A military court in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has sentenced former president Joseph Kabila to death in absentia after finding him guilty of “treason” and alleged complicity with the M23 rebel group.
Gatekeepers News reports that the 54-year-old ex-leader, who left the country in 2023, was neither present at Tuesday’s trial in Kinshasa nor represented by lawyers. The court ruled that Kabila conspired with M23, an armed movement that has seized large parts of eastern Congo with alleged support from Rwanda.
Military prosecutor General Lucien Rene Likulia had pressed for the death penalty, accusing Kabila of plotting to overthrow President Félix Tshisekedi. Additional charges included homicide, torture, and rape linked to M23 operations.
Likulia alleged that Kabila coordinated with Rwanda to stage a coup against Tshisekedi, with the involvement of Corneille Nangaa, former electoral commission chief during the disputed 2018 election.
Kabila’s party denounced the ruling as a “political trial.”
Observers believe the sentence is aimed at neutralising Kabila’s potential influence over the opposition, particularly after he briefly reappeared in Goma in May, where he met religious leaders in the presence of M23 spokesman Lawrence Kanyuka. His current whereabouts remain unclear.
President Tshisekedi has repeatedly accused Kabila of masterminding M23’s rebellion, while Kabila has described Tshisekedi’s government as a “dictatorship.” Rwanda denies backing the rebel group, though UN experts say Rwandan forces have played a “critical” role in its campaign.
The death penalty, reinstated in the DRC last year after a moratorium was lifted, has not been enforced through executions in recent times.
Kabila, who ruled from 2001 to 2019 after the assassination of his father Laurent-Désiré Kabila, left office following Tshisekedi’s contested victory.
