KINSHASA, May 23, 2025 (BSS/AFP) - Joseph Kabila's party on Friday 
denounced the stripping of the former Democratic Republic of Congo leader's 
immunity as a "witch hunt" meant to mask failures of governance under 
President Felix Tshisekedi.

A Senate vote on Thursday evening stripped Kabila, 53, of his parliamentary 
immunity.

That opened the way for him to be prosecuted on accusations he conspired with 
a Rwanda-backed militia in the eastern DRC to remove his successor.

Tshisekedi has accused Kabila of preparing an "insurrection" with the M23 
armed group, which with Rwanda's help has seized swathes of the DRC's 
mineral-rich east.

Kabila led the DRC between 2001 and 2019.

Although he left the country in 2023, with his entourage tight-lipped on his 
exact whereabouts, he still enjoys some influence over Congolese political 
life.

The overwhelming vote in favour of stripping his immunity as senator for life 
-- an honorary title granted to Kabila on leaving office -- came as little 
surprise. Tshisekedi's coalition enjoys a comfortable majority in both 
chambers.

Kabila's People's Party for Reconstruction and Democracy (PPRD) boycotted the 
last polls in 2023, and the independence of the Congolese judiciary has often 
been questioned.

"It's really a manhunt, a witch-hunt," Ferdinand Kambere, the PPRD's deputy 
secretary-general told AFP on Friday.

With this "masquerade" in the Senate, Tshisekedi has embarked on a path 
aiming to "destroy democracy in our country and close the mouths of any 
Congolese who denounce the war in the east", Kambere said.

"There is a desire in Felix's regime, and that's to want to mask or hide the 
failure of governance," Kambere added, denouncing the lifting of Kabila's 
immunity as "theatre".

For more than three decades the eastern DRC has been riven by conflict, which 
has intensified since the M23's resurgence in 2021.

Since the beginning of 2025 the anti-government armed group has seized the 
key eastern cities of Goma and Bukavu, and set up to govern for the long term 
in the areas under its control.

The justice ministry in April referred the case against the former president 
to the military courts, after Kabila announced he would make a grand return 
to the country in the east.

He however did not specify whether he would visit a part of the east under 
the M23's control.

No concrete evidence of his return ever emerged.

Yet in the wake of the announcement the Congolese authorities raided several 
of his properties and suspended his PPRD.