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Direct elections in the Democratic Republic of the Congo occur for the Presidency, National Assembly (lower house of the legislature), and provincial assemblies. The Senate (the upper house), and provincial governors are elected indirectly by members of the provincial assemblies.
Electoral law also provides for the direct election of local councils—commune, sector, and chiefdom—as well as indirect elections for city mayors, city councils, commune burgomasters, and sector chiefs. None of these were held in the first three election cycles under the current system. In the current cycle, as of April 2024, only the election of a limited number of commune councils has occurred.
These elections are run by the Independent National Electoral Commission, often referred to by its French acronym CENI. New elections should be run every five years.
Electoral framework
Elections are governed by Electoral Law No. 15/001 of 12 February 2015, which amends and supplements Law No. 06/006 of 9 March 2006, which organizes presidential, legislative, provincial, urban, municipal, and local elections, as amended by Law No. 11/003 of 25 June 2011 and Electoral Law No. 17/013 of 24 December 2017.
Direct voting system
President
Since the 2011 law, the president of the republic is elected by a first-past-the-post, single-round system for a five-year term, renewable only once. The vote is held ninety days before the expiration of the incumbent president's term. The 2006 electoral law previously used a two-round system.
National deputies
The National Assembly consists of 500 seats whose members are elected for five years according to a mixed system. Of these, 60 deputies are elected by first-past-the-post in single-member constituencies, while the remaining 440 deputies are elected by proportional representation with open lists in 121 multi-member constituencies (109 before 2018). Deputies are elected along with two substitutes.
The lists are called "open": a voter choosing a party list may cast a preferential vote for a single candidate to raise that candidate's position on the list; the allocation of seats won by the list is then carried out using the "largest remainder" method. but in accordance with Article 118 of this electoral law, candidates obtaining more than half of the votes cast in their constituency are called "exceptionally elected" and automatically obtain a seat, even if their party (or group) does not reach the 1% electoral threshold, without increasing the total number of seats in the constituency. In 2018, ten candidates obtained seats in this way.
Provincial deputies
The twenty-six provinces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, including the city-province of the capital, Kinshasa, have provincial assemblies elected for renewable five-year terms, for a total of 780 provincial deputies. The voting system is the same as for national deputies.
Each province is allocated between eighteen and forty-eight deputies. Of these, between seventeen and forty-four are elected by direct vote based on population, while one to four are co-opted by the others from among traditional chiefs. This results, at the national level, in 715 elected provincial deputies and 65 co-opted deputies, for a total of 780. The number of seats in a municipal council depends on the population of the municipality, as follows in 2018: These organizations generally showed little interest in political matters, particularly in seeking or exercising political authority. However, during the 1957 municipal elections, some of these associations evolved into political platforms supporting emerging leaders.
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! data-sort-type=date |
! data-sort-type=date | Election<br />day
! class="unsortable" | Election
! Type
! Status
|-
| data-sort-value="1 Feb 2024" | 1 Feb
| data-sort-value="29 Apr 2024" | 29 Apr
| Senate and gubernatorial
| indirect
|
|-
| data-sort-value="1 Feb 2024" | 1 Feb
| data-sort-value="2 May 2024" | 2 May
| South Kivu governor runoff
| indirect
|
|-
| data-sort-value="1 Feb 2024" | 1 Feb
| data-sort-value="24 May 2024" | 24 May
| Equateur senators and governor
| indirect
|
|-
| data-sort-value="1 Feb 2024" | 1 Feb
| data-sort-value="24 May 2024" | 24 May
| Ituri senators
| indirect
|
|-
| data-sort-value="5 Apr 2024" | 5 Apr
| data-sort-value="26 May 2024" | 26 May
| Mai-Ndombe and North Kivu senators
| indirect
|
|-
| data-sort-value="5 Apr 2024" | 5 Apr
| data-sort-value="2 Jun 2024" | 26 May
| Mai-Ndombe governor
| indirect
|
|-
| data-sort-value="24 Apr 2024" | 24 Apr
| data-sort-value="19 Jun 2024" | 19 Jun
| Commune burgomasters and city councils
| indirect
| Indefinitely delayed after candidate registration
|-
| data-sort-value="26 Jul 2024" | 26 Jul
| data-sort-value="7 Sep 2024" | 7 Sep
| City mayors
| indirect
| Indefinitely delayed
|-
| data-sort-value="14 Nov 2024" | 14 Nov
| data-sort-value="15 Dec 2024" | 15 Dec
| Yakoma and Masimanimba national and provincial deputies do-over
| direct
|
|-
| data-sort-value="29 Mar 2025" | 29 Mar<br />2025
| data-sort-value="2 Apr 2025" | 2 Apr<br />2025
| Kwilu and Nord-Ubangi senators and governors
| indirect
|
|}
Elections of the 4th cycle (2023–2028)
Presidential
National Assembly
See also
- Electoral calendar
- Electoral system
- Independent National Electoral Commission
- Mass media in the Democratic Republic of the Congo
External links
- Electionworld
- Adam Carr's Election Archive
- African Elections Database
- Looking at the Congo's Historic Moment An index of resources from the Woodrow Wilson Center on the DRC's democratic
- [https://web.archive.org/web/20120426002412/http://politicsinspires.org/2011/11/how-are-election-preparations-unfolding-in-the-democratic-republic-of-the-congo-drc-hope-or-failure-two-perspectives/] A local and an international perspectives on the 2011 elections on 28 November 2011
transition; Last update August 1, 2006