10. Anti-corruption Tabloids in Democratic Republic of Congo

Brian discusses the Democratic Republic of Congo arguing that despite embracing democracy from colonialism, it is engulfed in prolonged civil wars and dictatorships making the fight against corruption difficult to achieve. He notes that corruption is deeply rooted in government institutions. He looks at tabloid journalism practice and corruption exposure. He explores the Kabila regimes noting that even though on numerous occasions they declared their commitment to fighting corruption, their anti-corruption agendas were often manipulated for political reasons. Brian discusses the Glencore mining scandal which revealed corruption in the country’s revenues agencies and state mining companies’ revenues for the state budget amounting to at least US$750 million which went missing over three years from 2013 to 2016. He concludes that even though the tabloid newspapers regularly expose embezzlement, corruption is deeply rooted and is not so much an affliction of the Congolese system as it is the system itself, deeply entrenched in the history of the Congolese state.