KIRUMBA, Democratic Republic of the Congo—Within the courtyard of a small Catholic church in Kirumba, a metropolis within the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s (DRC’s) North Kivu province, Harmless Munyandekwe Mpizi addressed the few hundred individuals who had gathered to listen to him.
Mpizi is the town’s mayor, the third appointed by a militia referred to as M23, or the March 23 Motion, that took management of a large swath of the japanese DRC starting in the summertime of 2024. Since taking workplace, he has held neighborhood conferences each Thursday.
At one such assembly in mid-December 2025, armed militiamen stood close to a Jeep. They held their weapons, prepared to fireside if something suspicious occurred whereas residents complained to Mpizi of a surge in banditry. The bandits had been stealing money from properties and even killing individuals. Mpizi supplied reassurance that M23 would apprehend the criminals. When persons are caught, they’re whipped.
He additionally had one other message: “We’re Congolese,” he mentioned. “We invite you to affix our ranks in order that we are able to go and liberate different areas beneath the management of the Kinshasa authorities.”
It was an effort to reassure the individuals, who’ve a powerful allegiance to their Congolese nationwide identification, that his group isn’t Rwandan, regardless of widespread data that it has strong backing—even ongoing provision of munitions and even troops—from that neighboring nation.
It was additionally a transparent sign that the current peace deal between Rwanda and Congo, brokered by the US and signed in early December, means nothing in most M23-held areas. The deal resolved that M23 would disarm, and its territory would return to DRC authorities management. U.S. President Donald Trump hailed the second as a “nice day for Africa—nice day for the world and for these two nations.”
However M23 stays in place as the federal government of a lot of japanese Congo. Most shockingly, many individuals right here would favor that it keep that method.
When M23 seized the city of Kirumba in late 2024, certainly one of us—Merveille, who has lived on this metropolis all her life—believed that ongoing, widespread atrocities and mass killings had been sure. In any case, this was the group accountable for exacting extraordinary bribes; raping males, girls, and kids; and hacking off limbs and heads with machetes because it swept by the area to assert as much mineral-rich land as doable.
However Merveille and her neighbors didn’t die. Now, although some nonetheless need Congolese governance restored, many others, resembling Merveille, see that this new administration, nonetheless unlawful, provides new alternatives. There are fewer taxes. Neighborhood service is obligatory, however it’s put towards efforts to enhance roads and different infrastructure. There’s no extra harassment by the hands of the nationwide military, often called the FARDC for its French initials, which frequently acted no higher than every other militia group. M23’s troopers are extra disciplined. There’s even been an easing of corruption.
It’s removed from idyllic. Banks have been closed for greater than a yr, which has led to a money disaster and exacerbated excessive poverty. Throughout the japanese DRC, violence towards girls and ladies, together with by the hands of M23, is shockingly excessive. The armed group is a violent and extortive ruling pressure.
However for all of M23’s viciousness, the earlier establishment—excessive instability, by no means figuring out when one other armed group would emerge from the forest to slaughter individuals on the street—appears worse. In opposition to all odds, M23 has introduced a type of stability that hasn’t existed in a long time.
“We don’t need M23 to depart right here anymore as a result of we’re already virtually at peace,” one businessman mentioned.
Rwandan President Paul Kagame’s administration has all the time staunchly denied supporting M23, regardless of assertions from the United Nations and different worldwide our bodies that it does. Gold, coltan, and different minerals from japanese Congo, the place the nation’s pure wealth is essentially concentrated, movement freely from M23-held areas and past to Rwanda. Trump has said that the US additionally desires a share of the DRC’s mineral wealth as a part of the peace deal, and U.S. corporations have already elevated their exercise within the nation.
However at the same time as that deal was reached, M23 was advancing on Uvira, a city in South Kivu province that serves as a key border crossing between the DRC and Burundi. Underneath U.S. strain—and the day earlier than the city assembly in Kirumba—M23 withdrew from Uvira. However the group additionally mentioned that it wouldn’t retreat from locations the place it has entrenched itself as the federal government, some extent that Mpizi, the Kirumba mayor, reiterated in that neighborhood assembly.
That Congolese authorities has had, at greatest, tenuous management of the japanese DRC for many years. For generations a area that has suffered political and social instability, this contemporary period of violence started within the years after the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, the place extremist Hutus massacred individuals of the minority Tutsi group. Kagame, a Tutsi, was then a army chief and is essentially credited with ending the conflict in Rwanda. Hundreds of thousands of Hutus, a small variety of them extremists, crossed into the DRC Lengthy strains of those refugees walked by Kirumba.
Merveille, a youngster on the time, remembers eyeing these refugees warily, suspicious that they got here with violent intent. Armed Tutsi teams emerged on this period to take revenge on the Hutus. Opposing teams shaped, too, or revived within the fray. Even earlier than that, Merveille remembers operating desperately and repeatedly by the forest together with her siblings when armed teams pushed by her area. Her grandparents’ village, situated some 20 miles away, was a refuge—till it too was inevitably attacked.
Since 2010, tens of hundreds of U.N. peacekeepers have been based within the provincial capital, Goma, situated 60 miles south of Kirumba—a trek that may take six hours or extra. These peacekeepers are sometimes passive.
M23 was established in 2012 and has turn into essentially the most highly effective of the 50-odd militia teams contesting management of the area. Within the a long time of battle because the genocide in Rwanda, some 6 million individuals have been killed within the combating, and 7 million extra displaced from their properties.
Folks right here in Kirumba now face a dilemma. Most don’t belief M23, which they see as a Rwandan proxy that has dedicated quite a few atrocities. And but, if M23 had been to disarm and withdraw because the peace deal requires, they concern a return to the rule of the Congolese authorities. At minimal, M23 appears capable of fend off different armed teams that, beneath the nationwide authorities, emerged from the forest with out warning to slaughter individuals.
Shortly after M23 was based, it took management of Goma, the provincial capital, for about 10 days. This time round, individuals puzzled: Would the occupation final for a day? Per week? Certainly not.
However now, greater than a yr later, it’s clear that this time is totally different. A minimum of in Kirumba, individuals meet at church on Sundays. Faculties function as regular, with academics being paid by native credit score cooperatives, satirically funded by the Congolese authorities. There’s an uptick in housing development as M23 eliminates a lot of the bureaucratic pink tape that was overwhelming beneath the Congolese authorities.
Nonetheless, although there have been well-paying jobs beneath the Congolese authorities, there aren’t any skilled alternatives with M23. And as all the time, violence is only a breath away.
On the neighborhood assembly that Merveille attended in December, one man requested Mpizi whether or not M23 supposed to balkanize the nation.
No, Mpizi replied. The intention isn’t to carve out sections of the DRC to create a brand new nation, however to grab your complete nation.
One other individual requested if, in that case, M23 supposed to alter Congo’s nationwide anthem. Mpizi shrugged off the query. When M23 is completed, he mentioned, the DRC will probably be made complete. “We’ll by no means depart right here once more,” he mentioned.
