Home of defeated candidate surrounded by DR Congo military

Police in Congo surrounded the home of Moïse Katumbi, who is a big politician in the opposition. This happened after the elections last month.

On Monday, his spokesperson Hervé Diakesse said he couldn’t leave his home in southern Katanga province.

But the police and soldiers went away because a governor in the area told them to.

Mr Katumbi said that President Tshisekedi‘s big win in last month’s election is not real.

Five other leaders who didn’t win the election are planning a protest march with Martin Fayulu.

On Monday night, people from Kashobwe village went to Mr. Katumbi’s house after hearing that the security forces were not letting him leave. Videos of this were posted on social media.

A person related to Mr. Katumbi told the French RFI news website that there were many armed soldiers surrounding their house.

“We are having a hard time understanding why,” Mr. Diakesse said to Reuters news agency.

Provincial governor Jacques Kyabula Katwe ordered the security forces to leave to calm down the crisis. He called the incident a mistake.

“Security forces wanted to protect Mr. Katumbi’s property from possible damage. ”

The December 20 election had a lot of problems with how things were organized. Some people who watched the election were worried about how it was done.

Just one person went to court to argue about who won the election for president.

The most important people say they don’t trust the courts. Instead, they want people to resist election fraud without saying how.

Mr Tshisekedi got the most votes, almost 73%. Mr Katumbi got 18% and Mr Fayulu got 5%. This information was released by the election commission.

Western governments are asking people to be calm and not fight after the election. The UN’s top human rights official, Volker Turk, is worried about growing tension between different ethnic groups.

Almost 20 people were killed in violence leading up to the election.