Author: Congo Times

A Landmark 20th Edition and Its Diplomatic Echoes When seventy-five amateur and professional athletes answer the starter’s pistol on 14 August, the Brazzaville Semi-Marathon International will cross an important threshold. Two decades of uninterrupted organisation have turned what began as a local celebration into a modest, yet influential, node of Central African sports diplomacy. Embassies accredited to the Republic of Congo have quietly expanded their guest lists for the customary finish-line reception, aware that a well-timed handshake in running gear can resonate more warmly than a formal démarche. Organised by the multi-sports association Lion d’Or under the stewardship of businessman…

Epidemiological Snapshot of an Ancient Foe The World Health Organization’s Situation Report N°6, released on 7 August 2025, records 1 842 cumulative suspected cholera cases and 56 fatalities since the first alerts in mid-May. Over three-quarters of notifications emanate from riverine districts stretching from the Pool downstream to the Plateaux, reaffirming the historical correlation between Vibrio cholerae transmission and seasonal fluctuations of the Congo River. Although the case-fatality ratio stands at a controlled three percent, epidemiologists warn that any disruption in rehydration protocols could tip the balance. UNICEF field officers attribute the recent spike to a fortnight of unseasonal torrents…

Epidemiological Snapshot of August 2025 The seventh situation report issued on 9 August 2025 records 1 128 suspected cholera cases and 32 fatalities since the index alert in Makoua six weeks earlier. While the absolute figures remain below the peaks of the 2009 and 2017 outbreaks, the geographic diffusion—stretching from the Ogooué basin to peri-urban Brazzaville—places new pressure on the surveillance grid maintained by the Ministry of Health and Population. Field laboratories in Owando and Pointe-Noire confirm that the current strain belongs to the El Tor lineage, serotype Inaba, mirroring profiles circulating simultaneously in western Democratic Republic of Congo. According…

Calendar Anchored in Legal Certainty Brazzaville’s Official Gazette on 7 August carried the Interior Ministry’s decree that synchronises two critical moments in the electoral cycle: the nationwide revision of voter lists from 1 September to 30 October 2025 and the presidential poll on 22 March 2026, with armed-forces personnel casting their votes five days earlier. The timeline is consistent with the constitutional requirement that the Head of State be elected at least forty-five days before the end of the incumbent’s mandate, a provision embedded after the 2015 referendum. National authorities stress that the ten-week window for enrolment will allow the…

Lower-League Pitches, Higher-Level Stakes Much of the Republic of Congo’s international visibility is still channelled through the flair of its footballers, a reality President Denis Sassou Nguesso has repeatedly framed as a vector of soft power during meetings with the sports ministry. The weekend just elapsed offered a timely reminder. While media lenses naturally gravitated toward headline fixtures in Europe’s elite competitions, a quieter form of diplomacy unfolded on provincial grounds in England, Austria and Belgium, where members of the Diables Rouges and their dual-national compatriots accrued points, minutes and an intangible yet potent reservoir of national prestige. At Peterborough,…

Independence Festivities as a Catalyst for Public Health Each August, Congo-Brazzaville’s Independence commemorations provide a moment of collective reflection on nation-building. This year, the festivities acquired a distinctly public-health dimension with the launch of Lipanda ya Mboka—literally “Freedom of the Nation”—a promotional eye-care campaign initiated by the non-governmental organisation Œil Droit, Œil Gauche (ODG). The programme, which runs from 6 to 31 August in Brazzaville, offers ophthalmic consultations and prescription spectacles at markedly reduced prices, aligning patriotic celebration with the pragmatic objective of expanding access to essential health services. A Silent Epidemic of Preventable Visual Impairment The campaign arrives against…

A Congolese Board Game as Soft-Power Vector When the Pointe-Noire start-up KB Publishing lifted the lid on Lissolo 2.0 earlier this month, seasoned observers of Central African politics immediately detected more than a simple parlour pastime. The upgraded board game, furnished with 1 200 meticulously curated questions and a Ludo-inspired map of Congo’s twelve departments, arrives at a moment when Brazzaville is seeking to widen the spectrum of its international narrative beyond hydrocarbons and timber. In that respect, the project dovetails neatly with the national cultural industries roadmap outlined in President Denis Sassou Nguesso’s programme Le Chemin d’Avenir, which lists…

A Firm Reminder from the Prefect of Likouala Under the humid dawn light of Impfondo’s main square, Prefect Jean Pascal Koumba raised the tricolour and, in measured tones, invited his departmental directors to remain physically and morally present at their desks. His admonition, delivered during the weekly flag-hoisting ceremony, was more than a ritual lecture. It was a carefully timed reminder that the credibility of local governance often rests on simple assiduity. According to dispatches from the Agence Congolaise d’Information, a non-negligible number of senior civil servants have decamped to Brazzaville or Pointe-Noire, leaving junior staff to navigate budgets, payrolls…

Geography as the First Negotiator Diplomatic textbooks often begin with the axiom that geography negotiates long before diplomats do. In the Republic of the Congo this maxim is almost literal. Hemmed by five neighbours and fronting the Atlantic Ocean, the country sits astride trade corridors linking the Gulf of Guinea to the heart of the continent. The 342,000-square-kilometre landmass is nearly seventy per cent rainforest, conferring both ecological prestige and logistical complexity. Mount Nabemba, at 1,020 metres, may not rank among Africa’s highest summits, yet its symbolism is potent; it crowns the northern Sangha region, a zone eyed by investors…

A Theatre Becomes a Diplomatic Sounding Board The velvet-lined balconies of the Teatro Teresa Carreño, more accustomed to Verdi arias than to policy discourse, reverberated last weekend with an unusual symphony of press badges and simultaneous-translation headsets. At the invitation of Venezuela’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 120 journalists representing more than fifty national press unions assembled for the inaugural “Voces del Nuevo Mundo” forum, an initiative openly framed as a response to what Caracas describes as a “global communication siege” (Ministerio del Poder Popular para Relaciones Exteriores). Foreign Minister Yván Eduardo Gil Pinto, opening the proceedings, depicted the meeting as…