From cobalt to electric cars: how the Congolese population hardly shares in mega profits

The so-called copper belt in southeastern Congo was already a lucrative hotspot during colonial rule. The Belgian company Union Minière du Haut-Katanga (UMHK) had millions of tons of copper extracted for the Belgian industry. The Shinkolobwe mine (now closed) mined uranium ore that would be used for the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

After independence in 1960 and the temporary secession of Katanga, President Mobutu nationalized the mining company until Gécamines. The copper price collapsed in the late 1980s and international sanctions against Mobutu dealt the death blow to the mining industry and his own regime.

The 1997 revolution brought Laurent Kabila to power. In the civil war that followed, the mining area in Katanga, like the Kivu region with its coltan and gold, became a real Far West. Delvers or “creuseurs” went there en masse and in dangerous conditions in search of the precious stones.

After the end of the war in 2005, more and more larger players emerged. Attempts by some Belgians and Westerners to rebuild Gécamines failed. President Kabila preferred to do business with controversial businessmen such as the Israeli Dan Gertler, and with China. It became a period of large-scale corruptionalso at state-owned company Gécamines.

Kabila signed a mega deal with China in 2008. 6 billion investments, half of which through infrastructure works, in exchange for generous mining concessions with China receiving almost 70 percent of the proceeds and Congo about 30 percent.

When he took office in early 2019, President Tshisekedi promised to improve conditions in the mining sector and went to China to review the mining deal. There was also a new one mycode drawn up and a tax investigation into fraud and corruption launched. Tshisekedi also made it a point to put the production line between cobalt and the finished products more in Congolese hands.