A Call for International Leadership—Including From President Trump—to Support a Legal Referendum on Self-Determination. A sweeping new assessment from peace building organizations in the Great Lakes region has issued a sobering warning: hate speech, ethnic persecution, and targeted violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) have reached levels that now threaten the very future of the country. For Congolese Tutsis and other marginalized communities in the east, the crisis has become existential.
After decades of discrimination, statelessness, organized hate campaigns, and atrocities—including lynching, burning, and documented cases of cannibalism—many observers are asking a question once considered unthinkable:
Has Eastern Congo reached the same historical breaking point that pushed South Sudan to seek independence?
And if so, should the international community—led by the United States—support a peaceful, democratic referendum on independence for Eastern DRC?
A Region Under Siege: Hate as a Tool of Governance
The latest human-rights report depicts an alarming reality:
Hate speech has infiltrated political institutions, media, churches, and youth movements.
Congolese Tutsis are slandered as “foreigners,” “infiltrators,” and “Rwandan agents.”
Government-aligned militias—the Wazalendo—have carried out horrific violence with near-total impunity.
Soldiers and police officers of Tutsi origin have been hunted, lynched, and burned alive.
More than 7,000 civilians have fled into Rwanda.
These conditions—chronic, structural, and unchecked—mirror the long pattern of persecution that preceded South Sudan’s vote for independence in 2011, after decades of violence and state-backed discrimination by Khartoum.
Just as South Sudanese communities concluded they could no longer live safely under northern Sudanese rule, many in Eastern Congo now believe the social contract with Kinshasa has collapsed.
Historical Parallels With South Sudan
The comparison is striking:
1. Systemic Discrimination
South Sudanese faced cultural, linguistic, and religious repression.
Eastern Congolese Tutsis face relentless campaigns questioning their citizenship and right to exist in the country.
2. State-Enabled Militias
Sudan armed Janjaweed-style militias in the early 2000s.
Congo has empowered Wazalendo groups implicated in atrocities and ethnic targeting.
3. Deployment of Hate Speech
Sudan’s leaders used dehumanizing language to rally support.
Congolese officials and media have used similar rhetoric, inciting mobs to violence.
4. Breakdown of Trust
Both South Sudanese communities and Congolese Tutsis reached the same conclusion:
A government cannot claim to protect citizens whose very identity it denies and demonizes.
5. International Failure to Intervene Early
The world watched South Sudan’s suffering for decades before acting.
Many fear Congo is following the same path.
Is Independence the Only Remaining Solution for Eastern Congo?
For years, regional governments and international partners promoted three strategies:
Integration of armed groups
National dialogue
Security-sector reform
Yet all three have repeatedly failed.
Instead:
Hate speech is rising.
State institutions are implicated in abuses.
Elections have become vehicles for exclusion.
Minorities face eradication-level violence.
In such a context, the question is no longer abstract. It is urgent and practical:
Can a people survive inside a state that systematically targets them?
If the answer is no, then the international community must confront a difficult but necessary conversation—one centered on the legal right to self-determination, not forced partition, not war, but a democratic and internationally supervised referendum, exactly as South Sudan received.
A Legal, Peaceful Path Forward: A Self-Determination Referendum
International law recognizes the right of a people to self-determination when:
They suffer systematic discrimination,
Their physical safety is threatened,
The state denies them equal citizenship,
And all political remedies have failed.
Eastern Congo now meets these criteria.
A referendum would:
Allow all communities—Tutsi, Hutu, Nande, Hunde, Twa, Havu, and others—to decide their future.
Create a legal framework for autonomy or independence.
Reduce the likelihood of endless war.
Bring international oversight and accountability.
This model preserved peace in:
South Sudan (2011)
Eritrea (1993)
East Timor (1999)
And could do the same for Eastern Congo.
A Call for U.S. Leadership — Including President Donald Trump
The United States played a decisive role in South Sudan’s independence by pushing for a legitimate referendum rather than a military outcome. President Donald Trump—now a central figure in Great Lakes diplomacy through the Washington Accord—has the unique leverage, political capital, and global attention required to address the crisis.
The call is not for Washington to “give independence,”
but rather:
To champion a peaceful, internationally supervised democratic referendum on the political future of Eastern DRC.
Such leadership would:
Prevent further mass atrocities,
Dismantle the networks that promote hate speech and genocide,
Address the root causes of conflict,
Restore regional stability,
And uphold America’s longstanding commitment to human rights.
If the people of Eastern Congo vote to remain in the DRC, the result must be respected.
If they vote for autonomy or independence, that too must be honored.
Either way, the U.S. can help ensure the process is peaceful, legitimate, and free from coercion.
Conclusion: A Historic Decision Point
Eastern Congo stands at a crossroads reminiscent of pre-independence South Sudan. Hate speech, persecution, and targeted killings have eroded the foundations of national unity so deeply that many communities no longer feel they have a future within the DRC.
The international community must not wait for another catastrophe before acting.
A referendum—monitored by the African Union, the United States, the European Union, and the United Nations—offers the only sustainable, rights-based path out of an escalating crisis.
The question now is whether global leaders, including President Trump, will recognize the urgency and help guide Eastern Congo toward a peaceful, democratic decision about its own future.
