On Saturday, Felix Tshisekedi was sworn in as the president of the second-largest country in Africa, the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The 80,000-seat Martyrs sports stadium in Kinshasa was chosen by the leader known as “Fatshi” for the inauguration event.
Despite the political unrest in the country, he will take on the position for a second five-year term.
He won reelection with more than 70% of the votes, but the opposition parties refused to acknowledge his win due to several election irregularities in December. However, the authorities swiftly refuted the allegations of fraudulent votes. According to the election commission, nearly 18 million votes were cast, representing a 40% voter turnout.
Multiple polling locations commenced operations belatedly, while others remained closed entirely and were short on supplies. The election monitoring organisation CENCO characterised the legislative and presidential elections as an electoral catastrophe.
The 60-year-old was sworn in against Joseph Kabila for the first time in January 2019. During his first tenure, he pledged to end the 25-year conflict in the East and improve living conditions in the DRC but failed to do so. He seeks to provide free primary medications once more for the current term and has requested an additional mandate to “consolidate” the gains.
