Nous sommes arrives

And arriving in DRC through Kinshasa airport is quite an experience. There are few facilities, and many steps to pass through with passport, yellow fever vaccination certificate, baggage labels all checked – sometimes repeatedly with a hint of bribery in the air. Dozens of locals descend on you looking to help with bags or provide taxi rides for fees that are ‘clarified’ later. The relative calm of Kigali Airport seems a long way away.

It was surprising to us when planning this visit that there were no direct flights at all between the capitals of Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo, and the quickest way to get from one to the other was to fly in the other direction to Nairobi, Kenya and wait six hours before flying back again. So we had a long day on Sunday, and with some technical problems on departure finally arrived in DRC at 10.30pm.

Our hotel had agreed to arrange pick-up at the airport and it really was an old pick-up van!! But at that time of night, grateful to have all our bags arrive with us this time, we were happy to jump on board.

Hotels here are surprisingly expensive, and with a few exceptions they leave room for development. We are paying double what we paid in Kigali, but our pick-up driver drives us through some very dodgy looking back streets, past a rather severe looking prison until we are near our hotel. A shiny bright new building stands out in the street and our hopes are lifted. But he drives past and our place is two doors down. Oh boy.

However, we are here now. Despite the poor internet, the dodgy toilet and a sleepless night, the second stage of our All Party Delegation to study conflict and development in Rwanda/DRC is underway. The DRC may be struggling to recover from a history of exploitation, corruption and conflict, but the Congolese are a proud and resilient people. It will be good to engage with them again.

We will be searching for causes and solutions. The new Regional Peace and Security Framework is surely an opportunity to make progress, but commitment and leadership will be required to see it through. Watch this space.