Human rights in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)

KINSHASA, Congo, The DR of - June 23, 2023 - PRLog -- The Human Rights Measurement Initiative's new data show human rights continue to be neglected by the DRC's government. The government is not adequately protecting people from the violence and insecurity in the country. It is in fact directly responsible for many of the violent acts committed against Congolese people.

The DRC is achieving far less than what it could achieve at its level of income to protect economic and social rights, including education, food, health, housing, and work. Experts on human rights in DRC cite insecurity, high cost of living, lack of infrastructure, and lack of government protection as reasons for people not enjoying economic and social rights.

The right to be safe from the state has improved from 3.0 out of 10 in 2018 to 5.2 in 2022. However, this score still suggests that many people in DRC are not safe from one or more of the following: arbitrary arrest, torture and ill-treatment, forced disappearance, execution or extrajudicial killing.

Human rights experts identified human rights advocates, journalists, and people with opposing political opinions to the government as being especially at risk of violations of these physical integrity rights, among many others.

The DRC scores 4.6 out of 10 on empowerment rights, suggesting that many people are not enjoying their civil liberties and political freedoms. All three of the government's empowerment rights scores fall in the 'bad' range, and the country is performing worse than average in our sample of 30 countries. Human rights experts identified human rights advocates, protestors, and people with opposing political opinions to the government as being especially at risk of violations of their empowerment rights, among many others. The authorities censor anyone opposing the government or fighting for democracy, especially in relation to the presidential election.

Since Félix Tshisekedi's election in 2019, physical integrity rights have somewhat improved, but empowerment rights have deteriorated. It's clear from what human rights experts in DRC have reported that anyone with opposing political views is at high risk of human rights violations, especially presidential candidates.

"Civil and political rights are a challenge in DRC currently," said lawyer and local human rights expert Emery Mutanda Kabangu, "coming up to the December 2023 elections, it is civil and political rights that are most violated: in this case, the protest rights, freedom of expression, etc. are violated daily. The space for respect of human rights is shrinking."

Please visit https://rightstracker.org/ for the freely available dataset.

For media inquiries, please contact:

Thalia Kehoe Rowden

Strategy and Communication Lead, and Global Spokesperson:

thalia.kehoerowden@hrmi.ngo

www.humanrightsmeasurement.org