© Simon Dawson/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Israeli businessman Dan Gertler pays a visit to the mining complex of Katanga Mining Ltd. in 2012.
On Thursday, February 24, Congolese authorities signed a memorandum of understanding with the group owned by controversial Israeli billionaire Dan Gertler. What definitively close the disputes between the two parties and allow the DRC to recover all the mining and oil assets attributed to the businessman, for an estimated value of 2 billion dollars. In recent days, Congolese civil society has been calling on the government for more transparency. the government therefore responded on Thursday to questions posed by civil society.
With our correspondent in Kinshasa, Patient Ligodi
Why a memorandum of understanding? The Deputy Chief of Staff to the Head of State André Wameso immediately stressed that until then neither the legal proceedings nor the American sanctions had enabled the DRC to recover its assets.
Justice Minister Rose Mutombo argued that arbitration proceedings would not have benefited the government either because the lawyers’ fees would have amounted to several million dollars. So, according to her, negotiation was the only remaining strategy.
Kinshasa therefore agrees to reimburse Dan Gertler for the investment costs in these mining and oil projects, but without interest.
And the government also recovers studies to further enhance these assets for which there would already be other suitors.
Today, Dan Gertler no longer has any mining or oil concessions in the Congo. He will still continue to benefit from these certain rights under royalties.
The details of the memorandum of understanding will not all be released at this time due to confidentiality clauses, said Patrick Muyaya, government spokesman. However, this document will be shared, he said, with the American authorities in the name of the partnership between the DRC and the United States.