Henri-Thomas Lokondo

Henri-Thomas Lokondo Yoka (27 July 1955 – 10 March 2021) was a Congolese politician who served as a deputy in the Democratic Republic of the Congo National Assembly from 2011 until his death in 2021. He previously held office as Deputy Minister of Public Works from 1993 until 1994 and Deputy Minister of Foreign Relations from 1996 until 1997. In the 2000s he formed his own party, the Union Congolaise pour la Liberté. Biography Henri-Thomas Lokondo Yoka was born on 27 July 1955 in Équateur Province, Belgian Congo to a Mongo family. He earned a degree in political science with a focus in international relations from the Université libre de Bruxelles. Lokondo then worked in the Congolese government's intelligence services in Uvira. From 1991 until 1992 he participated in the Conference Nationale Souveraine—a national convention that discussed democratisation and political reform—and served as an expert on the Haut Conseil de la République. On 2 April 1993 Lokondo became Deputy Minister of Public Works under Faustin Birindwa's government. He served in the post until 6 July 1994. On 26 February 1996 he was made Deputy Minister of Foreign Relations under Prime Minister Kengo wa Dondo and remained in office under Likulia Bolongo until 17 May 1997. That day the Alliance des Forces Démocratiques pour la Libération du Congo-Zaïre seized Kinshasa and overthrew the government. Lokondo went into exile in Belgium, though several months later he returned under Laurent-Désiré Kabila's regime and became the Mouvement Populaire de la Révolution (MPR)'s national secretary for communications. He joined several other politicians in December 2000 in demanding Kabila allow for political liberalisation in the Congo. He felt "forgotten" during the Inter-Congolese Dialogue—a series of negotiations between 2001 and 2003 that led to the end of the Second Congo War—and left the MPR. Using money and connections he had garnered during his work in the intelligence services and in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Lokondo founded the Union Congolaise pour la Liberté (UCL), a party that soon allied with Joseph Kabila's Parti du Peuple pour la Reconstruction et la Démocratie and others to form the Presidential Majority. In July 2003 he became a member of the Transitional National Assembly on the government's list. In October 2004 President Joseph Kabila appointed him privy councilor to the presidency. On 8 November he vacated his seat in the Assembly.