Author: Emmanuel Mbala

Seasoned Congolese Diplomat Steps Forward When Firmin Édouard Matoko tendered his resignation on 14 March 2025, the corridors of UNESCO’s Paris headquarters fell briefly silent. After thirty-five years devoted to the organisation, the former Assistant Director-General for Priority Africa declared himself “a free man”, instantly turning the page from civil servant to candidate for Director-General. The election, scheduled for 6 November during the 43rd General Conference in Samarkand, will decide whether the 69-year-old economist transforms institutional knowledge into executive authority (Jeune Afrique, 29 Sept. 2025). His late entry startled observers who had watched Egypt’s Khaled el-Enany tour capitals for two…

An unexpected loss for the National Assembly The sudden death of Joseph Mbossa, member of parliament for the single-seat constituency of Abala in the Nkeni-Alima department, cast a muted pall over Congo-Brazzaville’s political class. Parliamentary sources confirmed that the 62-year-old legislator passed away on 28 September at a Paris hospital, where he had been undergoing routine medical examinations according to family acquaintances. No official medical bulletin was released, yet several colleagues stressed that the illness had not been deemed life-threatening, amplifying the sense of shock that followed the announcement. Within minutes of the news, the Assembly’s speaker, Isidore Mvouba, conveyed…

A measured acceleration toward July 2026 The Dynamique républicaine pour le développement, a component of Congo-Brazzaville’s presidential majority, has entered a decisive phase of its institutional life. Less than a month after the August 21 conclave that redrew its organisational chart, party president Hellot Matson Manpouya opened, on September 27, the inaugural sitting of the preparatory commission charged with delivering the second congress scheduled from 31 July to 2 August 2026. The venue—Makélékélé, first arrondissement of Brazzaville—symbolically links the party to the capital’s historic districts while reminding militants of the grassroots logic espoused since its creation in 2015. The timetable…

Early Registration Momentum Builds in Brazzaville The late-September humidity did not deter a steady line of residents converging on the fifth constituency office in Ouenzé. There, officials of the national electoral commission have been revising the voter registry since 11 September, following the schedule adopted by the Ministry of the Interior. While the exercise is routine in the life cycle of elections, the atmosphere carried something of a civic renaissance: by mid-morning the flow of citizens had already surpassed the customary two or three daily visitors, according to Yowan Pandzou, a member of the local commission. He credited the surge…

Strategic Partnership for Safer Highways The marble hall of the Brazzaville Prefecture was unusually animated on 24 September 2025. Beneath portraits of national leaders, the Directorate-General of Land Transport (DGTT) and the private operator La Congolaise des Frets (LCF) gathered some thirty officers from the police and the gendarmerie for an intensive seminar on mobile speed-control radars. The session was ceremonially opened by DGTT Director-General Atali Mopaya, whose address framed the project as an emblem of the state’s resolve to modernise public services and protect citizens. “Road safety is a public good; equipping our frontline forces with cutting-edge tools is…

Peace diplomacy meets economic calculus Speaking on the margins of the United Nations General Assembly in New York, President Denis Sassou Nguesso expressed satisfaction that former US president Donald Trump continues to frame peace agreements as a gateway to shared prosperity. The veteran Congolese statesman, who has witnessed every White House occupant since Jimmy Carter, argued that “without peace there is no development”, a credo he says underpinned Brazzaville’s mediation in the late-1980s talks that hastened Namibian independence and Nelson Mandela’s release. Trump’s claim of having worked to defuse seven conflicts in as many months struck a familiar chord in…

A landmark address at the 80th UNGA President Denis Sassou Nguesso walked to the famous green marble rostrum of the United Nations on 24 September 2025, carrying both the gravitas of a seasoned statesman and the conciliatory tone that has marked Brazzaville’s diplomacy since the early 1990s. Speaking to an audience of heads of state, diplomats and observers, he declared that the world had reached “a moment of inflection”, where the survival of multilateralism itself is at stake (UN Web TV, 24 Sept 2025). Conscious of the symbolism of the 80th session, he revisited the founding ethos of 1945—solidarity and…

Niamey Takes Centre Stage in the Migration Debate For two days the Nigerien capital has hosted an unprecedented consultation on irregular migration, bringing together government envoys, diplomats, civil-society activists, technical partners and religious leaders. In the hushed conference hall, the focal point quickly became the intervention of Dr Ernest Nounga Djomo, General Coordinator of the Panafrican Consortium for Peace. Speaking on 24 September, he placed the historic responsibility of colonialism at the heart of contemporary population movements from Africa toward Europe, arguing that the phenomenon can no longer be treated solely through the prism of security or humanitarian urgency. From…

Ceremonial splendour masks a tired multilateralism The marble lobby of United Nations Headquarters, freshly adorned with white lilies and a vermilion carpet, offered a veneer of optimism as delegates converged for the third day of the 80th General Assembly. Yet the courteous smiles could not conceal drawn faces: the accumulation of simultaneous crises—from Gaza to Eastern Congo—has left the multilateral engine short of breath. The official motto, “Together for a Better Future”, floated above the entrance like corporate sloganeering, pleasantly vague but ill-equipped to calm anxieties over the forum’s effectiveness (UN press service). Trump’s mechanical pause and rhetorical barrage Former…

Nigeria’s representation gap comes under renewed scrutiny In the gleaming but still unfinished wings of the National Assembly Complex in Abuja, an old arithmetic continues to unsettle activists: four women sit among 109 senators, and sixteen among 360 representatives. The imbalance, repeatedly flagged by election observers and civil-society lawyers, places Africa’s most populous country near the foot of global gender-parity tables despite its vibrant pool of female professionals. The numbers, recited this week by hundreds of women who converged on the capital, have acquired the ring of a mantra—symptom and rallying cry at once. A bold ‘Special Seats Bill’ and…