The United States restored preferential trade status to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) on Tuesday, December 22, ten years after withdrawing it due to human rights concerns. In a presidential proclamation, Donald Trump once again attributed to Kinshasa the possibility of sending exports to the US market without customs taxes, “Because of the measures taken by the government of the DRC”.
According to a 2000 law, the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), countries in sub-Saharan Africa can export most of their goods to the United States without tariffs if they respect certain principles related to the State of law, political pluralism, workers’ rights and a market economy. Former President Barack Obama had withdrawn this privilege from the DRC in December 2010. His government officials then invoked human rights violations by the Congolese security forces, including the use of rape as a weapon of war.
But Washington has displayed its optimism since the election of Félix Tshisekedi, who took office in January 2019 on the occasion of the first peaceful transfer of power in the DRC. The Congolese president is committed to fighting endemic corruption in this vast country plagued by poverty despite its enormous wealth in natural resources. Among the spectacular twists and turns since coming to power, his former chief of staff Vital Kamerhe, a hitherto untouchable player in Congolese political life, was sentenced in June to twenty years of forced labor for corruption.
Vital Kamerhe had previously been a close ally of the previous president, Joseph Kabila, a strongman of the DRC for eighteen years. For nearly two years, Félix Tshisekedi had to govern in coalition with the Kabila camp, but in recent weeks he has undertaken to get rid of this cumbersome ally, officially to carry out the anti-corruption reforms supported by the United States and the Union. European.
