Uganda was counting on a militarily realigned region to quickly snuff out any possible flare-up in the Democratic Republic of Congo as tension mounted over the delayed announcement of results from the November 28 presidential election.

Casting aside fears of a protracted fallout that would split regional military resources between conflicts in Somalia and Central African Republic, Defence Minister Crispus Kiyonga said he did not expect that any fallout from the DR Congo election would spread much beyond Kinshasa.

And if that happened, a new convergence and perception of risks to security, both regionally and internationally, would see a sufficient effort mounted to deal with any emerging threats.

“My projection is that the situation will not get out of hand, the people have been reasonably patient in the face of the logistical challenges that have delayed the vote count. But we will still manage if there is a problem in DR Congo because there will be enough help,” Mr Kiyonga said, alluding to the active UN presence in the DR Congo, the African Union’s recent involvement in the anti-LRA effort, as well as the recent arrival of US special forces to help in the hunt for the elusive Lord’s Resistance Army leader Joseph Kony.

The recent months have given rise to a new drive for collective security in East Africa after incessant provocations by the Al Shabaab terrorist outfit forced Kenya to join the conflict in Somalia in October.

This emergence of multiple conflicts by radical forces has led to a new thinking that sees terror as a threat that has no borders, leading to a convergence of efforts to deal with it.

Mr Kiyonga argued that the threat of a protracted fallout from the DR Congo election was remote.

“There are no longer internal militias of a strength significant enough to sustain such a campaign,” he said.

Most of the armed groups that have exploited the power vacuum in DR Congo to operate there are either from Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi.

“We are monitoring what’s going on so we are not taken by surprise,” said Col Felix Kulayigye, spokesman for the Ugandan military.

Presidential elections in the DR Congo, which eventually became a two-horse race between President Joseph Kabila and the career oppositionist Etienne Tshisekedi, were marred by allegations of irregularities and violence. It did not help matters that Tshisekedi, even before the first ballot was cast, had already claimed victory in a contest that observers said was likely to be close.

Dozens of people have been killed in its aftermath, and many more wounded in violent clashes. 

Uganda, which in the past kept a strong military presence in eastern DR Congo as it pursued Kony, has limited influence in Kinshasa, and its troops were recently asked to leave Congolese territory. Officially, the two countries have normal diplomatic relations, but the relationship cannot be said to be as friendly as Uganda is with, say, South Sudan.

The biggest concern for Uganda, at least in the short term, will be how to handle a refugee problem that could spiral out of control if militia groups in eastern DR Congo took advantage of events in Kinshasa, where most of the violence is taking place.
“We expect some kind of refugee crisis,” said Ibrahim Bisiika, a consultant on regional security.

“There has not been effective government control in eastern DR Congo. Groups supporting the Rwandan or Ugandan government may take advantage of the lawlessness.”

The situation now is somewhat different from what obtained in 2006, when DR Congo’s first multiparty elections, boycotted by Tshisekedi, gave Kabila an easy victory over Jean-Pierre Bemba, the former rebel leader who had served as his vice president. While Tshisekedi is a formidable candidate in a way Bemba was not, he does not command a militia. But his tongue can be reckless, and what he says can have implications for security at home and abroad.

Witnesses said Congolese men and women were steadily streaming into Uganda under cover of darkness, some of them carrying machetes for protection. Christopher Kibanzanga, a former lawmaker from the frontier district of Kasese, said he was woken up one night, not long after elections in the DR Congo, by the sound of two or three Congolese crossing into Uganda.

“We are getting the spillover, those of us who live on the border,” Kibanzanga said. “They cannot wait until the election results are announced. For their safety, they have to move.”

Kibanzanga, who spends most of his time in Kasese, said the relationship between Congo and neighbours like Uganda could best be described as “predatory.”

Uganda’s military presence in the Congo has now been restricted to mostly border patrols along the Albertine rift.

In December 2008, the Ugandan army launched an aerial assault on Garamba, a vast forest in northeastern DR Congo where Kony had set up camp. But the rebel leader escaped, leaving behind his guitar and fatigues, and is now said to be constantly on the move in the Central African Republic. About 100 US Special Forces are in the region to help local armies hunt for Kony and his associates.

A climate of lawlessness in the Congo could also create the perfect opportunity for new rebel groups to take shape at a time of great transition for the new state of South Sudan and the production of oil in Uganda.

A meltdown in the DR Congo could cause a shift in priorities for Uganda, which has used the relative stability of recent years, especially after the expulsion of the LRA from Ugandan territory, to engage militarily in Somalia.

Additional reporting by MICHAEL WAKABI