A sentence of 20 years in prison was requested Thursday by the Congolese justice against the former president of the National Assembly Vital Kamerhe, political ally and director of cabinet of the president of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Vital Kamerhe, 61, is the principal of three defendants in an unprecedented trial for alleged embezzlement and laundering of some $ 50 million in public money.
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The judgment will be rendered on June 20, said the president of the tribunal de grande instance in the evening, after a fifth hearing broadcast live, very followed by the Congolese. The trial is being held in the Kinshasa central prison, where Vital Kamerhe has been in pre-trial detention since April 8. Like his two co-defendants, he claimed his innocence, denouncing a "political trial" and the "brutality and relentlessness" of the court against him.
The prosecutor had asked for 20 years of "forced labor" against him, as well as ten years of deprivation of the right to vote and to stand as a candidate. The same sentence of 20 years was required against the first of his two co-defendants, the Lebanese entrepreneur Jammal Samih, 78 years old, including more than 50 in the Congo. The prosecution also requested the “confiscation of bank funds” from the wife of Vital Kamerhe, her daughter and a cousin of the accused, as well as “the confiscation of real estate properties acquired with the embezzled funds during the period from January 2019 to date ”. In the pleadings of the civil party, a lawyer from the Democratic Republic of the Congo claimed that the couple who married in February 2019 had acquired and renovated a mansion in France for more than a million euros.
"True justice will come from God"
"It's as if we really wanted to destroy the whole family," defended Vital Kamerhe, speaking of a house "45 minutes from Paris". "True justice will come from God, when human judges depart from true justice," he added, claiming to have warned his wife before the hearing that "mass is said" regarding her judicial fate. Originally from the province of South Kivu (East), Mr. Kamerhe has been a central figure in Congolese political life since the 2000s.
Candidate declared in the presidential election of December 30, 2018, he had withdrawn in favor of Félix Tshisekedi a month before the election. The two men had signed an agreement that Vital Kamerhe would become prime minister and candidate for the next presidential election in 2023. Once in power, Félix Tshisekedi had finally appointed him chief of staff, before reserving the post of Prime Minister for a close relative. from his predecessor Joseph Kabila, under another political agreement.
The public money that Vital Kamerhe is accused of having embezzled was to finance a component of emergency works of the "100 days" program launched by the Head of State in early March 2019. This component related to the construction of social housing for the military, in the form of 1,500 prefabricated houses imported from Turkey. The deal was made with Jammal Samih, who also asked for his acquittal: "I am innocent," he said. The two men are tried with a third accused, Jeannot Muhima, in charge of the import-export service at the presidency of the Republic, and the customs clearance of imported goods.
From Paris, a group of lawyers from Vital Kamerhe claimed to have seized a "United Nations working group on arbitrary detention" , "requesting an urgent intervention to guarantee respect for the fundamental rights of Vital Kamerhe". "There is no evidence of culpable financial flows , " write in a statement Me Jean-Marie Kabengela and Me Pierre-Olivier Sur. The two lawyers also return to the sudden death of magistrate Raphaël Yanyi on the night of May 26 to 27, barely two days after presiding over the second trial hearing. Pending an autopsy report, "several sources" claim that the magistrate has been "poisoned and designate Mr. Vital Kamerhe as responsible". "In this tense context, the Congolese prison authorities are unable to guarantee security," said Vital Kamerhe.