17 January 2023
By Gentil Kasongo, Programme Manager DRC at Impunity Watch.
In December 2022, I facilitated a knowledge-sharing workshop on transitional justice and victim participation in Goma/North Kivu in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), organised by Impunity Watch and partners.
One of the workshop participants asked: “Why does violence in eastern DRC keep recurring?”.
Certainly, despite various peace agreements since 2002, violence and political instability are still a reality on the ground. At the time, renewed fighting broke out in the North Kivu province between the DRC’s army and the M23 rebel movement, one of the 100+ active armed groups in the east of the country.
Among the answers to this crucial question, I underlined the challenge of effectively implementing transitional justice – a systemic approach to dealing with legacies of conflict.
What’s at the heart of transitional justice?
Non-recurrence/non-repetition of violence constitutes one of the ultimate objectives of transitional justice processes, alongside the fight against impunity and the promotion of social cohesion, reconciliation and peaceful cohabitation between people.
The effective implementation of transitional justice processes and mechanisms can, in fact, break the cycle of violence and contribute effectively to the consolidation of peace in the DRC.
This presupposes the painstaking work of identifying and recognising the root causes of violence.
Root causes can be internal and/or external, structural and complex, and can have distant and historical origins. Read more about some of the root causes of the violence in the DRC here and here.
Thereafter, it is necessary to work intentionally on the constructive transformation of the root causes identified to ensure that the same causes no longer produce the same effects (the ‘never again!’ principle), while addressing the legacies of past violence. This is the essence of transitional justice.
Genuine institutional reforms (security sector, justice sector, etc.), serious vetting, and successful processes of disarmament, demobilisation and reinsertion of ex-combatants (DDR) are key elements of guarantees of non-recurrence and non-repetition of violence – one of the main pillars of transitional justice.
Other transitional justice mechanisms and processes (both formal and informal; both national and provincial or local/community-based) can also contribute directly or indirectly to the non-recurrence/non-repetition of violence. These are truth-seeking, criminal prosecution, reparation measures, and memory work.
Constant political will and sustained commitment of peace-loving men and women, in the DRC and at the regional and international levels, are essential if violence is to end and peace and security are to be a reality for all in eastern DR Congo, including through the effective implementation of transitional justice processes.
Read the original version of the blog in French and find out more about our work in the DRC.
[Header photo credit: Africa Reconciled. The poster comes from an awareness-raising campaign about transitional justice, as part of a project to implement the meaningful participation of victims of mass crimes in the DRC.]