The event was the first in a three-part series this semester organized by the student-led Africa Alliance.
The next event, on April 12, will be a day of remembrance to honor the vicitims of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi people in Rwanda. Over a catastrophic 100 days from April 7 to July 19, up to 800,000 people were killed and more than a million fled their homes. The legacy of the massacre continues to destabilize the region.
Africa Alliance is collaborating with the Rwandese Community Association of Maine and Ibuka Maine, survivors of the conflicts, to host the Saturday event. They are inviting students from schools across the state and the general public to campus for a panel discussion, film screening, testimonials from survivors, and community building. A representative from the the US Embassy of Rwanda will attend.
The third event, cohosted by the Africana studies department, wil be a public lecture on April 24 called “Peace, Conflict, and Security in Africa: Policy Approaches,” by from the Elliot School of International Affairs at George Washington University. “We are hoping this event will be a good way to offer a way forward and keep the conversation going,” said Ruth Olujobi ’25, president of Africa Alliance.
Olujobi said her group has spent many hours thinking and talking about the conflict in central Africa, and wanted to encourage more of the campus to engage with the issue. “We’re trying to spread more awareness about events on the continent and deepen enlightenment about the history of Africa,” she explained.
She noted that the themes that come up in the examination of the DRC—competition for minerals, ethnic divisions, the control of borders, and the erosion of state authority—“are global and universal themes,” ones relevant to the United States today.
“People need to pay attention because when we don’t, we allow avoidable conflicts to keep happening,” Olujobi said. “There is so much we can learn.”
Ending Conflict in the DRC: Global Lessons
David Gordon, a historian who specializes in southern and central Africa, opened the discussion by giving a brief overview of the region's history. “This is a war that keeps ending and starting again,” he said, a multilayered, complex struggle with many actors, including neighboring African countries, Western nations, China, and Russia.
“You might have missed the most current news given the amount of turmoil we’re experiencing here in the United States,” he continued, “but the latest iteration of the conflict occurred in January of this year when the rebel group M23 advanced through parts of eastern Congo, capturing major towns and mineral-rich areas.”
The recent bout of violence has already led to widespread misery: Hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced, at least 7,000 have died, and the rebels threaten to capture more towns in the interior. Since the Rwandan genocide of 1994, which has direct ties to today’s bloodshed, conflict in eastern DRC has led to approximately .
The event's two main speakers, of Seton Hall University and Michael Yekple, who has an appointment in ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø±¬ÍøÕ¾'s African Studies department, shared their thoughts and recommendations for bringing peace to the region.
Alfani, the author of (Peter Lang, 2019), began by noting that for some in the audience, the conflict was likely personal. “Many of us have been affected by the consequences of mass violence in the region, which is one of the difficulties of engaging in this conversation,” he said. “I suspect that members in the audience have lost friends, family members, and property. I do sympathize with your losses.”
He argued that the situation in the DRC could be analyzed through the lens of two conflict models: the . The first whips up wars in which armies pursue control of resources and wealth, while the latter breeds fighters who protest historical injustices, inequalities, and political oppression.
“They can happen in conjunction,” he said, and most likely are in the DRC, which is enriched with deposits of precious metals and minerals essential for batteries, electronic devices, and other modern technologies.
The conflict in eastern Congo is also the result of the “mismanagement of displaced populations,” Alfani contended, leading to discrimination and hardship for millions of refugees and victims of violence. He also placed blame on the international community: “The Congolese population continues to pay the heavy price of the international community’s failure to avert the Rwandan genocide, as well address the issue of refugees left at the border of Rwanda and Congo.”
He offered several remedies for the chaotic and complex situation: First, UN peacekeepers should be given an offensive rather than a defensive mandate, to more directly deter rebel troops. Second, acknowledging human rights violations and killings, especially against women, civilians, and children, must be part of the solution, he said. At the same time, it’s important to defuse longstanding negative perceptions of ethnic differences. Finally, he stated that strengthening the rule of law in Congo and consolidating the state-building process, including democracy, is critical.
Yekple's focuses on peacekeeping effectiveness and civilian protection in armed conflict, conflict and political violence, voters and foreign policy, and the international politics of Africa. He built on Alfani’s arguments, emphasizing the need to respect international borders, deploy a strong peacekeeping and governing force, and promote mediation between antagonistic groups. “I always ask my students, 'Who are the parties and what do they want?' Arguably, the DRC is a giant party, and you ask, 'Why can’t it protect its territory?' The answer is because the state is weak.”
“It is a large state that is weak due to its troubled history. It is a state that can’t protect the territory within its borders,” he continued. “So how do we ensure that groups and neighbors don’t invade? It takes time for states to build, and if the Democratic Republic of the Congo is not at a point where it can safeguard its borders and defend its territory, someone must lead and deploy troops to do so, if necessary.The African Union and the continent's regional organizations need to take on this responsibility.”
Gordon also called attention to the consequences of a failed state. “There is an active interest in destroying the state because some people benefit from that action, not unlike what is happening in our country today. The Congo in that respect in my view is the future of us, not the past.”
At the end of the discussion, Olujobi encouraged students to keep talking about the conflict. “We have a role to play in this,” she said. “Bring your friends to the next two events. Take the lessons you learn outside of here and into classes and the world.”
