Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) urges all political parties, candidates, and their supporters to exercise patience, and refrain from acts of violence

PRETORIA, South Africa, January 11, 2019/ --

The Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) welcomes the release of the provisional results of the Presidential Election held under the combined Presidential, Legislative and Provincial Elections on 30 December 2018 in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

SADC congratulates the Congolese people, the Government of the DRC, all political stakeholders and the Independent National Electoral Commission (CENI) for conducting the elections.

SADC urges all political parties, candidates, and their supporters to exercise patience, and refrain from acts of violence, whilst the process of releasing all the final results of the elections is being conducted.

SADC further takes note of the disputes that have arisen, and encourages all concerned stakeholders to remain calm and act in a way that consolidates democracy and preserves peace. 

SADC calls upon all stakeholders with concerns, including regarding the accuracy of the results, to pursue any election dispute about the provisional results, peacefully, through avenues provided by the existing national legal framework, and resolve their differences through political dialogue among all stakeholders.

SADC reaffirms its commitment to continue to assist the DRC with respect to neutralising the negative forces and other armed groups operating in Eastern DRC.

Distributed by APO Group on behalf of Republic of South Africa: Department of International Relations and Cooperation