THE Democratic Republic of Congo’s Senate will on Thursday debate lifting the immunity of ex-president Joseph Kabila, who the government accuses of supporting a Rwanda-backed militia in the mineral-rich east.
A vote in favour could expose the 53-year-old to prosecution on charges of supporting the M23 armed group, which has seized swathes of the eastern DRC with Rwandan support.
His successor, President Felix Tshisekedi, accuses Kabila of conspiring with the M23, whose recent lightning offensive has intensified the more than three-decade-long eastern conflict.
Kabila has been outside the country since 2023, according to his entourage, without revealing his whereabouts.
Justice Minister Constant Mutamba in April urged the military courts to take up the case against Kabila, who led the DRC between 2001 and 2019.
The government accuses the former president of “treason, war crimes, crimes against humanity and participation in an insurrectionary movement”.
On leaving power, Kabila obtained the honorific title of senator for life and with it, parliamentary immunity.
To allow legal proceedings to move forward, the Congolese army’s public prosecutor lodged a request for the Senate to lift that privilege.
In response, the Senate created a 40-lawmaker special commission to rule on the matter, which was to hand in its conclusions on Wednesday ahead of their presentation at a plenary session the following day.
According to a Senate statement sent to AFP on Thursday, the session will open at 1300 GMT with a sole agenda item the “presentation and adoption of the special commission’s report”.
A vote should then take place on adopting its recommendations.
If the commission recommends lifting Kabila’s immunity and lawmakers vote in favour of the principle, the senators will still have to work out the exact procedure to be followed to carry out the measure.
A key question for constitutional experts is whether the final vote to strip him will require a two-thirds majority in both houses of parliament, where Tshisekedi’s coalition enjoys a significant majority.
Kabila is the sole former president to become senator for life in the country’s history.