DR Congo leader's camp wins parliament majority

DR Congo President Joseph Kabila's party and its allies won a parliamentary majority in November elections, results showed Thursday, some two months after polls slammed by the opposition and observers. The ruling People's Party for Reconstruction and Democracy (PPRD) and its allies captured an absolute majority of about 260 seats in the 500-seat National Assembly while the opposition took about 110 seats, according to figures released by the electoral commission. The rest of the seats are held by a number of very small parties which are not in official alliance with either camp. About 100 parties will be represented in the new parliament, many with just one or two seats. Kabila's party obtained 62 seats, the biggest number -- down from 111 in 2006 elections. Opposition leader Etienne Tshisekedi's Union for Democracy and Social Progress (UDPS), which had boycotted the 2006 polls, followed with 41 seats. He has dismissed the legislative elections as "rubbish". In the capital Kinshasa, Tshisekedi's UDPS party took five seats compared to the PPRD's four. The announcement of the results had been postponed several times amid criticism of the counting process. In total, almost 19,000 candidates vied at the polls for 500 seats in the parliament of the Democratic Republic of Congo, a vast central African country wracked by two wars from 1997 to 2003. Eastern provinces are still conflict-ridden, partly over control of considerable mineral wealth. Kabila, who has been in power since January 2001, took nearly 49 percent of the vote in the November 28 presidential vote that coincided with parliamentary elections. Tshisekedi came second with 32 percent, but claims he was denied victory by massive fraud and declared himself president days after Kabila took the oath of office. The vote which gave Kabila five more years in power sparked violent protests and was widely criticised for major irregularities by international monitors. Kabila himself admitted there were electoral flaws although he rejected claims that the polls lacked credibility. But Tshisekedi denounced widespread fraud in both elections, while foreign and Congolese observer teams also reported irregularities. Tshisekedi has called on Congolese troops to arrest Kabila "wherever he may be and bring him to me alive and tied-up so that we can prosecute him for the crimes he committed on Congolese soil." Human Rights Watch said security forces have killed at least 24 people and "arbitrarily" arrested dozens since Kabila's disputed victory was announced on December 9. The group said security forces fired on crowds to prevent protests against the result. London-based rights group Amnesty International has denounced what it said was a wave of political arrests, notably of opposition activists, since the elections. The latest results showed nearly 50 women elected to parliament, including Kabila's twin sister Jaynet, who stood as an independent candidate in the southeastern province of Katanga. Kabila's youngest brother, Zoe, was also elected in Katanga, as a candidate for the PPRD. The results do not include 17 seats in seven of the country's 169 voting districts, where the electoral commission had applied for the vote to be annulled over election violence or other forms of voter intimidation.