Biography of Edouard Mwangachuchu Hizi

Born Edouard Mwangachuchu Hizi, 09/30/1953 in Rutshuru. Congolese businessman and politician (Democratic Republic of Congo), he is married to Ms. Mukabaranga Upera with whom he had 6 children. This faithful Seventh Day Adventist was elected national deputy in the Masisi constituency on behalf of Patrick Bologna’s ACO political party.

His father Pastor RUHAYA Mwangachuchu was a missionary pastor of the 7th Adventist Church; installed in Kanyatsi by Mwami BULENDA INDWE III.

The Mwangachuchu family; ended up in MASISI; NYAMITABA which was the capital of the GISHARI chiefdom that the Belgians had created to welcome Banyarwanda immigrants and suppressed in 1957.

It was a crowned head of the RCD/Goma. His company SMB, formerly MHI (Mwangachuchu Hizi International), was once awarded as spoils of war PE 4731 (36 squares), amputated in complete anarchy from PE 76 (360 squares) Specific sites include Bibatama D2, Luwowo, Gakombe D4, Koyi, Mataba D2, Bundjali and Bibatama D3. This company emerged in the galaxy of this armed movement as a screen company allowing the formerly occupying armies to exploit the resources of the Congo in the shadows. Then, his interests led him to the CNDP, yet another rebel movement supported by Rwanda and which later became a political party.

Immediately after the 2011 general elections after which he was elected national deputy in Masisi thanks to the vote imposed in his favor by the CNDP soldiers, the boss of SMB was appointed president of this structure by Bosco Ntanganda, sentenced to 30 years by the ICC (International Criminal Court) for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Ituri. And under Bosco Ntanganda, SMB enjoyed a quasi-monopoly on the exploitation and marketing of minerals, mainly coltan, in Masisi. This did not please and does not always please the local populations who do not recognize the right of ownership over PE 4731, a SAKIMA heritage. Hence the interminable conflicts with the populations aggravating the security situation and social peace.

Edouard Mwangachuchu did not appear openly with the M23. However, his good relations with some of his former CNDP allies who became M23 enabled him to play good offices in the negotiations between them and the Kabila government. In its issue of August 29, 2012, the newspaper “Le Potentiel” noted: “CNDP President Edouard Mwangachuchu, still a Senator, would ask the government to understand his rebel friends of the M23 by putting forward the spirit of reconciliation, as if It is the government that poses the problem”.

This deputy from Masisi, one of the three territories under the control of the M23 rebels, in the province of North Kivu, is being prosecuted in the act of treason, undermining state security, illegal possession of arms and ammunition, association of criminals and participation in an insurrectionary group.

He was deputy to Senator Sebakunzi Ngabo Désiré, whom he replaced in 2017 as senator.

Yet during his trial, a civilian officer read the result of a Covid-19 test taken at the Rwanda Biomedical Center on May 28, 2021 in Kagali, Mwangachuchu presented himself there as a Rwandan citizen born on September 19, 1959 residing in Rwanda. The man who does not dispute the result of the Covid, but says he went to Rwanda following the volcanic eruption of Nyirangongo in the city of Goma.

RGL