Calm appears to have returned to the streets of Kinshasa after a couple of days of violence. Clashes, which left about 150 people dead (according to some reports), occurred between government forces and militia loyal to Jean-Pierre Bemba, the runner-up in last autumn’s elections. Bemba, who had recently vowed to play a constructive role in the opposition and was recently sworn in as a senator, appears to currently be hiding out in the South African embassy.

Because of the polarizing nature of last year’s two rounds of elections (the east voting for Kabila, the eventual winner, and the west and the capital voting for Bemba), the role that Bemba would play in the new DRC has been a very important question. His former career as a warlord during the vicious conflicts that nominally concluded in 2002 and the large private militia he maintained during the election campaign and afterwards have done much to keep the DRC on a knife’s edge. That said, Kabila’s camp has in the past turned to violence too .

According to an agreement signed ahead of the election, the winner of the presidential poll is committed to guarantee the loser’s security. This latest round of violence is a result of the failure of Bemba’s militia to disarm in accordance with an agreed upon deadline. Bemba claims government forces are out to get him and refuses to accept the fifteen police officers allotted to him by the state in place of his privately-funded militia. By no means am I sympathetic to Bemba, but it does not take much imagination to foresee such a delicate situation becoming violent. Excluding Bemba, a man with 40+% popular support from the political process, is not a recipe for success. The questions that arise from the current situation are very unpleasant. Will the Congolese government risk trying Bemba for high treason and so aggravate social unrest and the unhealed divisions of last year’s campaigns? Will Bemba be allowed to go into exile? If in exile will he feel compelled to levy troops against Kabila’s government?