?”

  Kiro listened to the guy carry on about globalization—whose cornerstone didn’t consist of trees but of stock options—and was thinking it over. He needed to find out more about the region he now managed, and the odd fellow in front of him was the perfect person to help him out. And, in view of the turn his conversations were taking, the young man would distract him, that much was certain.

  “Listen,” he said, handing him his business card, “my office is nearby. Stop in, I’m there every day. God willing! Bosco, you see this man? If he stops by the office, send him up.”

  “Here, for your water.” Without counting, the guard handed the Pygmy a wad of bills.

  “OK!” Isookanga said. “I’ll come by. Take a packet, it’s a gift.” He gave him three. “See you soon.”

  And the Pygmy moved on, chanting, “Pure water! Mayi yang’oyo!” He continued his trade, evading the crowd, the container balanced on top of his head, his mind and pockets filled with dreams.

  A moment later Kiro’s long-awaited spouse appeared, accompanied by a bodyguard in fatigues carrying a large cardboard box filled with staples, which he put in the back of the 4 × 4. When Madame had settled down, the guard closed the car doors, glanced around at the human bustle, and then jumped into the back of the departing vehicle, its horn unrelenting to force its way through.

  The relationship between Adeïto Kalisayi and Kiro Bizimungu was a peculiar one. They had met, if that’s the term, in the territory of Mwenga in South Kivu, where someone—surely a great sorcerer of globalization—had decided that the soil was more fertile than elsewhere because it was packed with stones and rare metals. Scratching it just a little was enough to increase the options on any one of the new generation’s telephones. The diviner had claimed that all they needed to do was bleed the surface soil of Kivu in order to own telecommunication satellites that would provide the most mind-boggling performances and possibilities. By creating permanent devastation down there—which wasn’t very difficult—they would acquire the means to develop a buildup for the highly sophisticated technology and thus be forever invincible. And by driving the effort a little further, if they managed to eradicate its population as quietly as possible, they would be able to attain the stage of master among the world’s masters.

  And so the men of Kiro Bizimungu, known as Commander Kobra Zulu, had turned up in trucks to contribute to fulfilling the utopia of former statesmen and billionaires who had gathered in Urugwiro Village.2 It was a matter of radicalizing the exploitation project to which Kiro and his cronies had decided to devote themselves. As for those inhabitants of Kivu who were neither willing to go into hiding nor disappear, Kiro and his men would need to terrify them sufficiently so they would end up leaving of their own free will. Being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize is one thing; capturing the Global Citizen Award granted by the Clinton Global Initiative is another: there’s no beating around the bush.3

  Kobra Zulu’s battalion had originally been deployed to take the village by stranglehold, and then shots had rung out, spreading total confusion. Men, women, and children were killed on the spot. They dragged people from their huts and homes and brought them together at a crossroads with a little market, a few vending stalls, and a toleka service station.4 A few knocks with their rifle butts were enough for the soldiers to destroy the last panels of a billboard. They hauled a man from the largest house and tied him up with electric wire to the now exposed iron bars of the ruined billboard. They tore off his shirt and his pants and he stood there, naked. His feet apart, his arms stretched
out wide, he gazed at the crowd before him.

  Normally the place was animated with villagers coming to buy needed staples that the little commercial center along the road had to offer. Today it was a very different scene. The population present was made to attend the demonstration of the new order that had been established in Kivu and throughout the east of Congo. A few days earlier, not far from there, a convoy of Rwandan soldiers and rebels had been attacked by Maï-Maï,5 which resulted in enormous losses. It was a matter of reminding the largest possible number of people that subversion belonged to the past, that any resistance would be mercilessly repressed. To instill this idea, they had to resort to acts that would be branded in the villagers’ minds forever. To set the example, a traditional village chief would be sacrificed. Extreme terror was the most efficient short-term and long-term way to deter any revolt.

  Held at bay by weapons of all calibers, the gathered population was silent. The soldiers looked grim. Everything seemed rooted to the spot. The leaves on the trees barely stirred in a warmish breeze. Only the agitated eyes of the torture victim were still moving. They turned from left to right, occasionally pausing at one person, calling each one to witness. The crowd had been ordered to keep silent, to watch carefully, and, above all, to not dare shed any tears.

  The session about to take place would take a little time but not much. One simple rule had been established. Simple but delicate in its application, it was known as the “rule of steadily accelerated subtraction” and consisted of cutting up a man into pieces in such a way that, before he bled out, he could be present, cognizant of the dismemberment of his own body, his reproductive organ in his mouth.

  After a swift speech by Commander Kiro Bizimungu, the large knife went to work, snipping, cutting flesh and fat around the testicles and penis of the hostage. The man was tightly bound, but extra arms proved necessary to hold him down. Despite the chief’s ghastly howling, the soldier in charge worked deftly, with steady, almost elegant gestures.