5 months after the DRC Presidency-Civil Society round table, the PCA of ODEP follow-up on DRC-Ventora agreement
Five (5) months have passed since the work of the Round Table organized, from April 13 to 14, 2022, by the Presidency of the Republic in Kinshasa on the restitution to civil society of the Settlement Agreement at the amicable agreement signed between the Congolese State and the Ventora Group of the Israeli businessman Dan Gertler.
Florimond Muteba, PCA of the Observatory of Public Expenditure “ODEP”, deplores the silence of the Presidency of the Republic on the evolution of the agreement signed between the DRC and the Ventora group. Five months later, the follow-up committee composed of members of civil society and the government, which should be set up, has not materialized. At this stage, the civil society that participated in this round table has no control over the development of this agreement.
“During the round table with the Presidency of the Republic, the Dircab of the Head of State had promised us on behalf of Félix Tshisekedi that there would be no files concerning public policy in the mining sector and natural resources with which civil society cannot be associated. There was a need between the two parties to set up a monitoring committee made up of civil society and other members of the Government. At the current stage, none of this has been 5 months later, neither the round table itself has been evaluated let alone the follow-up. Those who were supposed to work with civil society have never been available to do so. We can say that the round table has ended in a fishtail, which is a shame,” laments Florimond Muteba.
For the latter, the participation of civil society in this round table was never intended to support the billionaire Dan Gertler but rather to accompany the DRC to recover its assets.
“We were never at the round table to support Dan Gertler. We went to support the fact that the Government was going to recover exceptional public revenues which can be added to the budgetary forecasts. We went there to discover this agreement in the framework of citizen control. It was necessary to go to this round table today, we think that there are a lot of limits to what we can do together with the Presidency of the Republic”, he said. hammered.
What about 2 billion that the DRC should earn after the amicable agreement signed with Dan Gertler?
The estimate of the approximate average value of the assets recovered has been evaluated to date at more than 2 billion US dollars, including 1.5 billion US $ for the oil Blocks I and II of the Graben Albertine, 500 million US $ for the permits of Iron Mountain and Sanzeta $US, 500 million for the gold permits of Moku Gold…
Florimond Muteba deplores the retention of information by the Presidency of the Republic on the 2 billion recovery of assets by the DRC.
“Civil society knows absolutely nothing about it at this stage. This is a question to ask the government. Until today, we do not know the outcome of this asset recovery file, which has been valued at more than 2 billion USD. We note on the part of the presidency that there was really no intention of developing a partnership with civil society.5 months later, nothing remains of the round table.The working methods of the presidency are deplorable. We can therefore draw conclusions about the behavior of the presidency,” he said.
It should be noted that the memorandum of understanding for the amicable settlement signed on February 24 between the Congolese State and Dan Gertler’s Ventora group has not yet been made public. Only members of a few civil society organizations have had access to this agreement, which contains confidentiality clauses.
