Elections in the DRC: “The Carter Center rejects the use of any form of disinformation”
Publications on the social networks Facebook and WhatsApp in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) concerning a poll of national deputy candidates in an electoral district in the Congolese capital and the submission of an alleged report to the European Commission for the annulment of last December’s elections have been falsely attributed to the Carter Center’s election observation mission. The Center’s electoral observation mission issued a denial on Wednesday;
At the head of this poll are the names of members of the presidential party, notably Peter Kazadi, Deputy Prime Minister in charge of the Interior, Security and Customary Affairs, Augustin Kabuya, the General Secretary, both close to President Tshisekedi. The poll was first published on a page on the Facebook social network titled which candidate for Mont-Amba 2023 with the caption “last turn” and information about an alleged filing of a report annulling the elections was widely shared in several Whatsapp groups in the DRC with between 200 and 400 members.
Quote: “The European Union calls for the outright cancellation of the elections of December 20, 2023, The European Commission for African Affairs, through its diplomatic representation in Kinshasa, accuses the ceni of massive fraud, violation of the electoral law on the deadline and lack of concordance of data presented by the CENI between the period of voter registration and to voters of December 20, 2023, the number of voters being higher than the number of people enrolled by the CENI, 44 million Congolese enrolled and more than 64 million Congolese who voted, the European Union deplores this confusion maintained by the CENI. European Union observers in the DRC, representatives of CENTRE CARTER, have submitted a detailed report of the CENI’s fraud to the European Commission, which is now calling for the outright annulment of the latest elections in the DRC. (…) European Union observers in the DRC, representatives of the carter center, have submitted a detailed report of the CENI fraud to the European commission (… )’’
The facts: we expressed doubts about the authenticity of this text reproduced in these numerous publications firstly because the carter center’s mission is not to conduct an opinion poll. We then decided to check the website of the Carter Center as well as its Twitter and Facebook to find out if this poll as well as a report on the cancellation of the elections have been officially published by this observation mission.
After checking, we found no poll of national deputies from Mont-Amba, nor any report from the carter center calling for the December 20 elections in the Democratic Republic of Congo to be annulled.
The Carter Center warns of misinformation
The communications department of the Carter Center observation mission denied this information;
Faced with all the talk on social networks about the Carter Center, one of the electoral observation missions in the DRC reacted on January 3, 2023 with a statement published on its website and its social networks.
The Carter Center is aware of more disinformation falsely attributed to its international election observation mission for the December elections in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.#RDC2023
Full statement: https://t.co/kUevdUOt08
Communiqué: https://t.co/pDY60T9DjO— The Carter Center (@CarterCenter) January 3, 2024
“The Carter Center is aware of further misinformation falsely attributed to its international mission to observe the December elections in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Disinformation is false information intended to mislead and gain political power or profit. The Carter Center rejects the use of any form of disinformation,” reads the statement, adding that its statements and reports are always published on its website and official social network accounts.
In December, a poll on voting intention was falsely attributed to the Carter Center and precisely the election observation mission had also circulated on the social networks Facebook and WhatsApp in the Democratic Republic of Congo and the document gave Felix Tshisekedi as the winner with 79.6%, with Martin Fayulu coming in second with 10%, according to the document we consulted, but the Carter Foundation had also denied this information on the evening of December 11.
Have the European Union’s observers in the DRC submitted a detailed report of the CENI’s fraud to the European Commission?
Unproven information. Already, theEuropean Union had announced on November 29 the cancellation of its election observation mission ( EOM-EU) in the DRC for reasons of technical constraints beyond the control of l’Union Européenne. “Due to technical constraints beyond the EU’s control, we are forced to cancel the EU Election Observation Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The EU mission had planned to deploy long-term observers in most provinces of the DRC, but this is no longer possible”, the institution wrote.
The European Union delegation in the Democratic Republic of Congo has not officially published anything about fraud by the Independent National Electoral Commission . Son dernier tweet dates from January 2, 2023 and announces that the new EU ambassador to the DRC , had the honor of presenting, this Tuesday, the figurative copies of his credentials to the DRC’s Deputy Prime Minister of Foreign Affairs, Christophe Lutundula and to show his commitment to strengthening the good relations between the DRC and the EU.
Background
The DRC held general elections on December 20. The list of election observers included the E.U. EOM with a small team based solely in Kinshasa, as well as an electoral mission from the Carter Center.
After the December 20 2023 elections, the Carter Center Election Observation Mission had published a preliminary report on the conduct of this operation. Like other observation missions, the EOM from the Centre Carter had placed particular emphasis on the irregularities that marred the conduct of these polls.
Despite calls from the opposition to cancel the elections which it described as “chaotic” following several irregularities noted, the results published by the independent national electoral commission gave Tshisekedi the winner with 73% of this ballot with over 13 million votes or 73% ahead of opposition candidate Moïse Katumbi who obtained 18%.