The Democratic Republic of Congo has released 24 prisoners jailed over their roles in the assasination of former President Laurent Kabila.
Laurent Kabila was shot and killed by a bodyguard, Rashidi Muzele, in his palace in January 2001. The bodyguard was himself shot dead while attempting to flee the scene of the crime.
Prosecutors said the assassination was part of a coup attempt led by Colonel Eddy Kapend, Kabila’s closest personal aide, and a court sentenced him and more than two dozen others to death.
Now, following a presidential pardon by President Felix Tshisekedi, the accused were released from prison in the capital, Kinshasa, after nearly 20 years incarceration.
Kabila’s former ally, Kapend, is among those freed in what the Congolese government said was a show of “humanity, pardon, justice and national reconciliation.”
However, the move is seen as a further deepening of the rift between Tshisekedi and Joseph Kabila – who succeeded his father, Laurent, as president after his assassination.
Joseph, who stepped down as president in 2019 and was replaced by Tshisekedi, repeatedly resisted calls to pardon Kapend and the others.
For two years Tshisekedi was in a coalition with Joseph Kabila. But a deep rift has developed between DR Congo’s two most powerful politicians and Tshisekedi is now trying to distance himself from his predecessor and remove Kabila loyalists from the government.