referendum in DRC

Ali has a short series about the referendum taking place this sunday in the Congo DRC (first, second and third); very interesting read. If you don't know the context : the Congo DRC has been in a process for democratization since the early nineties, held aside by a couple of civil wars which ended up in a transition governement with the different componants. The transition started in 2003 and is still nothing close to democracy (nobody has been elected).

Radio Okapi had a great series of shows the last few weeks talking with people for and people against the proposed constitution that would lead to democratic elections in june 2006.

I personally do not like some parts of the constituion. First of all the (stupid) ‘exclusive’ citizenship. Then the possibility of the governement to give up sovereignty on some areas for the good of the ‘african union’ (wazat mean?). And most of all, one of the last article, that says the (non democratic) institutions of the transition will hold until the new ones are in place. This is utterly silly. They will take as much time as they can. Since there is no limit set, I can't imagine how many years they will take. The only mention of time limit, is 36 months after the new institutions have been set up; and that's only about the 10 provinces becoming 26, therefore allowing provinces to shares power with the central governement.

Now if politicians turn out to be of good will, *cough*, then voting yes is probably the only, ... er... best option.