The Republic of Congo (Congo-Brazzaville)

September 3, 2019

The Republic of Congo (Congo-Brazzaville)

The Republic of Congo, also known as Congo-Brazzaville

(after its capital), is an oil-rich former French colony in

central Africa. It has extensive natural resources, but poor

governance and civil conflict have long hindered poverty

alleviation and development. Heavily reliant on oil exports,

the country is struggling to emerge from an economic crisis

precipitated by the collapse of global oil prices in 2014. The

price shock sent Congo into a deep recession in 2016-2017;

it remains in severe debt distress.

President Denis Sassou Nguesso (“SAH-soo n-GAY-soh”),

age 75, is one of Africa’s longest-serving leaders. He has

led Congo since 1979, aside from a five-year hiatus during

a civil war in the 1990s. U.S. engagement has been limited,

with U.S. policy interests focused on Congo’s role in

regional stability and maritime security, energy resources

and investment potential, and participation in U.S.-backed

forest and wildlife conservation projects. U.S.-Congo ties

have come under strain periodically due to U.S. concerns

with undemocratic and corrupt governance.

Historical Background

Congo gained independence from France in 1960. Sassou

Nguesso, a military colonel, was appointed president by the

Congolese Workers Party (PCT, after its French acronym)

in 1979. With pressure mounting for democratization,

Sassou Nguesso oversaw multiparty polls in 1992, which he

lost. A civil war then erupted between rival ethnic and

political militias in which some 7,000-11,000 people died.

With Angolan troops and French support, Sassou Nguesso

retook the presidency by force in 1997. A new constitution

was promulgated in 2001 and Sassou Nguesso was returned

to office in a flawed presidential election in 2002. All

ensuing elections have been marred by irregularities, along

with opposition allegations of fraud and institutional bias.

Political and Security Conditions

Sassou Nguesso has centralized power in the presidency

and among his family. A new constitution adopted by

referendum in 2015 shortened the presidential term from

seven to five years but increased the number of permitted

terms from two to three and abolished the presidential age

limit—clearing the way for Sassou Nguesso to run for

reelection again. The referendum drew criticism from the

fractious opposition as well as from some allies of Sassou

Nguesso. Security forces violently dispersed large street

protests. Following the vote, the State Department

expressed disappointment with a “deeply flawed process...

marred by violence, intimidation, and severe restrictions on

basic freedoms.” Sassou Nguesso went on to win reelection

in March 2016. The opposition decried the conditions of the

vote, which was held months ahead of schedule amid a

telecommunications blackout. Observers documented

widespread fraud and irregularities; according to the State

Department, some observers that deemed the poll credible

“later admitted the government underwrote their work.”

Figure 1. The Republic of Congo at a Glance

Source: CRS graphic. Statistics from CIA World Factbook; 2018

estimates unless otherwise specified.

Shortly after the election, gunmen attacked several security

force stations and government buildings in southern zones

of the capital—an opposition stronghold and former base of

the Ninjas, a militia active during the civil war. In response,

the government launched an offensive in the southern Pool

region. U.N. officials expressed alarm at reports of mass

arrests and torture; Amnesty International alleged that

government air strikes hit churches, schools, and medical

facilities. Some questioned whether the operation was

aimed not at resurgent Ninjas but at political opponents.

Security improved after the government signed a peace

accord with the Ninjas in late 2017. Thousands of

combatants have reportedly demobilized, and authorities

have withdrawn an arrest warrant for the Ninjas’ leader.

The PCT and its allies dominate the bicameral legislature.

Members of Sassou Nguesso’s immediate family serve in

prominent positions in the ruling party, parliament, and

state-owned enterprises. Some analysts assess the growing

role of the president’s son, Denis-Christel—a member of

parliament, diplomatic envoy, and former manager in the

national oil company—as a sign that he is being groomed

for higher office, possibly the presidency. Denis-Christel

has denied rumors of a possible presidential run, however,

and many expect his father to seek reelection in 2021.

Human Rights and Governance Issues

Observers documented a deterioration in human and civil

rights conditions in 2015-2016 as a number of opposition

supporters and activists were arrested, tortured, or forcibly

disappeared. Several political detainees were released in

2018, yet dozens remain in prison. Other human rights

issues include arbitrary detention and harsh prison

conditions, limits on freedom of assembly and association,

and impunity. Press freedom has been constrained by state

closures of newspapers and expulsions of foreign reporters;

journalists reportedly self-censor to evade persecution.

Corruption is widespread. Sassou Nguesso and his family

have been targets of a long-running French judicial inquiry

https://crsreports.congress.gov

The Republic of Congo (Congo-Brazzaville)

into real estate and other assets allegedly acquired through

embezzlement and money laundering. The anti-corruption

organization Global Witness alleged in 2019 that Claudia

Sassou Nguesso, the president’s daughter and a member of

parliament, used state funds to purchase an apartment in the

Trump International Hotel in New York City. Meanwhile,

Denis-Christel was named in leaked financial records

known as the “Panama Papers” indicating that he had used

offshore companies to embezzle oil revenues. Separately,

Global Witness has accused Denis-Christel of embezzling

over $50 million in public funds, asserting that some

laundered funds passed through the U.S. financial system.

The Economy

Low oil prices since 2014 have weakened Congo’s

economic outlook. The International Monetary Fund (IMF)

estimates that Congo’s GDP contracted by 2.8% in 2016

and 3.1% in 2017 before rebounding to 0.8% growth in

2018. The IMF projects GDP growth to exceed 5% in 2019

due to rising oil production. Most Congolese remain poor

and rely on subsistence farming. Other key sectors include

logging, banking, and construction, but corruption and a

poor business climate hinder non-oil sector activity.

“Poverty rates in [Congo] remain much higher than in

other oil-exporting countries, with 46 percent of the

population living under the poverty line. A sizeable

middle class with robust education, skills, and material

living standards does not exist on a large scale.”

- State Department Investment Climate Statement (2019)

The oil price slide has exacerbated a fiscal crisis. Congo

benefitted from sovereign debt relief in 2010 under a joint

IMF-World Bank debt relief program, but external debt

surged in the ensuing years to reach 91% of GDP in 2016.

According to the IMF, the debt resulted from high public

spending financed through loan agreements with China and

“nontransparent oil-for-infrastructure barter arrangements”

with oil traders. In mid-2019, after Congo and China agreed

to a debt restructuring, which was a precondition for IMF

support, the IMF approved a $449 million loan package.

Conservation Concerns

As one of six countries that share the Congo Basin, the

world’s second-largest area of contiguous tropical rainforest

(after the Amazon), Congo faces conservation challenges,

including wildlife poaching and trafficking. Roughly twothirds of Congo’s territory remains covered in dense forest,

but the conversion of forested areas for agriculture and

infrastructure development has contributed to deforestation.

Illegal logging is another driver of forest degradation. A

2014 analysis by Chatham House, a think-tank, found that

“around 70–75% of all [timber] harvesting in Congo is

illegal in some way.” Illegal logging is reportedly driven by

demand from emerging economies, notably China.

U.S. Relations and Assistance

U.S.-Congo ties were minimal in the decades after

independence as Congo, under a self-declared Marxist

regime, established close relations with the Soviet Union,

China, and Cuba. Diplomatic ties were severed entirely

between 1965 and 1977. Bilateral relations warmed in the

1990s, after the PCT formally disavowed Marxism.

As of September 2018, the State Department characterized

U.S.-Congo ties as “positive and cooperative,” centering on

“strengthening regional security, improving the living

standards of Congolese citizens, and safeguarding the

environment.” The State Department nonetheless regularly

documents human rights concerns, limitations on political

freedoms, and poor business conditions. Sassou Nguesso

has met with U.S. Presidents at the White House twice, in

1990 and 2006, and attended the Obama Administration’s

2014 U.S.-Africa Leaders’ Summit in Washington, D.C.

The United States provides little bilateral aid apart from

International Military Education and Training (IMET), with

$150,000 allocated in FY2018 and the same amount

requested for FY2019 and FY2020. The United States also

has provided regionally- and globally-allocated security aid

to support Congo’s contributions to a peacekeeping mission

in neighboring Central African Republic (CAR) and its role

in maritime security in the Gulf of Guinea. In 2017 and

2018, the State Department ranked Congo as a Tier 3

(worst-performing) country under the Trafficking Victims

Protection Act of 2000 (TVPA, P.L. 106-386), triggering

legal restrictions on certain U.S. aid, including IMET. The

Administration waived such restrictions for FY2018 but

declined to waive them for FY2019. Congo improved to a

Tier 2 Watch List ranking in 2019, which does not trigger

aid restrictions for FY2020. The United States also provides

humanitarian aid for the Pool region and refugees fleeing

CAR and the Democratic Republic of Congo, aid that is not

subject to TVPA restrictions. In FY2018, U.S. humanitarian

aid obligations totaled roughly $8.9 million, including $6.4

million in emergency food assistance.

The United States also provides conservation aid to Congo.

In FY2019, Congress appropriated $40.0 million for the

Central Africa Regional Program for the Environment

(CARPE), the primary U.S. government contribution to the

multi-country Congo Basin Forest Partnership initiative.

USAID and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service manage

these funds. The State Department has designated Congo a

focus country for U.S. anti-poaching and counter-wildlife

trafficking aid pursuant to the Eliminate, Neutralize, and

Disrupt (END) Wildlife Trafficking Act (P.L. 114-231).

Economic ties center on Congo’s energy sector, though the

value of U.S. oil imports has dropped in the past decade as

U.S. domestic supply has increased. U.S. petroleum imports

totaled $407 million in 2018, when they accounted for 94%

of U.S. imports from Congo. The State Department reports

that U.S. firms “have cited corruption as an impediment to

investment, particularly in the petroleum sector.” Congo is

eligible for duty-free treatment of certain exports to the

United States, including oil, under the African Growth and

Opportunity Act (AGOA, Title I, P.L. 106-200, as amended

and extended), but not for expanded apparel export benefits

under the Act. Congo’s deep-water port in Pointe-Noire can

receive and send shipments directly with the United States.

A bilateral investment treaty entered into force in August

1994. A bilateral Open Skies Air Transport Agreement

signed in 2018 affords reciprocal airline market access.

Tomas F. Husted, Analyst in African Affairs

Alexis Arieff, Specialist in African Affairs

IF11301

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The Republic of Congo (Congo-Brazzaville)

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