By:The Homeland News Agency/AFP
The Democratic Republic of Congo announced a coalition government Monday, seven months after the inauguration of the new president Felix Tshishisekedi.
“The government is finally here. The president has signed the decree and we will begin work soon,” Prime Minister Sylvestre Ilunga told reporters before the members of the new government were announced by the presidency’s spokesman.
The power-sharing agreement will see 23 members of the executive drawn from Tshisekedi’s Direction For Change, and the remaining 42 from former president Joseph Kabila’s Common Front for Congo.
Kabila presided over sub-Saharan Africa’s biggest country for nearly two decades and still commands widespread support.
Forming the coalition had taken time as both sides had to “remove everything that could be an obstacle to the functioning of the government”, said Ilunga.
DR Congo’s unstable politics remain overshadowed by ex-president Joseph Kabila
The
executive will have a female vice prime minister, minister for foreign affairs
and minister for planning, Ilunga said.
Around three-quarters of members were serving in government for the first time,
he added, hailing this as an “important innovation”.
Tshisekedi emerged victorious in elections that marked the Democratic Republic
of Congo’s first peaceful transition of power since the mineral-rich nation
gained independence from Belgium in 1960.
The unstable country’s politics remain overshadowed by Kabila, who amassed
extensive clout after 18 years in power.
