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People
Population
The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has an estimated population of over 67 million with a density of 21 people per sq. km (54 per sq. mi.). Largely rural, the population is concentrated in the Eastern Highlands and along rivers. Twenty-nine percent of the population lives in cities. That said, the capital of Kinshasa is a highly populous city of over eight million people.
Language
About 250 languages are spoken in the DRC. Under Mobutu Sese Seko's government, French remained the primary language of government, formal economy and most education. Mobutu himself gave speeches predominantly in Lingala. After President Laurent Kabila ousted Mobutu in 1997, KiSwahili has seen resurgence. Kabila learned KiSwahili in Eastern Zaire and Tanzania, but he is said to speak French poorly. The four indigenous languages that hold official status are Kikongo, Tshiluba, Lingala and KiSwahili.
Early European missionaries attempted to standardize these and other languages. Of the four most widely used indigenous languages, two are identified with the DRC's largest ethnic groups, the Tshiluba with the Luba-Kasai of south-central Zaire and KiKongo with the Kongo of southwestern Zaire. KiSwahili made its way into the DRC from the east, imported by Arab slavers in the latter half of the 19th century. It spread over time throughout eastern Zaire and quickly established itself in the ethnically mixed population of the copper-belt towns.
Lingala has become the most prominent of the indigenous languages. It is the language of the people from the region of the capital, Kinshasa. It was also a lingua franca among soldiers during the colonial and post-colonial era. The popularity of Zairois music with Lingala lyrics also has continued to perpetuate the widespread use of Lingala. In inter-ethnic marriages, especially in the eastern part of the country where KiSwahili is spoken, Lingala has become the dominant household language. As a result, the number of people who speak Lingala as a first language has multiplied in recent years.
The vast majority of languages spoken in the DRC are Bantu derivatives. Only in the north have other language groups been represented. Adamawa-Eastern languages are spoken in the entire northern portion of the DRC, interspersed in the east along the Uele River with Central Sudanic languages. In the far northeast (from Lake Albert north) the few Eastern Sudanic languages spoken in Zaire are heard, interspersed with Central Sudanic, Adamawa Eastern and an occasional Bantu language. Crude estimates cite 80 percent of the population as speakers of Bantu languages. The remaining 20 percent may be divided, in declining numbers of speakers, among people speaking Adamawa-Eastern, Central Sudanic, and Eastern Sudanic languages.
Ethnicity
Following the linguistic pattern, there are an estimated 250 different ethnic groups in the DRC. Most of these groups are of Bantu origin, including Luba, Kongo, Mongo and Lunda. Some sources report that the Luba, Kongo and Mongo groups as well as the non-Bantu-speaking Zande and Mangbetu make up about 45 percent of the population. Calculations of the number and relative sizes of ethnic groups are at best approximations, however. These groups are neither fixed entities nor the sole or even primary points of reference for all Congolese. In most contexts, rural Congolese identify more with a clan or lineage identity than with an ethnic identity. Ethnic identities are often viewed as constructs of the centralizing forces of the colonial power or the inherited mode of domination of the Mobutu era.
Further obscuring the ethnic make-up of the DRC have been the effects of the ongoing war. Certain ethnic identities (most espcially among the Pygmies of the Ituri region) are more of a target than others, and certain first-language speakers, such as Lingala speakers around Kisanagani, also have become targeted. As a result, a further reversion to clan and lineage identities is apparent, as is the splintering of identities. The greatest casualty in this ethnic de-unification is the sense of Congolese nationalism and the perpetuation of collective identities that form the bedrock of a common society.
Health and Welfare
The literacy rate is 65.5 percent, according to recent estimates, however, there is a wide variance between male and female literacy. Notably, the male literacy rate is 76 percent and the female literacy rate is 55 percent. Life expectancy in the Democratic Republic of Congo is 54 years of age on average (with little gender variance), while the infant mortality rate is 83.11 deaths per 1,000 live births. The fertility rate is 6.37 children born per woman.
About 11.2 percent of GDP in this country is spent on health expenditures. The risk of infectious diseases in this country is very high. Food or waterborne diseases include bacterial and protozoal diarrhea, hepatitis A, and typhoid fever; vectorborne diseases include malaria, plague, and African trypanosomiasis (sleeping sickness); water contact diseases include schistosomiasis; and animal contact diseases include rabies.
HIV/AIDS in the DRC is estimated by the World Health Organization to be eight percent. Other estimated place the HIV/AIDS rate as lower -- between four and five percent. While this range is high, regardless of the source, these rates are far below the rate in many neighboring countries. Nonetheless, upswings in HIV/AIDS cases among rural women in Rwanda and Burundi as a result of warfare have led to the speculation that the continued warfare combined with the vast population of the DRC is a recipe for disaster. To make matters worse, recent reports indicate that there is a split in the HIV-1 virus. One study identified four recombinant viruses within the HIV-1 strain. If this finding holds, then it suggests the presence of new HIV subtypes in the region and a further diversification of the disease. This will make identification, treatment, and research all the more difficult.
Human Development
A notable measure of human development is the Human Development Index (HDI), which is formulated by the United Nations Development Program. The HDI is a composite of several indicators, which measure a country's achievements in three main areas of human development: longevity, knowledge and education, as well as economic standard of living. The HDI places the Democratic Republic of Congo in the low human development category near the bottom of the full list, at 168th place among 169 countries and territories.
Note: Although the concept of human development is complicated and cannot be properly captured by values and indices, the HDI, which is calculated and updated annually, offers a wide-ranging assessment of human development in certain countries, not based solely upon traditional economic and financial indicators.
Written by Dr. Denise Youngblood Coleman, Editor in Chief, www.countrywatch.com; see Bibliograpy for list of research sources.
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