Geographically one can safely say that the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is probably Zambia’s closest neighboring country within the 16-nation Southern African Community (SADC) yet most Zambians dread going there while the brave ones who manage to visit towns and cities come back with horrific stories of maltreatment  especially at the hands of unscrupulous customs and immigration officers.
Presently most soccer fans from nearby Copper belt towns and cities would love to travel to Lubumbashi, which is literally at their doorsteps – or less than about one-and-a-half hours’ drive from Chililabombwe/Kasumbalesa border gate – to watch matches involving the ever popular TP Mazembe where Chipolopolo National Team Captain Renford Kalaba is at the core of the Congolese club’s successes in the continent but are deterred because their security cannot be guaranteed.
It is for this reason I welcomed the recent signing of an agreement by the DRC and Zambia to set up a one-stop border facility at Kasumbalesa to rationalize the flow of cargo and passenger traffic between the two countries. With this development, one hopes that hair-raising stories of Zambians and other travelers losing their property, including motor vehicles, on bizarre charges would become a thing of the past.
In the colonial days, Zambians travelling to and from Luapula and Northern provinces via Fort Roseberry (now Mansa) always complained of persistent harassment, detention and imprisonment by customs and immigration officers at Mikambo border post along the Pedicle Road. Most thought the ill treatment  would end when former Belgian Congo won its political independence in 1960 but alas that was not to be as matters inside the country itself became even more chaotic.
Policemen and even military operatives who went for months without their pay resorted to underhand tactics to make ends meet; and helpless Zambian travellers proceeding to Chembe (now a full district), Mansa, Kawambwa; Luwingu, Mporokoso and Kasama districts (Northern province) were at the receiving end.  Matters actually got worse during General Joseph Mobutu’s reign of terror during which Katangese rebel soldiers took the law into own hands, ambushing travellers and mounting road blocks in the middle-of-no-where simply to ‘grab’ something to put on the table for their starving families.
When I visited Lubumbashi and spent some two nights at the Zambia Consul General’s (Mr Kamwana) residence in 1969, I found the Congolese to be peaceful people who love their rumba music and a good life. The only sad thing I noticed was that a Congolese would do anything to survive.
But according to my childhood friend, Goodwin Msisha (late), who partly received his early education in the Congo, things have improved for the better with the coming to power of President Joseph Kabila, who replaced his father, Laurent Kabila after the latter was assassinated in Kinshasa in 2001.
Although his opponents still insist that he must go after serving his two five-year terms, young Kabila seems to have succeeded at the seemingly impossible task of stabilizing the country except in the Eastern part of the DRC where ‘rebels without a cause’ continue to give government forces a torrid time.
Inside Lubumbashi where there is a huge population of residents of Zambian origin – who still speak fluent Zambian languages including Bemba, Lamba, Kaonde and Lunda – life continues to flourish as if there had been no devastating civil war.
In fact the first thing anyone visiting Lubumbashi  notices upon entering the city centre are dilapidated and bullet-riddled buildings which have been in that state since the end of the civil war in the late 1960s during Moise Tshombe’s rule of Katanga which had broken away from the rest of the former Belgian Congo. Zambians, accustomed to driving on the left as they enter the city from Chililabombwe/Kasumbalesa border-gate often find themselves in hot soup.
One traveller  had his car confiscated by policemen who claimed he was driving a car which had been reported stolen by its ‘legitimate’ Congolese owner. Despite producing documents, including the bluebook and insurance certificate, the man was ordered to go and the motor vehicle at the nearby police station. The incident, one of the many cases involving tourists and international truckers transporting food and industrial equipment, was resolved only with the intervention of the Ndola-based Congolese Consul-General’s office and Zambian officials.
Some transporters even claim to have been willing to pay in United States dollars (the currency of choice in DRC) in order to retrieve their impounded trucks allegedly for traffic violations by their drivers. I understand some cases are still pending before DRC-Zambia Permanent Joint Commission.
’Tenez Droite (French for Keep right),’ says the signpost as you enter Lubumbashi’s Central Business District (CBD) where traffic is always heavy.
May be things have changed since then but the speed limit is 60km/h. The robots have two lights only – Green for Go and Red for Stop. There is no amber for Get Ready. You would expect a lot of accidents in such circumstances, but that doesn’t happen in sprawling Lubumbashi.
“Nous sommes les meilleur chauffeurs en Afrique (We are the best drivers in Africa),” bragged a tall and corpulent Congolese who had just emptied a Coke, recalled Msisha who died in Chingola after a short illness some four years ago.
In the city’s outlaying townships like Zone Nkenya, Zone Katuba and Zone Kamalondo, the roads are full of potholes, motorists cannot drive at over 5km/h or more without risking a flat tyre.
On nearly every street, the visitor is greeted by loud music emanating from bars and shebeens. Don’t expect your host to take you out to a restaurant for lunch or supper. He will instead take you to an al fresco bar where cassava – the staple – (for nshima /pap) and goat meat sell like hot buns. The ever popular Simba or Tembo beer is there to wash down the michopos and cassava meal.
Most Congolese are used to this because it is cheaper compared to restaurants or hotels.  For the high flying Congolese a decent meal is rare.
A trip to the market in Zone Nkenya , where I tried to buy the popular Chitenge material for my wife, reveals a wide range of Zambian goods on display. These include sugar, salt, cooking oil, washing soap and mealie-meal, which is sold in measures of a small engine oil tin. No bag here because the businesswomen selling mealie-meal want to make you think that a Zambian market has been shifted to Lubumbashi.
‘Ca c’est bon (That is good) because why should we suffer when our ‘voisin’ (neighbour) has what we need,” said one fat Congolese. When night falls, it is time for a Congolese to drink beer. Congolese like drinking in groups of five or six.
Like their Kenyan counterparts, a Congolese will always drink from a glass, never a bottle. But in contrast to the East Africans who cherish Tusker ‘wa moto’ (warm), the Congolese prefer very cold beer (baridi sana) and dance to the latest rumba music. If they know that their guest is from Zambia, they want him to listen to the latest rumba.
Dancing girls in bars whose job is to lure men, especially foreigners, to buy more beer and eventually go to their rooms with them. Zambian tunes including old ones like those of the Glorious Band are also popular. The girls would often invite Zambians to join them in the dance. This will go on until the wee hours of the morning and it is up to the man to decide which girl to go out with.
The other thing that immediately becomes particularly noticeable is that there is not much sensitization as regards HIV and AIDS disease. People seem to talk less about the killer disease as if it does not exist.
“Uku akuna Sida (There is no AIDS here),” the dancing queens would often tell their prospective customer in ki-Swahili. The motive is clearly to lure the man into picking her for a fee of a few Francs with which to buy food and beer.
The only hotel in Lubumbashi is a five-star facility – the 500-room Karavia Hotel – where a visitor or client can order any type of meal. The hotel has a golf course and an underground discotheque. Other hotels in the townships are ghettoes in every sense of the word.
“Vous voullez une chambre? (You want a room?”) Nous avons double chamres seulement (We only have double rooms),” a receptionist at these hovels would often say. Zambian travelers must be on the lookout because the idea is for them to find a woman to accompany you.
But all in all sure relaxation for a Congolese man is a beer, a woman, music, and ‘michopo’ and football, of course. Congolese are highly talented soccer players, which is why some of them have managed to secure lucrative contracts with several professional clubs in Europe.
Background: The second largest city in DR-Congo – after Kinsshasa, the capital, Lubumbashi is the main industrial centre of mining and lies 180km from Ndola on the Zambian Copperbeelt.
Lubumbashi is the name of a small local river and the town was established by Belgian colonists in 1910 as a copper-mining settlement and was designated an urban district in 1942. Most regional mining companies are headquartered in Lubumbashi, which is the transportation centre for mineral products (copper, cobalt, zinc, cadmium, germanium, tin, manganese, and coal) from the towns of Likes, Kolwezi, and Kipushi where Goodwin Msisha’s father worked as a clerical officer in the early 1950’s.
Research documents state that mineral exploitation has been dominated by a government-owned organization, but foreign mining companies are also in evidence. The city’s other industries include printing, brewing, flour milling, and the production of confectionery, cigarettes, brick, and soap. Lubumbashi has a civic auditorium, a national museum, a Roman Catholic cathedral, and the Society of Congo Historians, as well as the University of Lubumbashi, which opened its doors to freshers in1955, or 11 years before the University of Zambia (UNZA) was established at the former Harry Oppenheimer College opposite the University Teaching Hospital (UTH).
The city with a population of 1,102, 000 people has road links to Kasai, Lake Mweru in Zambia, Kalemie on Lake Tanganyika, northeastern Congo, and eastern Africa. There are rail routes from Lubumbashi to the Atlantic and Indian oceans, and Luano international airport is just outside the city.
So if the security situation improves at Kasumbalesa, as envisaged following the signing of the ‘watershed’ Accord between Zambia and DRC, it won’t be long before Zambian soccer fans – in the spirit of good neighborliness and SADC regional integration – start flocking to Lubumbashi to watch international matches just like soccer lovers in Botswana, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Mozambique and Swaziland at weekends trek to neighboring South African cities like Johannesburg and Pretoria to cheer their Kaizer Chiefs’ and Mamelodi Sundown’s star players in action.
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