From our reporter in DRCongo

June 21st 2005 - The answer I get to the question posed at the beginning of most interviews is short: "nothing changed, really". I'm in Bukavu, a town in South-Kivu, a province in the East of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Here, about 1,400 kilometers from Kinshasa, the transitional government seems far away.This government of National Unity and transition was officially established on 30 June 2003. Rebel groups became political parties and their leaders became state officials. War is supposed to be over, but it's not. Our 'reporter' Willem Jaspers is trying to find out what 'transition' means in practice.````A talk with a local economist yesterday turned out to be very interesting. He claims that during the war, there was actually more construction work going on in the city than there is now. Furthermore, a bag of cement that would cost around $10 during the war, now costs $14. The reasons are costs of transportation and taxes imposed by Kinshasa. Transportation obviously is an enormous problem, as I will find out myself when heading to an army camp in Luberizi. The van I decided to rent (cheaper than a 4WD..) suffers from six consecutive flat tires. We have one spare.````Some excellent reports on the situation in the Eastern DRC have been published recently, for instance by International Crisis Group. The report mentions the importance of integration of former combatants into a national Congolese army and the breaking up of old command structures. Integration so far has mostly failed in the latter part and this resulted in the continuing excistence of parallel chains of command, both in the political sphere and in the military. But the commander of a Centre du Brassage I visit in South-Kivu refuses to admit that there are any problems. His 'retraining center' -a misguiding term, as for many combatants this is the first military they've ever received- has been up and running since march 18 this year. The idea is to train three brigades, with all combatants receiving 45 days of military training. Before coming to the Centre, combatants are disarmed and given the choice to either be demobilized or join the Congolese army.````That was theory, now practice: so far, the camp has been more of a 'storage' of ex-combatants (some 3,000-3,600) than anything else. Several hundreds of peoples that should be present in the camp at the moment are not there. Therefore, training hasn't started yet. There has also been no disarmament, as I can see for myself when entering the camp. Although the commander states that all is fine, there are problems with transportation, communication, medical care and sanitation. There used to be a shortage of drinking water, but Pakistani peacekeepers nearby are helping out. Food seems to be the only thing that is without problems. A business conglomerate that coincidentally is also one of the largest comptoirs in Bukavu, delivers it to the camp. The military training camp is a Congolese effort, and so it should be, but more international support (like that already given by the Belgians, South-Africans and Angolans) is definitely needed.````Willem Jaspers is working for the Bonn International Centre for Conversion (BICC). His visit to DRCongo is part of a multi-research project, funded by the German Foundation for Peace Research (DSF), on the role of external economic actors in war-economies in Sub-Sahara Africa. In september BICC will publish a report on the continuation of the Congolese war economy.