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Researching livelihoods and
services affected by conict
Urban governance
through personal
connections
Kinshasa and its unlawful
constructions
Working paper 66
Kristof Titeca and Albert Malukisa Nkuku
February 2019
B
SLRC publications present information, analysis
and key policy recommendations on issues
relating to livelihoods, basic services and social
protection in conict affected situations.
This and other SLRC publications are available
from www.securelivelihoods.org. Funded by UK
aid from the UK Government, Irish Aid and the EC.
Disclaimer: The views presented in this
publication are those of the author(s) and do not
necessarily reect the UK Government’s ofcial
policies or represent the views of Irish Aid, the EC,
SL RC or ou r pa r tn ers . ©SLRC 2019.
Readers are enc ouraged to quote or reproduce
material from SLRC for their own publications.
As cop yri gh t ho lder SLRC reque sts due
acknowledgement.
Secure Livelihoods Research Consortium
Overseas Development Institute (ODI)
203 Blackf riars Road
London SE1 8NJ
United Kingdom
T +44 (0)20 3817 0031
F +44 (0)20 7922 0399
E slrc@odi.org.uk
www.securelivelihoods.org
@SLRCtweet
Cover photo: Downtown Kinshasa. MONUSCO/
Myriam Asmani (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Written by
Kristof Titeca and
Albert Malukisa Nkuku
About us
i
The Secure Livelihoods Research Consortium (SLRC) is a global research
programme exploring basic services and social protection in fragile and
conict-affected situations. Funded by UK Aid from the UK Government (DFID),
with complementar y funding from Irish Aid and the European Commission
(EC), SLRC was established in 2011 with the aim of strengthening the
evidence base and informing policy and practice around livelihoods and
services in conict.
The Overseas Development Institute (ODI) is the lead organisation. SLRC
partners include: Centre for Poverty Analysis (CEPA), Feinstein International
Center (FIC, Tufts University), Focus1000, Afghanistan Research and
Evaluation Unit (AREU), Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI),
Wageningen University (WUR), Nepal Centre for Contemporary Research
(NCC R), Busara Center for Behavioral Economics, Nepal Institute for Social
and Environmental Research (NISER), Narrate, Social Scientists’ Association
of Sri Lanka (SSA), Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), Women and
Rural Development Network (WORUDET), Claremont Graduate University
(CGU), Institute of Development Policy (IOB, University of Antwerp) and
the International Institute of Social Studies (ISS, Erasmus University of
Rotterdam).
SLRC’s research can be separated into two phases. Our rst phase of
research (2011–2017) was based on three research questions, developed
over the course of an intensive one-year inception phase:
■State legitimacy: experiences, perceptions and expectations of the state
and local governance in conict-affected situations
■State capacity: building effective states that deliver services and social
protection in conict-affected situations
■Livelihood trajectories and economic activity under conict
Guided by our original research questions on state legitimacy, state capacity,
and livelihoods, the second phase of SLRC research (2017–2019) delves
into questions that still remain, organised into three themes of research. In
addition to these themes, SLRC II also has a programme component exploring
power and everyday politics in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). For
more information on our work, visit: www.securelivelihoods.org/what-we-do
Acknowledgements
ii
Research for this paper was made possible by the Secure
Livelihoods Research Consortium (SLRC), based at the
Overseas Development Institute (ODI), and through
funding provided by the United Kingdom’s Depar tment
for International Development (DFID). The authors are
grateful for assistance in the eld by Jean de Dieu Saye
and Eric Matombe; and would also like to think the
assistance of the Université Catholique du Congo, in
particular Philemon Muamba and Jean-Pierre Mbwebwa,
Judith Mbudi, Etienne Kamba, Daniel Kitambala and
Dieudonné Eanga. We also would like to thank Patrick
Edmond and George Richards for their help in nalising
the paper. The paper also benet ted from discussions
at the Development Policies and Practices conference in
Kinshasa (November 2018). The views presented in this
paper are those of the authors and do not reect the UK
Government’s ofcial policies or represent the views of
SLRC or other partner organisations.
iii
Acronyms
and glossary
DG Director General
DGRAD Direction Générale Des Recettes
Administratives (General Direc torate of
Administrative Taxes and Other Financial
Receipts for Central Government)
DGRK Direction Générale des Recettes de
Kinshasa (General Directorate of
Revenues in Kinshasa)
DRC Democratic Republic of the Congo
PALU Unied Lumumbist Party
‘Big men’ Powerful men, nodes in personal
networks who can exert powerful
political and economic leverage
Branché To be well connected
Constructions
anarchiques Unlawful constructions
Chef de cellule Cell leader (communal
level body)
Communes Co mmunes
Grosses
moulures ‘Big shots’
Invisibles Informal revenue
Mamans Wome n
Rapportage Upward prot sharing
Le réseau The network
Retrocession Upward prot sharing
Contents
iv
Executive summary v
1 Introduction
1
2 (Urban) governance beyond the state
in the DRC 3
2.1 The disintegration of the state in
sub-Saharan Africa and the DRC 3
2.2 Urban governance in the DRC
and Kinshasa 5
3 Economic incentives beyond
unlawful constructions 7
3.1 The difculties in abolishing
unlawful constructions 7
3.2 Conicts between various state actors 8
3.3 The nancial stakes of unlawful
constructions 9
3.4 Retrocession 10
3.5 Protection from invisibles
and rapportage 11
3.6 Involvement of higher-level actors 11
4 The political stakes of
unlawful constructions 14
4.1 Indu market and its political protection 14
4.2 Things look rough at Mukonzo too 15
5 Unlawful constructions through
‘big men’ 17
5.1 The development of Buma quartier 17
6 Conclusion 20
v
Kinshasa has been growing rapidly in the past few
decades, not only in terms of population, but also
spatially, as it has expanded in a largely, unplanned
manner. This paper addresses how urban governance
takes place where the state is only weakly present. It
does so by focusing on constructions anarchiques,
or unlawful constructions, which are present all over
the city. Although they are in breach of government
regulations (e.g. building in areas where they are not
supposed to) and carry with them a range of negative
consequences (such as vulnerability to erosion or
oods), they continue to take place and are often
protected against state measures.
The paper shows how urban governance is a multi-actor
and multi-policy affair – the way in which the city is
governed, planned and regulated is not the monopoly
of the state regulatory framework, but enacted,
contested and protested through a variety of other
actors. Connections and interpersonal relations are
central to the way in which urban governance unfolds in
Kinshasa. This is seen within the urban administration,
and in the way in which state actors relate with the
wider population. While this is the case worldwide, it is
particularly prominent in the Democratic Republic of
the Congo (DRC) and its capital. Here, these personal
connections have a profound effect on the expansion
of the city and the continued existence of unlawful
constructions.
This paper analyses the following economic and political
incentives behind these personal connections and
urban governance dynamics:
■Economic incentives: various actors in the public
administration are pressured to feed les invisibles
(as informal revenue is called) up the hierarchy.
Les invisibles act as a major facilitator for unlawful
constructions and a general neglect of urban plans,
providing nancial opportunities for civil servants.
■Political incentives: the protection of populations
within these unlawful constructions constitutes
an important source of political capital for local
and national politicians. By protecting unlaw ful
constructions, politicians are able to collect votes and
build constituencies
■The way in which the city is governed, and the
development of particular sites, therefore, depends
on the connections one has and the leverage one
is able to exercise through these relationships. The
importance of ‘big men’ is als o explored. ‘Big men’ act
as nodes in these personal networks: their leverage
allows the installation and provision of public services.
However, given the personalised nature of these
services and the instability of political functions, their
services are fragile and unpredictable.
Three key les sons for policy -makers:
1 Formal policies are often not adhered to.
We recommend looking beyond formal policy
measures, such as policies to destroy unlawful
constructions or other urban planning instruments.
Our research show that formal policies are secondary
to existing power-relations and the economic and
political incentives.
2 Economic and political incentives are crucial.
We suggest looking at the economic and political
incentives in place both within the public
administration, and in relation to the general
population. Financial prot and elec toral gain play
central roles in the way in which urban governance
takes place and continuing in unlawful constructions.
3 Different scales are interconnected.
We recommend focusing on the ways in which the
various levels and scales of government –actors
and institutions – are interconnected, instead of
focusing on one level in itself. For example, the
behaviour of street-level bureaucrats – who are
largely focused on revenue extraction – in relation
to unlawful constructions can only be understood
by looking at the economic pressures they face from
higher administrative levels, where bureaucrats are
expected to feed revenue upwards.
Executive summary
1
Kinshasa has been growing rapidly in the past ve
decades: from 400,000 inhabitants in 1960 (Pain
1984; Lelo 2011), to an estimated population today of
12,000,000. Spatially too, the city has been growing
rapidly: it grew out of the current commune of Kintambo
at approximately 3 km² and is currently 10,000 km²
(Ayimpam, 2014; Lelo, 2011). Kinshasa today can be
described as ‘not one but many cities at once’ (Fourchard,
2018: 17).
The urbanisation of Kinshasa happened, largely,
in a spontaneous manner, contrary to old and new
development plans for the city (De Boeck and Jean-Pierre,
2006; Lelo, 2011; Pain, 1984). Constructions, residential
and commercial, have been ere cted everywhere. In
the absence of social housing or real estate rms,
individuals, rich or poor, wanted a plot or a eld in a city
where ‘permanent renting remains synonymous with a
social failure’ (Lelo, 2008: 22). This led to a proliferation
of fragile and/or improvised constructions for poor
populations,1 which were constructed side by side with
modern and imposing constructions for the rich.
Many of these unlawful constructions are illegal and are
locally called constructions anarchiques. Importantly,
many of those who are building illegally are aware that
they are building in an area where they are not supposed
to. In the words of a government ofcial, ‘in order to
justify themselves, these actors argue that they are
not the rst and not the last to do these things’.2 These
actors do not respect the city development plan or urban
planning norms (Pain, 1984; Lelo, 2011 and 2018) and
the application of government policies to prevent unlawful
constructions are met with resistance and are rarely
implemented, as reected in some common sayings in
Kinshasa: to boyi ba conseillers3 (we do not want any
counsellors) or okanisi yo nde okobongisa ville yango4
(you think you are the one to put order in this city).
What are the formal rules for urban planning? In theory,
anyone who wishes to realise a construction project in
durable or semi-durable materials must obtain a permit
1 In the communes with population coming from Bandundu and Kongo
Central, the phenomenon in which land was taken from colonial actor was
called sala ngolo zaku; ‘fend for yourself’ or ‘débrouillez-vous’.
2 Interview, 15/04/2018, coordinator of the territorial planning unit.
3 Interview 28/03/2018 with a local leader in Mont-Ngafula.
4 Interview 02/07/2017, with an advisor of the provincial minister of land and
urban matter.
1 Introduction
Urban governance through personal connections
2
to do so from a mixed commission.5 In the current contex t
of decentralisation, the delivery of such authorisation
is within the jurisdiction of the central government for
buildings of more than two stories, and of the provincial
government for buildings that do not reach this level. In
practice, this mixed commission only exists by name,
while other key agencies and services of the national
state and city, which should formally be involved, are also
ignored (Lelo, 2011; Fumunzanza, 2011). As it stands,
urban planning norms and procedures are rarely followed.
In addition, the destruction of unlawful constructions
is problematic. Kinshasa City Hall is responsible for the
destruction of illegal constructions and should act on
the decrees signed by the ministers of land affairs, the
Minister of Urban Planning and the Governor of Kinshasa.
Yet in realit y, only a minori ty of thes e buildings are
destroyed by City Hall’s bulldozers, with the majority of
illegal constructions continuing to exist.
Unlawful constructions have a range of negative impacts
in Kinshasa. First, erosion has been observed,6 mainly
on the hills, due to insufcient or absent sanitation
networks (De Boeck, 2006; Lelo, 2018). Secondly, the
city suffers from ooding,7 which is partly due to the
ways in which unplanned and unlawful constructions
lead to sewer obstruction. Thirdly, there are increasing
cases involving the collapse of multi-storey buildings that
were constructed without permission (and are hence
illegal).8 These is sues often result in signicant material
damage and even death. Lastly, these constructions have
seriously eroded the green belt of Kinshasa, causing
concern for air quality and biodiversity (Lelo, 2011;
Kassay, 2010).
5 Composed of the Head of division of Urban Planning and delegate of the Minister of Environment; a delegate of the land registry, a delegate of the Société des
Architectes du Congo; a delegate of the Ofce of Roadways and Drainage; a delegate of the electricity parastatal (Société Nationale d’Electricité); a delegate of the
parastatal for the distribution of water (Société Nationale de Distribution d’Eau); a delegate of the parastatal for post and telecoms (Société Congolaise des Postes
et Télécommunications); ve other members designated by the governor. Article 9 de l’arrêté ministériel n° 027/CAB/MIN.URB.HAB/CJ/AP/CEH/2012, du
03/03/2012, portant réglementation de la procédure de délivrance de l’autorisation de bâtir et institution d’un cahier spécial des charges y relatif en République
Démocratique du Congo.
6 Radio Okapi (2014). ‘Kinshasa : plusieurs quartiers menacés par les érosions’, Published on 10/03/2014 and consulted on 15/11/2018 (www.radiookapi.net/
actualite/2014/03/10/kinshasa-plusieurs-quartiers-menaces-par-les-erosions).
7 RFI (2018). ‘RDC : Kinshasa continue de compter ses morts après les inondations’, Published on 05/01/2018 and consulted on 16/11/2018. (www.r.fr/
afrique/20180105-rdc-inondations-kinshasa-inondations-ngaliema-bandalungwa-barumbu-limete.
8 Le Phare (2013). ‘Effondrement d’immeubles : quid des normes urbanistiques ?’, Published on 15/10/2013 and consulted on 15/11/2018: (www.lephareonline.
net/effondrement-dimmeubles-quid-des-normes-urbanistiques) RTBF (2016). ‘RDC : six morts dans l’effondrement d’un immeuble à Kinshasa’, Published on
26/10/2016 and consulted on 16/11/2018 : (www.rtbf.be/info/monde/detail_rdc-six-morts-dans-l-effondrement-d-un-immeuble-a-kinshasa?id=9441144).
Given all of the se negative impacts, why do these
unlawful constructions continue in Kinshasa? What are
the factors preventing urban development from following
formal regulations? These are the questions this paper
will engage with. By answering the se questions, we aim
to show the various ways in which urban governance
happens in Kinshasa. We argue that the nancial
incentives play a key role. As with much of the Congolese
administration, civil servants active in the eld of urban
planning rely heavily on unregistered nancial dynamic s,
which hinders effective policy enforcement. Political
incentives also matter: political actors have little incentive
to support the demolition of unlawful constructions,
which are often occupied by their key constituents.
Political elites too have a major role in the development of
these illegal occupations – by installing them themselves
in these areas and in turn, attracting more people to live
there.
Methodologically, this paper is the result of qualitative
research undertaken in 2017 and 2018 in Kinshasa,
as part of the SLRC project. The research comprises
a combination of a review of the grey literature and
available documents, participant observation and
interviews. Overall, 406 interviews were conducted with
a range of actors, such as civil servants from the Ministry
of Land and Urban Affairs at the national, provincial and
communal level; their advisers (e.g. at the Governor’s
ofce, the ministries and so on); local chiefs (such as
the ‘chefs de quartier’); police of cers; various actor s
involved in unlawful constructions; analysts on these
is sue s; and others.
3
2 (Urban)
governance
beyond the state
in the DRC
2.1 The disintegration of the state in sub-
Saharan Africa and the DRC
Since the late 1970s, processes of state disintegration
in sub-Saharan Africa have been particularly intense.
This has strongly impacted on the capacity of public
administrations, which have suffered from material and
technical under-resourcing, organisational decits and a
lack of funds to pay its civil servants. Public services have
been severely diminished (Bierschenk, 2010: 7-8; Bates,
2008; Van de Walle, 2001). As the working resources
for civil servants seriously declined, civil servants had
to ‘fend for themselve s’ by using their state position
to secure other sources of revenue, a process which
Blundo (2006: 805) describes as ‘informal privatisation’.
These dual processes of disintegration and informal
privatisation profoundly impacted on the functioning of
the state, leading to slow procedures and bottlenecks,
opacity, manipulation and negotiation, embezzlement
with impunity and personalisation strategies (Blundo,
2006: 806-815). A consequence of this was that
administrative and regulatory powers were no longer
monopolised by the state but instead became the result
of interactions between a broad range of actors (civil
servants, intermediaries, users), a situation which is
continuously renegotiated (Blundo, 2006: 815; Hagmann
and Péclard, 2010; De Herdt and Titeca, 2019). As a
result, neither the state nor any other institution enjoyed
a privileged position or unique legitimacy to enforce
its regulatory monopoly (Bierschenk and de Sardan,
1998: 39). In other words, local power bec ame and
remains fragmented, and is characterised by ‘feeble
regulatory ability’ (Bierschenk and Olivier de Sardan,
2003: 156, 159). Institut ions took on a high degree of
exibility and uidity, characterised by poorly dened
terms of engagement, which were rarely formalised or
written down (Bierschenk & Olivier de Sardan, 1998:
37). Exacerbating this is the lack of central control over
such institutions; hierarchical bureaucratic state control
is neither common nor ef fec tive, while non- s tate actors,
such as customary chiefs, also exercise little hierarchical
control (De Herdt and Titeca, 2019).
As a result, the introduction of new state policies and
regulations are not necessarily followed up and/or
implemented. Instead, they are another layer which
is ‘piled up’ on top of existing layers of regulation
(Bierschenk & Olivier de Sardan, 1998, 2003). State
regulations lack uniform implementation and are
implemented partially or not at all, depending on how
they fee d into exis ting regulator y practices. Power
congurations (between state and non-state actors)
Urban governance through personal connections
4
also dictate how state regulations are implemented in
particular localities, which again lack uniformity between
a country, province or cit y.
Similar dynamics can also be seen in urban governance
in sub-Saharan Africa. Here, formal processes of
urbanisation and planning are at best one of the many
actors co-producing governance; at worst, they are totally
absent. As Lourenço-Lindell (2007: 1879-1880) argues,
a key characteristic of urban governance in post-colonial
Africa is the ‘extensive informalisation of cities, where
many existing laws, policies and urban plans do not
materialise’ (Lourenço-Lindell 2007: 1879-1880). These
processes of informalisation have resulted in urban
governance which is ‘very unstable and fragmented,
encompassing multiple sites of power where practices
of governance are exercised and contested’ (Buscher,
2012: 492). As the st ate is not the dominant actor in
regulatory processes, various actors may have opposing
and asymmetrical aims, creating fertile ground for
conict: ‘Whatever the motivation and aims, attempts
at domination are invariably met with opposition from
others also seeking to dominate or from those trying to
avoid domination’ (Migdal, 2001: 108). As a result, urban
centres can be seen as ‘complex ‘laboratories’ which
‘embody the spatial, political, social and economic agency
of a wide range of actors (state and non-state, formal and
informal, public and private, civil and armed)’ (Buscher,
2018: 305).
The above processes are mirrored in the DRC: rst,
the disintegration of the Congolese state has resulted
in practices of clientelism and patronage (Nzongola-
Ntalaja, 1986; Schatzberg, 1991; Lemarchand, 2001;
Reno, 2006; Young and Turner, 1985; Zartman, 1995).
DRC is widely seen as the ‘paradigm of informalisation
and criminalisation of the state and the economy’ (Petit
and Mutambwa, 2005: 467), fuelled by over 30 year s of
patrimonialism under Mobutu and six years of civil war
(Petit and Mutambwa, 2005: 467). Callaghy (2001: 107-
8) described the Congolese state as a ‘lame Leviathan’,
which is simultaneously ‘soft, yet highly coercive’. It is
weakened by patrimonialism and corruption ‘such that
the performance of key functions slowly declined and
in some cases disappeared completely’, but continues
to be controlled through military control and external
support. In these circumst ances, the st ate’s regulator y
capacities have been seriously affected, and has resulted
in the state becoming only one of the main actors co -
producing governance. For example and specically
focussing on conict in eastern DRC, the ‘governance
without government’ literature highlights the emergence
of ‘parallel or semi- autonomous power systems that
govern access to security and resources’ (Vlassenroot
and Raeymaekers, 2008: 50). For the Congolese st ate
as a whole, the ‘real governance’ literature has shown
how public services are delivered by a range of actors,
and how all of these are involved in co-construction of
governance (Titeca and De Herdt, 2011, Titeca et al.,
2013, De Herdt and Titeca, 2016).
This decline in governance had an impact on the
behaviour and functioning of individual civil ser vants.
Gould described the situation of civil servants in the
70s as ‘abject impoverishment … Negligence of their
social needs leaves them to their own devic es’ (1980:
69). Mobutu’s famous quote ‘Moto na moto abongisa’ or
‘Let each person sort things out at his own level’ had a
marked impact on the public administration and society
at large – it was ‘ironically’ reinterpreted in relation to
the old marshal’s kleptocratic behaviour, as an invitation
for ‘each and every one to steal at his own level of
responsibility’ (Petit and Mut ambwa, 2005: 482). In the
words of Rene Lemarchand (1988: 153), what happened
was a privatisation of state positions or the drawing of
‘per sonal benets … from the appropriation of public
of ce’. The st ate continued to hire civil ser vants but
assumed that they would ‘steal cleverly’ (De Herdt et al.,
2012).
Although the state budget eventually increased over
the years through the renewed engagement of donors
throug hout the 2000s (De Herd t et al., 2012), these
practices remained, termed by Pierre Englebert (2009:
114) the ‘capacity of legal command’. Nzeza Bilakila calls
this ‘la coop’ or the ‘Kinshasa bargain’: an agreement
between two or more parties that provides a return
(2004: 20). It can be solicited by a beneciar y or imposed
on a victim. Example s of these are various: a civil ser vant
asking for ‘something extra’; someone trying to obtain
a favour from a civil servant; negotiating a price with a
trader or taxi, and so on. In this situation, ‘all the state’s
usual attributes have been inuenced by informal
privatisation … public of cials – or thos e pretending
to be – have taken over the customary functions and
prerogatives of the state, selling their services to their
“customers”’ (Petit and Mutambwa, 2005: 467).
Central to these behaviours is that the state has become
an instrument for accumulation, and therefore remains
neces sary. This is a central paradox in the Congolese
state: although many actions of state actors go directly
against state policies, they remain dependent on the
state, and continue to rely on the state, its attributes
Urban governance through personal connections
5
and its policies, as it allows this accumulation to
happen. Civil servant s continue to compete for the mos t
protable position, where they have the best access
to the extraction from citizens. Administrations were
transformed into ‘parcels of power’, in which ‘each
position in the administration providing not only a wage,
but also an oppor tunity for appropriation’ (De Herdt,
Marivoet & Muhirigwa, 2015: 49; Malukisa, 2017).
2.2 Urban governance in the DRC and Kinshasa
Much of the urban development in the DRC happens
outside of the regulatory framework of the state, and
much of the infrastructure provision happens without
the st ate. In the DRC, one nds a paradoxical situation in
which the state physically is very present – for example
through its security services – yet at the same time, is
also very absent, for example in the provision of public
services or regulation (Buscher, 2012). The end result is
a ‘cacophony’ of different social forces engaged in urban
governance pulling in different directions in which ‘the
Congolese state does not form a united “site” of power’
(Buscher, 2012: 492). Analysing urban governance in
eastern DRC, Buscher shows how the Congolese state ‘is
increasingly challenged by other alternative sites of power
such as armed groups, a powerful business elite and an
increasing presence of international non-governmental
organisations (2012: 483). Justice, security, land
allocation, water provision, etc. are all “arranged” by these
hybrid institutions’. She continues by showing how this
leads to strongly contested forms of governance, which
have turned the city of Goma into a ‘highly fragmented
urban space, where power and authority over political,
economic and sociospatial resources are being contested
between different conicting forces’ (2012: 483).
In Kinshasa, De Boeck and Plissard (2004) urge us to
look beyond the material infrastructure of the city9 and
pay closer attention to relational networks, by arguing how
they form the locus of much of the ‘invisible modalities of
urban action’ (Simone, 2003).10 Given the largely absent
9 Specically, he encourages us to look at the ‘unnished city’, ‘possibilities of infrastructure’, ‘invisible architecture’, and the human body as a ‘main infrastructural
unit or building block’ of the city.
10 He relates this specically to the role of the physical body, particularly how ‘the physical body, with its specic rhythms, also determines the rhythms of the city’s
social body and ontologically grounds them. The comprehensive body work that is undertaken by the Kinois often generates specic forms of social life’. (De Boeck
and Plissard 2004: 239).
11 De Boeck describes this as ‘the absolute and constant necessity to renegotiate these link, to inscribe oneself in as many networks as possible, and engage in
as many relationships as possible, offers a mechanism through which strangers and others may be redened, however briey, in terms of relatedness, kinship,
friendship and autochthony (and possibly also vice versa)’ (De Boeck and Baloji, 2016: 120-121).
12 The importance of connections and networks has been shown in a variety of literature (Gilbert, 2018). For example, Gilbert (2018: 247) shows how phone
numbers are an important capital for young women, in which ‘Girls are not only admired for their material wealth but also the numbers that bring such wealth’.
In this situation, ‘young women’s biggest concern was that losing a number meant potentially losing fortune’. The wider anthropological literature has shown the
importance and meanings of giving, and the way in which relations are created through these acts (Gilbert, 2018).
state and dilapidated material infrastructure, people have
to ‘fend for themselves’ (MacGaffey, 1987) in the DRC.
Personal relationships play a key role in this, as a source
of protection and advancement (Malukisa and Titeca,
2018).
On the one hand, this is important for the public
administration: given the processes of extraction at play
and the general opacity of the public administration,
processes of governance become personalised. In this
context, Giorgio Blundo (2006: 809) argues how ‘The
general conviction that the administration works with
money and acquaintances, and that it is necessary to
protect oneself against possible corrupt practices, throws
the users into a ceaseless search for personal angles in
the relationship’ (2006: 809). Moreover, in our previous
work (Malukisa and Titeca, 2018), we have shown how
also within the public administration, personal relations
are important as a way to protect one’s position.
On the other hand, these issues go beyond the public
administration as people look for as many relations
as possible11 and not only with civil servants .12 This
accumulation of the ‘wealth in people’ in Kinshasa
(Guyer and Belinga, 1995) has been described in detail
by Katrien Pype: ‘The ideal for a cit y - dweller is to be
branché (to be well connected), meaning to be able
to move around in various social worlds and have a
well-established network’ (2017: 126). This network
constitutes various functions: it is ‘made up of people
who can help one nd a job, a partner, money, and
solutions for ad hoc problems’ (Pype, 2017: 126), and
is called le réseau (the network). Le réseau is central
to urban livelihoods: it ‘constitutes the most important
social space of belonging in an urban context, where
kinship ties are weaker and usually described in terms
of responsibilities and duties. Contacts are individuals
with whom one has (weak or strong) ties, which can
be mobilised when needed’ (Py pe, 2017: 126). In
this situation, people try to have connections with as
many people as possible (Pype, 2016a: 395, 396);
Urban governance through personal connections
6
and a distinction can be made between the strong and
weak tie s bet ween people. The latter connection s are
‘broader and less-permanent’ but still construct and
mediate a sense of belonging (Pype, 2016a: 396). Thes e
connections are constructed and sustained in a variety of
ways, by giving and returning favours, for example through
the exchange of phone credit or through technology
goods (Pype, 2016b). Overall, this trafc d’inuence –
‘the us age of social cont acts with high-ranked individuals
for personal bene t’ (Pype, 2016c: 634) – is impor t ant. In
the context of Kinshasa, Granovetter’s (1973) ‘strength of
weak ties’ thesis becomes particularly pertinent, both as
an instrument of protection and advancement.
We build on these ndings by analysing the ways
economic and political incentives inuence the practice
of unlawful constructions, and show the profound
personalisation of urban governance in Kinshasa.
7
In 2012, President Joseph Kabila launched his ve-
year infrastructure programme, ‘The Revolution of
Modernity’. Within it, Kinshasa was given special
attention, as was the destruction of unlawful
constructions. In 2013, a year in which this subject was
much covered, the Minister of Land Affairs informed all
those who held real estate titles13 in Kinshasa that:
taking into account the Strategic Orientation
Scheme of the Kinshasa Urban Area and the
City of Kinshasa’s special development plan, the
urban authority plans to demolish the so-called
unlawful constructions, identied throughout the
city of Kinshasa, the list of which is attached in the
annex. In connection with this operation, a meeting
of experts of the Presidency of the Republic,
Ministries of Spatial planning, urban planning,
housing, infrastructures and public works, Land
Affairs, of the City of Kinshasa and its Technical
Services, made the conclusions of its work, by the
elaboration of a chronogram, on the imminent
actions of demolition to be carried out...14
Following this, the Kinshasa governor expected those
involved to destroy their constructions with their own
means. If the urban administration was required to
intervene to carry out the destruction, the costs incurred
would be attributable to those who failed to comply.
Yet there are major difculties in abolishing ‘unlawful
constructions’ and in reality, the development and
expansion of Kinshasa continues as before. In the next
sections, we explain why this is so.
3.1 The difculties in abolishing unlawful
constructions
An ofcial at Kinshasa City Hall who plays an important
role in handling dossiers on unlawful construction,
pointed out:
It is easy to sign the demolition orders, but it is
difcult to execute them everywhere because the
city’s power stops where a stronger actor from
the central power tells him to stop. Sometimes,
the agents of the city even run the risk of losing
their life in this city of Kinshasa because they
must proceed with the destruction of anarchic
13 Administrators of a land area playing a key role in subdivisions.
14 Mbwinga Robert, Minister of Land Affairs, letter dated 12/09/2013
dealing with the publication of the list of unlawful constructions to be
demolished.
3 Economic
incentives
beyond unlawful
constructions
Urban governance through personal connections
8
constructions.15
Since 2003, when he began dealing with these cases,
City Hall rarely managed to destroy the unlawful
constructions of grosses moulures (big shot s).16 Indeed,
as he said:
Some owners of certain sites where illegal buildings
are located usually mobilise various well-armed
police or army units that sometimes dare to open
re on, arrest, or torture ofcers of the demolition
brigade from City Hall.17
For this reason, some operations to demolish unlawful
constructions in Kinshasa require the presence of the
highest political level, sometimes including the Prime
Minister, ministers, the city Governor, generals from
the police or the army or the President’s advisers. Such
senior ofcials would sometimes need to be called upon
to demobilise the uniformed men who serve the owners
of unlawful buildings or subdivisions, among which are
some public authorities.
A City Hall ofcer told us a story that illustrates what
often happens on the ground. Having received the
instructions of the urban authority, he said:
We operated on Avenue Poids-Lourds where it was
observed that private companies and individuals
had illegally occupied public space. We had started
well by destroying the constructions of Indian,
Lebanese and some Congolese companies. Some
called for help from some authorities to stop the
demolition, but the city Governor was rm and
the demolition continued, until we arrived at a
gas station under construction belonging to a
high authority. He put pressure on the Provincial
Planning Minister who ordered us not to touch it. A
little further on, we had found a fence, and inside
there were houses. This is where we reported
strong resistance from the soldiers that people call
Simba, a kind of militia of the General. As soon as
we approached the site, these soldiers threatened
to re on us.18
15 Interview 24/03/2018.
16 Literally, ‘big mouldings’ – an expression used to signify dignitaries of the regime, major public authorities or the people close to them.
17 Interview 25/03/2018 with a collaborator of the Technical Counsellor of the Governor of Kinshasa.
18 Interview 27/03/2018.
19 Interview 27/03/2018 with an agent of the Kinshasa City Hall destruction brigade for unlawful constructions.
20 Direction Generale Des Recettes Administratives which deals with administrative taxes and other nancial receipts for central government.
21 Speech heard in a ‘support sonore’ held by a counsellor of the Minister.
Since nothing further could be done, said one of the
colleagues of this City Hall ofcer:
We got in touch with our Minister of Planning
and the Governor was also brought on board.
A few minutes later, he went down on his own,
accompanied by another General. After discussions
with these soldiers and some authorities of the
country, a compromise was found to not touch
these anarchic constructions, while waiting to nd
another place to accommodate the soldiers in
question. We
were really surprised at this decision because
when we met in town, we were told that the
governor had received a rm instruction from the
Presidency of the Republic to destroy everything
on Poids-Lourds.19
Ultimately, although the City Hall ofcials were given
clear instructions to demolish all constructions on
these plots, it became clear that political interests took
over, more powerful than the instructions to abolish the
unlawful constructions.
3.2 Conicts between various state actors
State institutions and actors do not act in a unied
manner, but according to their own interests. While this
is not particularly new, and happens all over the world,
it takes extreme forms in the governance of Kinshasa,
as illustrated by the standoff described in Section 3.1.
This is not an exceptional case but happens often. For
example, in September 2018, the Minister of Urban
Planning accused the tax colle cting agency, DGRAD20
of illegal issuing of building permits in the name of the
Ministry and misappropriating public revenue. During our
eld research, the Minister gave the following speech:
‘we discovered a building in full construction. It turns out
that DGRAD has made a taxation ex ofcio in the name
of [the Ministry of] Urban Planning and one wonders if it
has the powers required to issue such a building permit.
It is a building of four storeys, but they are already at the
fth storey, with a plan to reach the seventh storey. This
is very serious!”21 The Minister concluded by st ating that
Urban governance through personal connections
9
‘it is an insult to the Government of the Republic and a
report must be given to whomsoever has the right [i.e.
the proper authorities]’,22 for possible sanctions.
What is the underlying reason for these inter-state-
agency conicts? The following conict, and quote, is
more explicit about this. On the 10th of April 2018,
André Kimbuta, Governor of the city of Kinshasa
responded to the Minister of Urban Planning (Joseph
Kokonyangi), when he declared:
We came to destroy the anarchic buildings in
Limete in the presence of the Minister of Land
Affairs himself. He is not like this greedy man
of Urban Planning [i.e. the Minister of Urban
Planning].23
Kinshasa’s Governor therefore blamed the Minister of
Urban Planning for ‘greed’, for issuing building permits
in illegal areas for nancial prot – the very same
accusation that had been levied at the Governor by
the Minister. This should not be seen as a technical
or administrative issue but as a struggle for nancial
interests: both actors aim to prot from unlawful
constructions. In the next sections, we explain this
further, by unpacking the nancial interests behind
these conicts, and which allow the constructions
anarchiques to continue.
3.3 The nancial stakes of unlawful
constructions
In one of our interviews in 2017, an advisor to the
Provincial Minister of Land and Urban Affairs argued how
the existence of unlawful constructions in Kinshasa is
‘all about money’, i.e. the funds pocketed by individuals
to allow these constructions, and avoid demolition. ‘The
invisibles’ (‘Les Invisibles’) is an important term in this
context: it is the term used by civil servants to refer to
funds which are extracted from citizens through taxes,
extortion or other means which are not registered. These
funds, are pocketed by civil servants or their superiors
and play a crucial role in the context of unlawful
22 Ibid.
23 Interview recorded 10/04/by us at the commercial square of Limete 7th street.
24 Referring to the city’s revenue made by his ministry in 2016, this advisor showed us tax records revealing 971,525,384.49 Congolese Francs, equivalent to +/-
$599,707 paid on behalf of the city to the Ministry, which is insignifcant compared with les invisible payments. Interview 25/07/2017.
25 Interview 10/10/2017 with a head of division of urbanism.
26 Following the current decentralisation process, this department deals with the collection of revenue from the city of Kinshasa.
27 Interview 10/10/2017 with a head of division of urbanism.
28 Interview 24/02/2018.
constructions.
While the city of Kinshasa continues to expand, the
ofcial revenues recovered on behalf of the urban
treasury (city nances) or the public treasury (state
nances), remain meagre.24 In theor y, a variet y of taxes
should be collected at both these levels of government,
such as the taxes on the authorisation to construct
a building, convert a two-storey building, demolish
buildings, developing private car parks in the public
domain, the costs of establishing land contracts,
transactional nes, and so on. A division chief noted that
even when work is done properly at his level, ‘it is hard
to maximise public revenues because those below us
sometimes stun us with the katakata (corruption), on top
of what we are already in the habit of giving them’.25 By
way of example, ‘in my own jurisdiction, we had one day
scheduled $30,000 that had to go through the provincial
tax authority (‘Direction générale des recettes de
Kinshasa’, DGRK).26 This amount had effectively been
paid by the person, but curiously, the amount declared
for the city treasure was 30,000 Congolese Francs or
$18.75. The money had disappeared at the level of the
DGRK where there is a large network of thieves’.27 Many
similar testimonies were given, where collected revenue
disappeared within the provincial government and its
agencies. An advisor for the Provincial Finance Minister
argued how ‘there exist parallel bank accounts which
supply provincial and national authorities’.28 Even if the
user pays their taxes (to the local government), there are
other arrangements within the public administration,
through which this ofcial revenue can disappear.
Related to this, local-level actors avoid paying taxes
by negotiating directly with the highest authorities. In
doing so, they are able to build unlawful constructions
and protect their constructions from demolition. What
cannot be attained at the city or provincial level, can
be achieved at the central government level by means
of money associated with family, friendship, ethnic,
professional, partisan relationships, etc. The following
quote from a division head in charge of implementing
urban governance policies and demolishing illegal
Urban governance through personal connections
10
constructions, illustrates this:
There is a lot of pressure from the authorities. For
example, at the avenue, several companies have
advanced their fences and have encroached at
least three meters on public roads. The Provincial
Minister asked me to follow up on this situation.
When I summoned those concerned for illegal
occupation of public easement, these companies
called the hierarchy. It was nally apparent that the
Secretary General and the Minister at the national
government level did receive money from all these
companies. We also have cases, for example,
where the city issues permits to build but the
Minister or Deputy Minister of planning of the same
central government can decide to suspend the work
saying that it is an unlawful construction.29
Actors occupying unlawful constructions can pay higher-
level authorities directly, to protect themselves. Similar
and much more widespread practices happen within
the public administration – a practice commonly called
retrocession or rapportage.
3.4 Retrocession
The land and planning ofces are structured in the
following way: at the lowest level – the communal level
– there is the cell leader (chef de cellule), followed by
the division heads and chiefs of the ofce (district level).
Above them there are the Provincial Ministers of Urban
Planning or Land Affairs and the Governor of Kinshasa
(at provincial level) and the General Secretary and
National Ministers of Urban Planning or Land Affairs (at
national level).30
Central to the functioning of this hierarchy is a system
of informal upward prot sharing, commonly called
retrocession, invisible or rapportage: all these names
refer to the same phenomenon, existing throughout
the Congolese public administration (Baaz and Olsson,
2011; Malukisa 2017). In this practice, lower-level
administrative units of the land and planning ofces
29 Interview 29/09/2017 with a division head.
30 In every commune and in every district of the city of Kinshasa, there is a deconcentrated administration of the Ministry of Urban Planning and Land Affairs. The
ofcials assigned to it depend on a dual supervisory authority based on the division of powers between the central and provincial governments. For example, as we
have already noted, the issuance of building permits for buildings of at least three stories is the responsibility of the rst, while the second deals with buildings that
are limited to two oors. At the provincial level, there is a hierarchical relationship between the cell leaders (commune ofce), the division heads (district ofce), the
Provincial Minister of Urban Planning or Land Affairs and the governor of the district. city of Kinshasa. At the national level, the same heads of cells and divisions
are under the authority of the Secretary General and Ministers of Urban Planning or Land Affairs.
31 Interview 21/08/2017 with a former counsellor to the National Minister of Land Affairs.
32 Interview 23/09/2017 with a head of division of urbanism.
have to share their income with the higher levels in
order to keep their post. For example, the division head
has to share their income (for example, from building
permits) with the upper hierarchy (namely the secretary
with highest administrative authority and the relevant
national or provincial ministers). These invisibles, not
the formal revenue, are channelled upwards and never
become public revenue, but are pocketed by individuals.
There exists strong pressure on the lower-level
administrative units to bring in this revenue. Indeed,
‘a division leader who does not bring in les invisibles is
simply sawing the branch on which he sits because he
will lose his functions immediately’.31
According to statements by some heads of division,
les invisibles heading to the ministry vary between
$120,000 and $325,000 per year. These funds are
largely collected through the underestimation of taxes
or through revenue which is not transferred to the public
treasury. Just as division heads are under pressure from
their hierarchy, they repeat this pressure vis-à-vis their
subordinates in the communes. One of our interviewees
explained it as follows:
If I send you as a head to the commune, but you do
not come back to say hello [i.e. give me the money],
you are gone for good, eating alone with your
bourgmestre. Then you will suffer because I have
the power to assign another person to your place
that will be indebted to me.32
The invisibles are, therefore, located at all levels of the
chain of command, from the local administration to
the central administration. Put differently, the whole
hierarchy is bound together through these nancial
interests: if
local subordinates fail to collect revenue, they may
endanger their local superiors who themselves need
these funds in a personal capacity and to feed upwards
to higher authorities. The administration calls this
phenomenon échelon aliaki (every step has eaten); that
is to say, all the key state actors have beneted from
les invisibles, and are bound together in their quest for
Urban governance through personal connections
11
revenue.33
Actors who do not feed their bosses are exposed to
sanctions, such as being recalled to the ofce to deal
with administrative tasks that do not yield money;
exclusion from future control missions because their
name does not appear in the mission order; transfer
to a province or poor communes; suspension, etc. It
therefore becomes crucial too that the hierarchy does
not discover records of revenue ‘lost’ in this way as it
would lead to punishment.34
These prot maximisation practices throughout the
Congolese administration means urban planning norms
have minimal traction. In the words of an analyst:
‘Anyone can erect an anarchic construction from the
moment he has the money to hand to state agents or
public authorities’. All actors are under large pressure to
feed money upwards to keep their jobs, and also use the
state power to maximise individual prot. The hierarchy
receiving these ‘dividends’ from its subordinates acting
in violation of urban standards or city planning plans
closes its eyes or pretends to ignore what is happening
on the ground.
3.5 Protection from invisibles and rapportage
However, not everyone has to pay these invisibles to
their direct hierarchical bosses: those with privileged
relationships with high-level (national or provincial)
governmental actors receive protection and are
therefore free from paying invisibles vis-à-vis their direct
hierarchical boss. Instead, they deal directly with their
‘protector’ at the higher level.
This however leads to conictual relations along the
hierarchy. For example, in the east of Kinshasa, there
are tensions between the Provincial Minister and a Head
of Division, who is protected by a public authority more
inuential than the Provincial Minister. As an advisor to
the Minister explained:
This one [the division head] does not respect the
instructions of the Minister. His wife is the niece
of a general very close to the President of the
33 Radio Okapi (2007). Démolition des maisons : le secrétaire général of urbanism et Habitat suspendu, published one 06/07/2007 and consulted on 20/11/2018
(www.radiookapi.net/sans-categorie/2007/07/06/demolition-des-maisons-le-secretaire-general-de-lurbanisme-et-habitat-suspendu)
34 Radio Okapi (2007). Démolition des maisons : le secrétaire général of urbanism et Habitat suspendu, published on 06/07/2007 and consulted on 20/11/2018.
(www.radiookapi.net/sans-categorie/2007/07/06/demolition-des-maisons-le-secretaire-general-de-lurbanisme-et-habitat-suspendu).
35 Interview 02/10/2017.
36 Interview 03/10/2017.
Republic who serves as an umbrella [i.e. protector].
Whenever our Minister wants to punish him, it is the
governor who tells him to stop, and we understand
that the urban authority does not want to upset the
interests of people who are close to Joseph Kabila,
at risk of endangering also his position.35
Similar dynamics can be seen in other places in
Kinshasa, and on other levels. In the same way, a cellule
Chief of Land Affairs or Urban planning (at the communal
level) can escape the control of his Head of Division. For
example, one Head of Division pointed out to us how
in three communes within his jurisdiction, the cellule
chiefs no longer obey his authority. All this is happening,
he argues, ‘with the complicity of the Provincial Minister
of Urban Planning. When we want to hit, the order
comes from above say ing that we mustn’t hit!’36 The
advantages for the protected actors are clear: by using
these circumvention strategies, a cellule chief or division
head has a great capacity for extracting resources at the
local level without fear of sanctions by a higher authority.
This however leads to a further fragmentation of the
public administration, resulting in a failure to implement
particular policies or in open conicts.
3.6 Involvement of higher-level actors
High-level government actors also involve themselves
through the direct and illegal occupation of plots of
land. In February of 2018, during our eldwork, we were
in the ofce of a Division Head in Kinshasa. A senior
gure of the Presidency entered, accompanied by two
armed soldiers of the Republican Guard. He wished to
obtain a concession of several hectares in the area but
this was not possible as this concession was already
taken. With great courtesy, the Division Head pointed
out that this would be an illegal occupation and required
authorisation by the National Minister of Land Affairs.
This led to a heated discussion in the ofce: the senior
gure argued how he had already talked with the
minister, and how he would not leave the ofce without
a positive outcome. After this encounter, the emissary
immediately reported this to his boss within the
presidency, which led to a telephone call to the Minister,
who eventually ordered the subdivision to authorise the
Urban governance through personal connections
12
ofcial’s permit.
Many similar cases exist, with high-level actors
intervening in instances such as the issuing of building
permits with civil authorities, army ofcers, police, and
so on. Conversely, ofcers of the Land Affairs and Urban
Planning ofces have even been arrested for trying
to do their job. They are blocked by high-level actors:
inuential and external state actors in the ministries of
land affairs and urban planning therefore pose a threat
to public servants working in these services, as they are
able to block the work of civil servants. However, these
high-level actors also represent an opportunity: they
allow civil servants to increase their bargaining power.
Indeed, division chiefs, heads of ofce and cellule heads
of land affairs and urban planning sometimes gain
enormous power for the services rendered to public
authorities of the highest level. In the words of a Head of
Division:
When you manage the land les of the Head
of State, the Prime Minister, the Ministers, the
President of the National Assembly or the Senate,
the Governor, the Generals, the Attorney General
of the Republic, the High Court Judges; you are
entering the big leagues because they often seek
a lot of favours from the administration. We must
then seek to build a lasting relationship with their
emissaries by sometimes giving them land next
to their leaders and they will make good reports
about us. In this situation the accusations of an
unlawful subdivision fall into the water because the
authorities receive often good ‘good services’ from
which they beneted from the head of division that
is accused.37
By managing the affairs of high-level actors, these
civil servants are given more leeway in their affairs,
particularly in proting nancially from unlawful
constructions. Both state and non-state actors are able
to prot from these unlawful constructions, and acting
against urban planning codes – state actors are able to
prot nancially, while non-state actors are able to build
where they like.
Civil servants therefore tend to involve high-level actors
in order to succeed in their unlawful urbanisation
projects. This involves not only nancial mechanisms,
but also by reserving and distributing land to inuential
37 Interview 04/05/2018 with a head of division at Land Affairs.
public authorities, which explains why security ofcials
own a disproportionate amount of land, particularly in
communes at the periphery of the city.
We started Section 3 by showing how, in theory, the
Congolese state aims to abolish unlawful constructions.
Yet these efforts at urban planning have failed to
yield results: these policies are ‘piled up’ on top of
existing policies and power congurations encouraging
the continuation of unlawful constructions. In this
way, urban governance is a multi-actor and multi-
policy affair – the way in which the city is governed,
planned and regulated is not the monopoly of the state
regulatory framework, but enacted, contested and
protested through a variety of other actors. We have
shown how the ways in which the state, and its urban
planning policies function, are both personalised and
monetised. Actors at various levels in the hierarchy are
co-dependent on pressuring each other into delivering
the necessary invisibles. This also creates a situation in
which unlawful constructions continue to ourish as they
provide an excellent way for nancial prot.
The way in which policies are implemented – whether
they intend to destroy illegal constructions or do the
opposite (build illegal constructions) – depends on who
yields most inuence in these hierarchal congurations.
This makes it difcult to enforce urban planning policies
or tackle the negative effects of illegal constructions. A
good example of these processes – in which hierarchical
connections, rather than policies are important –
are anti-erosion policies. The kind of spontaneous
urbanisation as described in this paper makes erosion
a particularly urgent problem and yet, when anti-erosion
policies are put in place, they quickly run into problems.
In areas where erosion represent a particularly
serious threat to infrastructure such as main roads,
donors occasionally provide support to the Congolese
government to tackle the erosion, in making the site
viable and ensuring no one continues to live on these
sites. However, as soon as works start, state actors are
pressured to illegally obtain plots on the same site. As
stated by a former Director General (DG) of the Roads
and Drainage Ofce, efforts to develop erosive sites
are sometimes compromised in this way by Congolese
ministers and their paid ofcials. In his example, a
large erosive site had ravaged houses and was left to
deteriorate cutting off large roads. With the nancial
support of the World Bank, the DG told us:
Urban governance through personal connections
13
We had a budget of $15 million to $20 million to
develop the site. People were properly expropriated
and compensated in the public interest. Those who
gave out the money wanted, at all costs, no new
homes on this erosive site, where construction
work on pipes and access roads to the hill were
being carried out. But to our surprise, it was the
Minister of Public Works, the primary responsible
person for the smooth running of the works, who
took a plot there, where he was building a house of
four or ve levels. We made this sad statement with
the representatives of the World Bank. At the end of
a meeting where we decided to demolish this
38 Interview 17/01/2018.
building, I received a call from the Minister himself
who said to me: ‘Mr ADG, it’s the Minister, you are
expected without delay in my ofce, otherwise you
are punished!’ I went to see him and he told me
that there would be no question of demolishing the
building that belongs to him, and that I had to nd
the solution. Meanwhile, representatives of the
World Bank threatened to suspend funding if the
building was not demolished. Fortunately, there has
been a rapprochement on both sides. We had to do
additional work so that this building did not create a
new erosion site.38
Road erosion during oods, Kinshasa. Jolino Malukisa, 2019.
14
Many unlawful constructions are tolerated because
they bring with them political gains. By acting as the
protector of these sites, politicians are able to collect
vote s from those who wish the sites to remain. This
happens at both a local and national level and increased
engagement in the politics and planning of cities, can
be largely attribu ted to these political advantages. For
example, capital cities are mostly oppo sition strongholds;
by inter fering, national-level actors can sabotage the
opposition and build political capital by building up
clientelist networks (i.e. the exchange of goods, services
or protection in return for political support). Politicians can
sustain and protect informal activities, such as informal
market traders (Malukisa and Titeca, 2018; Titeca,
2006 and 2014), but also unlawful constructions. In this
context, both high-level actors (political elites) as well as
lower-level actors (local population in informal spaces) are
looking to link up with each other; the latter for protection,
and the former for votes. Actors within informal spaces
(and within the informal economy in general) are seen
as ‘vote banks’, which are useful to mobilise in times of
elections (Goodfellow and Titeca, 2012; Lecoutere and
Titeca, 2007). In order to explain these dynamics, we look
at two case-studies in which politicians act as ‘protectors’,
allowing for unlawful constructions to continue.
4.1 Indu market and its political protection
Indu market is located in the municipality of Masina,
near Ndjili international airport. For several years,
various people have claimed to own the land where the
market is based, and claim the market to be an unlawful
construction. Market vendors on the other hand claim
that the land is state-owned, and that the alleged owners,
by wanting to destroy the market, are the ones seeking to
carry out unlawful constructions on public domain. Since
the late 2000s, court judgements have been issued by
individuals wanting to evict the vendors to install their
own plots in the market. While court judgments consider
the market an unlawful construction, the vendors,
supported by the governor (André Kimbuta, for whom the
vendor s are a key constituency), believe the ‘so-called
owners have corrupted the judiciary’.39 In 2010, the
rst destruction of the market of the market took place,
which led to angry protests and required the intervention
of Governor Kimbuta – but not before the market was
already destroyed.
In the run-up to the 2011 elections, as part of Kinshasa
39 Interview 13/06/2018 with the market administrator.
4 The political
stakes of
unlawful
constructions
Urban governance through personal connections
15
Governor Kimbuta’s campaign, he promised to rehabilitate
the market, which was done with funding from the
provincial government. The market was reconstructed and
vendor s began trading again. Yet, in response to this, the
presumed owners of the site again took the issue to court,
who ruled in their favour. Yet again, vendors, the Governor
of Kinshasa and his ministers accused the judges of
corruption and refused to implement the ruling. While the
plot owners sought support from central government to
execute the judgement, they failed to achieve this because
of strong opposition from the Governor.40
In September 2017, the plot owner s brandished a
judgment from the High Court of Ndjili (a higher body
than the court mentioned earlier) and from it obtained
the support of a minister and other authorities at central
level. With this heav y weight suppor t at a higher political
level, the police began the destruction of Indu market.
This again led to protests. Crucially, the President passed
by at this moment on the nearby Lumumba Boulevard –
‘it was a chance for us’, says the market administrator,
‘we sang songs in honour of the head of state, and asked
him to nd the solution so that we would no longer be
threatened’.41
This led to an intervention by Kinshasa’s Governor, who
met with the people. In the words of a trade unionist:
‘Governor André Kimbuta told us that he came on
instruction from the head of state. This judgment is
worthles s; it will never be executed to the detriment of
Kinois. He conrmed that this is a dispossession and
ordered the population to ransack the sheet metal fences
that were erected for the start of the demolition work’.42
The vendors’ resettlement was, again, assured. As a
result of these interventions, and to show their gratitude
to the Governor of Kinshasa, the sellers have changed the
name of the Indu market to ‘Kimbuta market’.
In sum, this example shows rst, the ways in which it
remains unclear what const itutes a ‘legal’ or ‘illegal’
construction. The fragmentation of public authority
makes it difcult to determine what constitutes legality
and illegality, and for example determine who are the
legitimate owners of the site. Second, it shows the way s in
which politicians act as ‘protectors’ of these sites, and in
40 In 2013, the Indu market was destroyed by a re, which according to local actors ‘was certainly perpetrated by a group of people who want to dislodge the sellers
to erect buildings on the market site’ (Interview with trade union actor, 26/07/17). This was not the rst attempt but had occurred after several nightly attempts to
destroy the market. The market was subsequently reconstructed.
41 Interview 13/06/2018.
42 Interview 17/10/2017 with trade union actor.
43 Le Phare (2013). Congo-Kinshasa : Assemblée nationale – La série noire continue…, Le député Mulumba traqué, published on 22/08/2013 and consulted on
20/11/2018 (http://new.lephareonline.net/assemblee-nationale-la-serie-noire-continue-le-depute-mulumba-traque)
doing so, aim to gather political supp ort.
4.2 Things look rough at Mukonzo too
The fate of Mukonzo, a large agricultural site in the city
of Kinshasa, has also been a site of contestation. During
the regime of President Mobutu, this site was known as
mabele ya Ngwele, and was famous for the production
of rice. For decades, many market gardening mamans
oper ated there. Then in 1997, the retired land ministry
of cial, Mr Mukonzo, declared himself the owner of the
site with document s he had only held sinc e 1991 . The
site became known as ‘Mukonzo’ and the former ofcial
immediately began attempts to clear the area of the
gardening mamans.
By 2007, Mukonzo, whose intentions were to sell plots
on the site, had exerted enormous pressure on the
market gardening mamans. However, the mamans
enjoyed strong support from three inuential members
of parliament: Gerard Mulumba, Léon Mulumba and
Toussaint Alonga, whose primary concerns were with
the intere sts of their cons tituents. They helped the
mamans to ght the eviction. Faced with this resistanc e,
armed with his title deeds, Mukonzo turned to high-level
actors in the Pre sidency, the Mini stry of the Interior and
the General Commissariat (combining police, army and
justice). A number of individuals within the se bodies
agreed to support him in return for plots on the site.
The conict between the two sides dragged on for many
years, with regular are-ups – for example, in 2013, Le
Phare reported that the MP Léon Mulumba had been
imprisoned, standing accused of ‘several offenses
including deliberate assault and battery, inciting market
gardeners to revolt’.43 In 2014, the market gardening
mamans were the subject of a large-scale forced eviction
by polic e and soldiers who had settled on the site.
The above-mentioned deputies (Gerard Mulumba and his
colleagues protecting the mamans), as well as Kinshasa’s
Governor also sought support from the highest levels,
which led to a televised statement from the Land
Minister, who stated: ‘I can say, right in the eyes of all our
population, that the demolition brigade will soon pass to
Urban governance through personal connections
16
annihilate everything that is like anarchic construction
on the Kingabwa market gardening site ... Mukonzo is a
forger, he cannot sell plots, his destiny lies in prison’.44
Moreover, a range of high- ranking of cials – the Prime
Minister Matata; the Minister of Land Affairs, Robert
Mbwinga and the Governor, André Kimbuta – visited
the site, which helped the mamans who were eventually
rehoused back at the site.
Between 2015 and 2018, Mukonzo continued to seek
support from public authorities. As a local analyst
argued, ‘the formation of new governments and
changes at the head of the police or army gives Mukonzo
opportunities to seduce some authorities by always
promising plots on the site’.45 Institutions and the actors
within them change, allowing outsiders opportunities to
seek new coalitions.
The new Minister of Urban Planning, Mr Kokonyangi,
became Mr Mukonzo’s ally, leading to a radical new
strategy. On 19 March 2018, Mr Kokonyangi announced
how, on the instruction of the President, ‘we decided to
make a subdivision for the honourable national deputies
without distinction of parties’.46 The plots would be given
to the MPs as reward ‘for the good services rendered to
the Congolese nation’. In response, the Governor stated,
‘I learned that the Minister of Urban Planning had come
to this site to say that we are going to build houses for
the deputies, for the members of the government. That
is false, I tell you it’s wrong ... you touch the market
gardening mamans, you have a problem with Kabila [the
President]’.47 Moreover, he asked the provincial police
commissioner (who had accompanied him to the site)
to proceed with Mr Mukonzo’s arrest within 72 hours.
In the press and in public opinion, people spoke of
open warfare between the Governor of the city and the
Minister of Urban Planning of the central government.48
While the arrest of Mukonzo did not materialise, the
mamans were allowed to stay on the site.
These two detailed case studies show the ways in
which political incentives interfere with, and protect,
unlawful constructions in Kinshasa. Both examples
44 Archives Emission ya Babobola de Molière TV consulted on 10/07/2018.
45 Interview 21/07/2018.
46 Speech heard 20/03/2018 on radio Top Congo.
47 Discussions as seen 20/03/2018 on Molière TV.
48 Moreover, the President of the National Assembly did not recognise this initiative, stating that the assembly ‘has never received any offer of plot allocation for the
benet of the Honourable National Deputies; no request for collective subscription to an offer of plots for the National Members of Parliament has been submitted
to the Bureau of the National Assembly or the Conference of Presidents, even less to the Plenary Assembly for approval’. Digital Congo (2018). Kokonyangi
désillusionné : Minaku dit ne pas reconnaître une quelconque offre d’attribution des parcelles aux députés nationaux, published on 23/03/2018 and consulted
on 27/03/2018 (www.digitalcongo.net/article/5ab4dd5e279c9400041a6d5e).
show the ways in which political connections inuence
the destruction and continuation of illegal constructions.
In the rst case, repeated court judgments should
have destroyed the market, but it continues to exist.
In both examples, the political leverage of the owners
proved to be better than any legitimate claim held by
the owners. Given their political importance as ‘vote
banks’, the occupants (market vendors) were able to
link up with higher-level political actors, proving time
and time again that political capital is more important
than urban planning policies. Also here, this shows the
ways in which policies are ‘piled up’ on top of each other:
court case after claimed ownership, after court case – in
which various actors compete for inuence. This leads to
a number of negative impacts including fragmentation
and inequality.
First, personal connections, rather than formal planning
rules, guide urban governance, and involves a large
plurality of actors operating at different scales. Yet,
the nature of these connections are different, creating
inequalities within the city: not all citizens or sites are
able to mobilise similar connections and protective
measures. This means that some sites and/or groups
are sanctioned, while others do not suffer the same fate
– city demolition orders only have an impact on sites
where the population is unable to mobilise support from
state actors considered to be strong.
Secondly, both cases further highlight the fragmentary
and contradictory nature of urban governance, and the
way in which regulations are implemented and enacted.
The way in which a particular regulation is enacted
depends on the power congurations at play – who is
able to mobilise which actors? This also means that
there often are strong contradictions between public
authorities about whether a construction is unlawful
or not. In the Indu market case study, the judiciary
considered the market unlawful, whereas the governor –
and his connections – did not. In other words: whether a
construction is unlawful or not depends on the political
leverage in play, the actors occupying the space and
their ‘protectors’.
17
‘Big men’ convert economic resources into political
control, and exercise power and authority over a group
of people through patron-client relations (Medard,
1992). ‘Big men’ play an important role in the expansion
of the city of Kinshasa and the way in which unlawful
constructions continue to exist.
Since the 1960s, the spontaneous and spec tacular
extension of Kinshasa from east to west has mainly
affected poor populations. However, during these last two
decades, ‘we observe that the extended neighbourhoods
are also inhabited by wealthy people’ (Ayimp am, 2014:
78). Increasingly, politicians and civil servants who were
previously living in more central areas of Kinshasa have
started establishing themselves in lawful or unlawful
spaces in poorer areas, living side by side with the poor, in
highly contrasting residences.
As we indicated above, personal connec tions, and their
inuence on political leverage they generate, are highly
unequal: they to a large extent determine whether an
unlawful construction is protected or not, whether a
judicial decision is respec ted or not, and so on. They also
have an impact on public services in Kinshasa. While
ever yone wants to benet from public ser vice s, the
means of the state and the cit y are extremel y limi ted.
Supply is far below the demand and there is competition
for access to these public goods and services, such as
elec tricity and water supply. The better the personal
connect ions, the better the access to the se goods. In
the context, the inuence of ‘big men’ is impor tant. The
major commodity of the se ‘big men’ are the high -level
connections they yield, and the way in which they use
these vis- à -vi s the wider communit y. Their connec tions
and networks are systems of both ‘politics and resource
provision’ (Simon, 2004b: 42). Utas (2012: 6) calls them
‘alternative governors of peopled infrastructures’. The
legitimacy of a ‘big man’ is largely based on ‘his informal
abilities to assist people privately’ (Utas, 2012: 6), while
‘building renown and power is based on amassing wealth
and redistributing it with “astutely calculated generosity”’
(Utas, 2012: 6, relying on Godelier, 1986).
This section offers a case study to show the way in which
big men are able to use their connections for public
services and urban governance.
5.1 The development of Buma quartier
In 2006, Antoine Gizenga, President of the Unied
Lumumbist Party (PALU) was appointed the First Minister
of the Democratic Republic of Congo. After 600 days in
5 Unlawful
constructions
through ‘big
men’
Urban governance through personal connections
18
of ce, he submit ted his resignation on 25 September
2008 to the President. Well over 80 year s old, he
recognised that ‘if the spirit can still be healthy and alert,
the physical body has its limits which must be taken into
account’.49
Gizenga wanted to retire on a mount ain, allowing him to
have a panoramic view. In 2012 he settled in Buma, on
the eastern outskirts of Kinshasa, which is also inhabited
by a very poor population. The local population had hoped
that Buma would benet from Gizenga’s relocation and
that it would lead to better provision of public goods and
services. The area began attracting many people and
led to a proliferation of unlawful constructions, and even
some members of PALU and Gizenga’s family were buying
plots. According to a policeman, prior to Gizenga’s arrival
at Buma, ‘the prices of the 20/20 meter plot s ranged
between $300 and $400. But as soon as the patriarch
(Gizenga) decided to live there, the prices had reached
$1,000 to $2,000, and that was only increasing’.50 As a
result of Gizenga’s inuence, a water supply was installed
to allow the surrounding population to draw water instead
of going to the well, which was very well received locally.
Gizenga built a large villa in Buma but many people were
concerned about the poor state of the roads leading to
his residence, which had seen greater usage from public
authorities’ visits. After visiting Gizenga on 16 October
2012, Joseph Kabila realised the magnitude of Buma’s
urban planning needs, starting with the main road in the
area (Nzoku road). Two days later, he sent a large high-
level delegation51 to do what was necessary to build a
modern city in Buma. For the rst time in the history of
Buma, there was popular jubilation: ‘the inhabitants were
seduced by the discourse of the revolution of modernity’.
The Minister of Land Use Planning and Urban Planning
declared publicly that projects would commence in the
area,52 and the rst works began on the Nzoku road, on
the 10 km stretch up to Gizenga’s residence.
Yet the situation can change as quickly as they began. In
2015, the former Prime Minister divorced, abandoning
49 Radio Okapi (2008). RDC : Antoine Gizenga démissionne, published on 25/09/2008 and consulted on 06/07/2018 (www.radiookapi.net/sans-
categorie/2008/09/25/rdc-antoine-gizenga-demissionne)
50 Interview 14/06/2018.
51 In this delegation were the governor of the city of Kinshasa, the Minister of Land Use Planning, Urban Planning, Housing, Infrastructure, Public Works and
Reconstruction, the Minister of Land Affairs, ofcials of SNEL, REGIDESO, OVD, and ofcials from the ministries of Environment and Public Works.
52 Déclaration diffusée par Digital Congo au journal télévisé du 19/10/2012.
53 Gizenga’s family, with whom she had no children, blamed her for having too much inuence over the patriarch and for propelling members of her network into
ministerial positions in the Matata government at the time reserved for PALU. After the divorce, Gizenga’s family began to exert great inuence on the PALU
ministers, who turned their backs on the ex-wife.
54 Interview 14/06/2018 with a local analyst.
his ex-wife in Buma. He moved to a villa in the wealthy
Mont-Fleury neighbourhood in Ngaliema commune.
Immediately, the works stopped on the Nzoku road:
Out of a dozen km expected, we had that 4 km from
the Lumumba Boulevard. From the residence of the
patriarch, the engineers had begun to asphalt the
720 m of the road, but they gave up everything.
All works – ongoing and planned – were abandoned.
Moreover, because of the unlawful constructions,
with many people having chosen to begin illegal
constructions expecting better future facilities, Buma
now has a serious erosions problem. Motorcycles on
sandy ground became the only means of transport for
the local population. Within Buma, many lost hope for
the road improvements as well as better access to water
and electricity. It also led to a signicant drop in the price
of the plots.
It was expected that Gizenga’s ex-wife still retained
some inuence, which would allow for some of the
projects to nish. Yet in reality, her relations has
deteriorated with Gizenga’s biological family53 and the
presidential family. With regard to the latter:
As if it were a conspiracy, there was an unexpected
upheaval, even Olive Kabila, the head of state’s
wife, no longer picks up the phone. On the Nzoku
road, there is no longer even the machinery of the
Ofce of Roads that was doing de-sanding to allow
one to reach the residence by vehicle without much
trouble. Erosions are progressing, and they are not
doing anything.54
This example shows the way in which the development
of this area – particularly the ways in which public
services are provided – is largely fuelled by the presence
of a ‘big man’, who through achieving development
for personal reasons will also benet the wider area.
This development happens in a strongly personalised
manner with ‘big men’ at the heart of such connections.
Urban governance through personal connections
19
However, this case study also shows that ‘big man
governance’ is unstable (Utas, 2012): once the big man
left, these developments came to a st andstill. There are
many areas in which we encountered cases of unstable
‘big man’ led developments. In another are a, a minister
had initiated roadworks in similar circumstances but once
he lost his position, these works came to a standstill. A
director of the road constructing agency lamented that,
‘the political projects are coming to an end: when you are
in power, you put pressure on us, we execute, but you
55 Interview 13/06/2018.
should always know that if you are no longer in power, the
building site stops automatically’.55
‘Big men’ – as nodes in these personal connections
– further contribute to the ‘feeble regulatory abilit y’
(Bierschenk and de Sardan, 2003: 156, 159) of local
(urban) governance dynamics. They further illustrate
the way in which power – and particularly the power
of personal connections – determine the way in which
governance and public services occur.
20
Unlawful constructions continue to exist and expand
in Kinshasa. Urban governance and urban planning in
DRC’s capital is largely outside of formal urban plans. A
multitude of actors are participating in the way in which
the city is governed – and the state and its regulatory
framework denitely are not the most powerful of these
actors. State regulations and particularly those trying
to govern the unlawful constructions are only one of
the layers which are ‘piled up’ on top of existing power-
congurations, and often have little impact. Ins tead,
personalised relations remains pivotal to the way the city
is governed. In this way, Kinshasa can be considered as
an ‘urban social machine’ (De Boeck and Baloji, 2016:
62). Instead of formal policies and regulatory frameworks,
personal connections govern the city and this can be
seen in various ways.
First, inside the public administration, the urban
planning departments are tied together through a
network of personal relations, which primarily centre
around nancial interes t s: low- level civil servants need
to deliver invisibles to protect and keep their job. Hig h-
level policy actors (such as security ofcials) protect
street-level ofcials, but also extr act resources from
them. As such, the public administration is a jumble of
cross-cutting networks in which it is often not clear who
controls particular territories. This ‘hybrid’ nature of urban
governance should not be underestimated. As Buscher
has shown in the eastern DRC, these processes of urban
governance are ‘lacking any integrated global vision and
are characterised by contest, inequalities, contrasts
and exclusion’ (Buscher, 2012: 497) – they are uid,
unstable, exible and therefore unpredictable (Ibid.). This
is also reected in Kinshasa, where there is an unequal
application of rules and regulations, depending on the
particular power congurations at play.
Second, personal relations play a key role outside of
the public administration. All actors try to have a wide
as possible network – le réseau. This is particularly is
important for the protection of illegal constructions where
we have highlighted examples of constructions which are
de jure illegal, but de facto protected by high-level actors.
The reasons can be both nancial (the high-level actor
has a stake in these buildings) and political (protecting
unlawful construction can be extremely politically/
electorally advantageous). Le reseau or personal
connections of various actors are highly unequal, with
some actors better placed than others. This inequality is
particularly stark with the provision of public services, but
also in the ways in which some groups are able to secure
poli tic al suppor t, and other s not.
6 Conclusion
Urban governance through personal connections
21
Similar to how urbanisation and expansion of Kinhsasa
takes places in a ‘spontaneous’ manner, the way in
which the state acts upon these situations can also be
seen as ‘spontaneous’. These actors exist in a uid and
unstable context, particularly given i) the dependency
of low-level actors on high-level actors and ii) the
unpredictable nature of high-level political coalitions.
With each change of government or public authorities
at key positions in Land Affairs, Urban Planning or Land
Use Planning, yesterday’s losers can gain the necessary
support through nancial or real estate invisibles, until
new challenges arise.
The public administration therefore is fragmented in
various ways. This certainly is the case internally, as
various high-level actors can be linked up with different
actors on the ground, leading to opposing positions.
This also is the temporally: as different actors take over
a particular position or institution, they might take a
radically different position – as was for example shown
in the contestation of the above markets. Overall, this
means that what counts as ‘unlawful’ or not primarily
depends on the linkages and power-position at stake,
rather than the adherence to the formal regulatory
framework.
While state policies are regularly outed, the state
and its policies remain necessary – actors remain
dependent on the state, and continue to rely on it,
in order to pursue and protect personal interest,
and in some instances, these interests are unlawful
constructions.
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Cover photo: Downtown Kinshasa. MONUSCO/
Myriam Asmani (CC BY-SA 2.0)
