Looming Congo election sparks deadly violence
Rallies are cancelled in Kinshasa and opposition frontrunner is blocked from meeting supporters, with at least two dead
Police in the Democratic Republic of the Congo have blocked President Joseph Kabila's main rival at an airport in Kinshasa to stop him staging an election rally after at least two died in violence across the capital city.
Ahead of presidential and parliamentary elections on Monday, rival factions hurled rocks at each other and gunfire was heard across the town.
A Reuters reporter saw one dead body on the road to the airport while a UN source reported another death elsewhere in town.
This will be Congo's second election since a 1998-2003 war. The campaign has been marked by opposition allegations of irregularities and concerns about inadequate preparations.
Police stopped opposition leader Etienne Tshisekedi and his entourage from leaving Kinshasa's N'djili airport after his party said it would defy a ban on political rallies imposed earlier on Saturday.
"I'll call the population of Kinshasa to come here," said Tshisekedi, 78, sitting in a red Hummer surrounded by police at the exit gate of the airport. "We are already dying in our thousands, we are not going to let a few injuries stop us fighting now," he said, a reference to his accusation that Kabila's government has saddled Congo's population with insecurity and poverty.
After hours of failed negotiations by UN peacekeepers, police moved in on Tshisekedi's entourage, dragging several people from their cars, according to a Reuters witness. Tshisekedi was later escorted to his home by the police, according to a UN source.
Earlier, tens of thousands of Congolese had turned out on the airport road, most of them identifiable as Tshisekedi supporters. Some chanted his name while many billboards for Kabila and his allies had been torn down.
Kabila, Tshisekedi and the other main challenger, Vital Kamerhe, had been due to hold rallies within several hundred metres of each oth! er in ce ntral Kinshasa on Saturday.
Kamerhe told Reuters four people had been killed, including one of his supporters, but it was not immediately possible to confirm that toll.
Under constitutional amendments signed off by Kabila this year, the presidential vote will be decided in a single round, meaning the winner can claim victory with a simple majority. Analysts say that favours Kabila against the split opposition.
Despite a logistics operation supported by helicopters from South Africa and Angola, some observers doubt whether all the ballot slips will reach the 60,000 voting stations by Monday in a country two-thirds the size of the European Union.
However national election commission president Daniel Ngoy Mulunda said he did not expect any delay to the polls, saying that materials were 90% distributed.
"We had some delays with weather but we know it will work on Monday it won't rain."
Kabila's rivals say fake polling stations have been set up to allow vote-rigging, an allegation denied by the authorities. They also accuse Kabila of using state media and transport assets for his campaign. Kamerhe said the Congolese would not accept a rigged poll.
"They want free and fair elections that allow them to take their destiny in their own hands. People will refuse cheating wherever it takes place," he said.
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