Hello, everyone. Good morning, afternoon or evening, and welcome to this edition of Elsewhere in Focus. You can find all the articles in the series here (along with my other diaries).
How is it like standing between the Satan and the sea? Sorry, the English call him the Devil, do you not? Well, the devil and the deep blue sea? And that with a whole lot of wealth in your hands? You need to only look at what is happening in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to find out. Between extractive policies that support exploitative mining of Congo’s vast mineral wealth and the rebellion from M23 funded by Rwanda—who gets their funding from the West—the Congolese people are being ground down.
The funniest thing? Very few governments are doing anything about it. (No not very funny.)
That can change if we pay more attention to what is happening in Congo, differentiate the crises and take appropriate actions suited to us and them. This piece is a contribution to that.
Since the story is very long, I have decided to split it into two parts: The first part of the story will cover mining in Southern DR Congo. The second part will cover the history of ethnic violence in Eastern DRC.
Onward then. Let us talk about DR Congo today.
Democratic Republic of Congo: Part I—Mining
The Mining that Kills
Nicholas Niarchos did a deep dive on the history of exploitation and mining in Southern Congo for the New Yorker (24 March 2021). (I recommend that you read this whole piece by the way. You get a fair idea of the conditions that prevail in the mining industry in the country from this).
Southern Congo sits atop an estimated 3.4 million metric tons of cobalt, almost half the world’s known supply. In recent decades, hundreds of thousands of Congolese have moved to the formerly remote area. Kolwezi now has more than half a million residents. Many Congolese have taken jobs at industrial mines in the region; others have become “artisanal diggers,” or creuseurs. Some creuseurs secure permits to work freelance at officially licensed pits, but many more sneak onto the sites at night or dig their own holes and tunnels, risking cave-ins and other dangers in pursuit of buried treasure.
The story of Congo’s exploitation starts in the nineteenth century when Congo became the colony of Belgium. However, industrial mining—for copper and cobalt—started only in the 1930s.
Copper has been mined in Congo since at least the fourth century, and the deposits were known to Portuguese slave traders from the fifteenth century onward. Cobalt is a byproduct of copper production. In 1885, Belgium’s King Leopold II claimed the country as his private property and brutally exploited it for rubber; according to “King Leopold’s Ghost,” a 1998 book by Adam Hochschild, as many as ten million Congolese were killed. But, because of local resistance and the inaccessibility of the region, large-scale commercial mining didn’t begin in the south until the twentieth century.
Kolwezi was founded in 1937 by the Union Minière du Haut-Katanga, a mining monopoly created by Belgian royal decree. These colonialists may not have matched the atrocities of King Leopold, but they still saw the country in starkly exploitative terms. They understood that the best way to extract Congo’s mineral wealth quickly was to create infrastructure. The company cleared the thickets of thorny acacias and miombo trees that had grown atop Kolwezi’s rich mineral deposits and built the town across the area’s rolling hills, with wide streets and bungalows for Europeans, whose neighborhoods were segregated from those where Congolese workers lived. Locals were used to create this infrastructure, and to labor in the mines, but, as Hitzman put it, “the whites ran everything.”
After independence, the southernmost province, Katanga, was viewed as a prize by Cold War powers. In the sixties, Katanga unsuccessfully tried to secede, with the support of Belgium and the Union Minière. Then, in 1978, Soviet-armed and Cuban-trained rebels seized Kolwezi and several hundred civilians were killed. Before the insurrection, the Soviet Union appeared to have been stockpiling cobalt, and, according to a report by the C.I.A., the attack set off “a round of panic buying and hoarding in the developed West.” Cobalt, the report declared, “is one of the most critical industrial metals.” Then, as now, the mineral was used in the manufacture of corrosion-resistant alloys for aircraft engines and gas turbines.
The West’s solution to the market instability was to prop up the country’s dictator, Mobutu Sese Seko, who presided over an almost farcically kleptocratic regime. The country’s élite sustained themselves, in part, on the profits from the mines. Gécamines, a state-controlled mining company, ran a virtual monopoly in Katanga’s copper-and-cobalt belt, and owned swaths of the cities that had been built to house miners.
By the early nineties, Mobutu and his cronies seemed to have stolen everything they could, and Congo was falling apart. As the country drifted toward civil war, the Army pillaged Gécamines, and former workers sold off minerals and machine parts in order to feed their families. In 1997, Mobutu went into exile. The disintegration of Gécamines transformed Congo’s mining landscape. Creuseurs began digging at the company’s largely abandoned sites, selling ore to foreign traders who had stayed behind after Mobutu was deposed.
Congo became mired in a series of wars in which more people were killed than in any other conflict since the Second World War. The country’s next leader, Laurent-Désiré Kabila, was assassinated, in 2001, and his son Joseph took over. Both Kabilas funded their war efforts by selling Gécamines sites to foreigners. By the time Hitzman arrived, in the mid-two-thousands, Gécamines had become a shell. “Some of the best geologists I’ve ever met in my life were still working for Gécamines, and hadn’t been paid for three years,” Hitzman said. “It was sad as hell.”
Creuseur is as the story explains an artisanal miner—different from industrial miner. Artisanal mining is the worst form of mining. No safeguards. No training and little regulation. Payment in pittance.
Victoria Beaule reported on the perils of artisanal mining for ABC news a year ago (8 February 2023).
This mining boom has also led many to turn to the industry for work. And while many work for established industrial mines and the large mining companies, many more work as artisanal miners, digging in informal pits alongside thousands in a cooperative without professional, large-scale equipment. Artisanal and small-scale mining are estimated to employ an estimated 200,000 people in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and over a million more are indirectly involved through trade and transport.
But this shadow economy is often dangerous and rife with human rights violations, observers said. Artisanal mining is often done with no personal protective equipment, in chaotic conditions. Mine collapses have caused hundreds of deaths and injuries. In October 2022, the U.S. Department of Labor added lithium-ion batteries to a list of goods produced by child labor, specifically because of children involved in the mining of cobalt in the country.
Siddharth Kara is a researcher in modern slavery and recently published a book on the cobalt rush. He said what he saw in Kolwezi shocked him more than anything he'd seen before, as "the severity and scale of human degradation and exploitation at the bottom of global supply chains, it just really shook me."
At mine sites he visited, "people were caked in toxic filth, children caked in toxic grime and filth and scrounging in pits, trenches and tunnels to gather cobalt bearing ore and feed it up the supply chain," he said.
A 2020 report by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development estimated that between 18% and 30% of the cobalt produced by the Democratic Republic of the Congo is mined through artisanal mining. It is difficult to ascertain how -- and how much of -- this cobalt makes its way into the supply chain, and ultimately into the world's cellphones and EVs.
Even though artisanal mining is said to make up only 30 percent of the mining in DRC, its entanglement with industrial mining and the difficulty to ascertain origins of any cobalt from the country would mean that all of cobalt from DRC is implicated.
As Siddharth Kara says in his interview with Terry Gross for the NPR, both industrial and artisanal mining are deeply entangled in DR Congo (1 February 2023).
Technically, under the law, there should not be artisanal mining taking place in any industrial mine. And yet, lo and behold, at most of the industrial mines, there is some artisanal mining taking place. In some cases, predominantly artisanal mining is taking place. And the reason is, it's a penny-wage way to boost production. I mean, imagine you're in a part of the world where there are millions of people who barely get a dollar or two a day who are grindingly poor and will accept almost any labor arrangement just to survive. Well, you put them in a tight pit, cram them with 10,000 other people and pay them a couple of dollars, and they'll produce thousands of tons of cobalt per year for almost no wages. And so that's not legal, but it's happening.
The Newyorker piece mentions seeing artisanal miners in Chinese industrial mines, with barely any equipment and subject to ill treatment reminiscent of colonial times. The artisanal workers have many times protested for pay and other necessities. The companies use the police against the workers and other locals who may agitate for equitable and just treatment (much like India where the police aid Adani coal and power plants in suppressing Adivasi/Tribal protests against deforestation, land acquisition and pollution).
The corruption in government combined with willingness of the foreign companies to use cobalt mined through exploitative methods means that human rights crimes and the blood and suffering of the people of DR Congo colour almost all of cobalt and other minerals produced in the country. The mining also exposes people—including future generations—to hazardous mineral intake.
UCL Science Magazine had a piece on how cobalt mining affects children born in DRC (no date).
It was found that babies born to mothers living in the city of Lubumbashi in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) have an increased blood cobalt concentration, higher than their mothers. The mothers in this study were not working in the cobalt mines but lived in communities where it is prevalent - many with partners in the industry. The discrepancies between studies were likely due to the source of metal exposure studied. Whilst the previous paper studied cobalt exposure in patients with metal-on-metal hip devices, the recent paper was based on exposure through cobalt mining[2].
In the recent paper, samples of umbilical cord blood, placental tissue with maternal venous blood, and urine were taken to analyse the concentrations of toxic elements such as arsenic, uranium, and cobalt. Researchers found the concentrations of cobalt in these samples were significantly higher than in other non-occupationally exposed adults. The most striking findings in the paper were that cobalt concentrations were 40% higher in the newborn’s blood compared to their mother’s, indicating active uptake by the foetus in utero.
Despite not working in cobalt-exposed environments themselves, 22% of the mothers within the study exceeded The Biological Exposure Index’s concentration limit of cobalt in occupational settings, set at 15ug/L urine. The wider implications that unregulated (and often regulated) mining has on the health of a community are extremely concerning, exacerbating the current human rights crisis in the DRC.
Cobalt is integral for the synthesis of cobalamin - a metal coenzyme that plays a role in a number of biological functions. More commonly known as vitamin B12, cobalamin metabolises fats, and carbohydrates, stimulates DNA synthesis, and is associated with normal brain and nervous system functions [3].
Due to its use in hip implants, research into the effects of over-exposure to cobalt has already begun. Within the mining industry, cobalt can be easily absorbed through inhalation and skin contact [4]. Effects seen in studies include a range of cardiovascular and endocrine deficits along with neurological impairments. As newborns are more susceptible to the impacts of toxic elements than their mothers, they may be born with birth defects.
All of us are to some extent implicated in this exploitation and destruction in the name of greed. But a country that does hold direct responsibility at present is China (apart from colonialism and West supported dictatorship of Mobutu).
Chinese Interests
Whereas Western companies are indirectly implicated (where do they get their electronics from, especially batteries?), China is directly invested in most of the industrial mining in the country. This came to be after DRC’s former president Joseph Kabila signed a deal with the Chinese government in 2006-7.
Robert Bociaga writes for the Diplomat about the extent of Chinese interests and US inaction in DR Congo (31 October 2022).
In 2020, China imported just under $9 billion worth of goods from the DRC, up from just $5.8 billion in 2019. That remarkable jump was not an outlier. China imported goods worth just $1.45 million from the DRC in 1995 – representing average annual growth of over 40 percent. According to data from the Observatory of Economic Complexity (OEC), from 2015 to 2020 China’s imports of cobalt from the DRC ballooned by 191 percent, imports of cobalt oxides by 2,920 percent, and imports of copper ore by 1,670 percent.
China’s increasing imports from the DRC are driven by Beijing’s determination to secure resources critical to a green future, as the clean energy transition has accelerated. More than 50 percent of the cobalt produced globally today goes into rechargeable batteries, but this bluish-gray metal also plays a vital role in military equipment including ammunition, magnets, stealth technology, and jet engines.
Of the 19 cobalt operations in the DRC, 15 are now owned or co-owned by Chinese entities. The five largest Chinese mining corporations with interests in cobalt and copper in the nation have access to credit lines from Chinese state banks totaling an astounding $124 billion.
All told, 70 percent of world’s cobalt is mined in the DRC, and 80 percent of that DRC output then heads to China for processing.
One factor behind China’s growing dominance in the DRC’s mineral sector is the inaction of the U.S. government. After the decades of very close (but also controversial) economic relationships between the United States and the DRC, China has been advancing its interest in this country, facing little or no reaction from the previous three American administrations.
Most notable is the sale of Tenke Fungurume Mining SA, the last significant U.S. investment in DRC cobalt and copper mines. Facing massive debt due to misplaced investments in the oil and gas sector, this DRC-based entity was sold to China Molybdenum one month before U.S. President Donald Trump vacated its office. The deal was backed by Chinese state-owned banks, which were able to facilitate the transaction within the short time frame.
Andoni Maiza Larrate and Gloria Claudio-Quiroga have written on the flaws of the Chinese mining contract of 2007 for The Conversation (3 April 2019).
It was confidently billed at the time as the “deal of the century”. The Sino Congolaise des Mines (Sicomines) was the most significant Chinese investment project in Africa when it was agreed in 2007.
The infrastructure agreement gave Chinese partners mining rights to cobalt and copper in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). These minerals are used in electric vehicle batteries and electronics, including smartphones and laptops. In exchange, China agreed to build much-needed infrastructure projects such as urban roads, highways and hospitals.
In addition to new infrastructure, the Sicomines deal was expected to provide a significant boost to the DRC’s economic growth. The view was that the agreed volumes of mineral production would contribute to higher levels of exports, tax revenue and inflow of US dollars.
More than a decade on, the Sicomines deal has not lived up to expectations. There have been infrastructure project delays as well as unexpected costs. There have also been problems associated with poor quality roads and infrastructure and inadequate environment and social impact studies.
On the economic front, mineral exports from the DRC have indeed risen steeply. But sharp cyclical fluctuations show that the country is heavily reliant on both the Chinese market and the price of a few minerals. In addition, the Sicomines deal won exemption from taxes until infrastructure and mining loans were fully repaid. This means that the DRC will not receive any substantial income from the agreement in the foreseeable future.
The Sicomines agreement demonstrates one of the main problems with deals of this nature. It never included any guarantee of the actual value that the Congolese population would get in exchange for the country’s main source of wealth.
As we argue in a recent International Affairs article, the Sicomines deal provides lessons for other African countries. Future deals like this present an opportunity to change the model followed in Sicomines and by most Sino-African trade relations. This has, to date, essentially involved China supplying value-added manufactured goods and high-skilled workers. In exchange, African countries have agreed to export mainly primary-based resource products. And African workers are hired for unskilled, low-cost tasks.
It needn’t be this way.
For the past few years, DRC’s President Felix Tshisekedi has been asking for a new contract with better terms for the people of the country. Michael J Kavanaugh of Bloomberg reports that the deal has now been restructured.
The Democratic Republic of Congo is set to receive $7 billion in financing as part of a revamped minerals-for-infrastructure contract with China, according to the mining company at the heart of the agreement.
The accord will give the DRC’s state-miner Gecamines a 1.2% royalty on the proceeds of a copper-cobalt venture known as Sicomines and the right to market 32% of its output, Sicomines said in a post on X. It’s “a significant step in promoting new development in cooperation between China and the DRC,” it said.
Officials from the office of Congolese President Felix Tshisekedi confirmed the statement on Saturday, but didn’t comment further.
Tshisekedi has been pushing for a restructuring of a 2008 $6.2 billion contract between the countries, which he said provided little benefit to the DRC — an important producer green-energy metals. The original deal promised $3 billion in infrastructure projects paid for by proceeds from Sicomines.
While the mine has operated for years, less than a third of the development money was ever disbursed, according to the DRC’s government. The country provides about 70% of the world’s cobalt, a key battery metal, and is a major copper miner.
Not sure this is a whole lot better; especially since the country needs more than roads.
As Bossissi Nkuba and Liliane Nabintu Kabagale write for Africaisacountry in their piece: Between M23 and electric vehicles, DRC still supplies only the raw materials.
Knowing that countries in the Global South have been shaped by their colonizers and are still maintained by Western powers as raw material providers, with as little as possible value addition on their soil; it is clear to see which countries are set to benefit from the booming EV market. Furthermore, this value distribution thus offers little to the DRC, which has around 70% of the global cobalt deposits and 3T minerals necessary for various electronic devices and the green energy transition.
Unfortunately, there is little room for countries in the Global South to negotiate a larger share of the EV pie. The economic war that China undergoes versus the EU and US are clear proof of that. Indeed, while the EU is criticized for its hypocrisy in blocking the imports of Chinese electric vehicles and simultaneously campaigning for a shift to EV’s to respond to climate change, the importation of batteries from China by European industry seems to raise no questions. One may wonder whether the actual reason for blocking cars and not their batteries is that the EU wants most of the value addition to be made on its soil, akin to the Biden administration’s goals in the US.
What Can We Do?
Why don’t we have a made in DRC Electric Vehicle or smart phone like we have made in US or made in China or EU (or garments made in other Asian countries, another source of exploitation)? That is the question that both DRC’s leaders and EU and US leaders and the people must ask themselves.
That my dear friends is where the neocolonialism argument comes in. Where once the people were the resources, to be stolen, enslaved and used in plantations whether in Africa itself or elsewhere, with the technological revolution, the mineral wealth has become the resource. So the West and some of the rest are now stealing the minerals leaving the people with nothing but pain and a whole lot of diseases.
Thus, do not sigh in relief that US or the West is not directly implicated in what is happening in Congo.
We should be asking for more. For, not just jobs in the US, UK, EU, or India but for technology transfer and equitable distribution of skills and protection of local jobs to be part of trade agreements with other countries. For our countries and their courts to hold the companies that flout the laws accountable.
You might have heard that some of the underage miners who were hurt in DRC and a few NGOs brought a case against Apple, Google, Microsoft, Tesla and Dell to hold them accountable for child labour in DRC. However, a federal appeals court threw out the case reports Devan Cole for CNN (5 March 2024).
A federal appeals court on Tuesday threw out a lawsuit that sought to hold Apple, Google, Tesla and other major tech companies liable for their alleged use of child labor to mine cobalt in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
The DC Circuit Court of Appeals said in a unanimous ruling that while the plaintiffs who brought the suit in 2019 had the legal right — known as standing — to bring the case, they had failed to satisfy the legal elements necessary to pursue their claims against the companies.
“Purchasing an unspecified amount of cobalt through the global supply chain is not ‘participation in a venture’ within the meaning of’ federal anti-trafficking law,” Circuit Judge Neomi Rao wrote in the court’s ruling.
“The plaintiffs have not adequately alleged the Tech Companies participated in a venture because there is no shared enterprise between the Companies and the suppliers who facilitate forced labor,” Rao wrote. “The Tech Companies own no interest in their suppliers. Nor do the Tech Companies share in the suppliers’ profits and risks.”
But, Rao noted, “the cobalt suppliers and their subsidiaries actively solicit and force children to work in order to meet the Tech Companies’ growing demand for cobalt.”
Cobalt is a major component of lithium-ion batteries found in virtually every rechargeable electronic gadget. Two-thirds of the world’s cobalt comes from Congo. A federal judge in DC had previously thrown the case out. But the group of plaintiffs, which includes former underage miners who were injured in cobalt mining accidents and the guardians of children who were killed while working in cobalt mines, turned to the appeals court in 2021 to revive their suit.
The defendants in the case were Apple, Alphabet (which owns Google), Dell Technologies, Microsoft and Tesla.
This indicates that the laws need to be better.
Ask for better laws. Push our countries to deal better with not just DRC but all African and other countries from where resources reach us.
As I say at the start, there is another side to this story. That of Rwanda, M23, and Eastern Congo. There you will see more of inaction and complicity from the West (such as the deal that the Sunak government in UK struck with Rwanda for deporting migrants: where do you think the money goes? Part of it goes to fund M23, which engages both in the rape and murder of Eastern Congolese and in artisanal mining operations there, which is then smuggled across the border and imported from Rwanda to, yes, EU and US.)
We will read about it next week. I won’t be here but I will write the part, schedule it and go.
Until then, everyone. Stay safe. Be well. Take care.
May each of us be willing and able to push our governments to do better in terms of ensuring that the resources that we make use of, that the companies rooted in our soil makes use of, are obtained through equitable practices.
