Top Congo FM, a Congolese media outlet covering the elections in Belgium

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Congo Those annoying questions Back to Basics

2024 Election

From June 1 to 8, Top Congo FM, the leading private media in the Democratic Republic of Congo, set up studios in Brussels to cover the federal, regional and European elections. During this “Belgian Week”, the programming will be broadcast live every day from 8 am to 1:30 pm Kinshasa time, and broadcast via YouTube videos and FM radio in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

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“We conducted field reporting in Brussels, Antwerp, Liège, Louvain-la-Neuve and Namur, where we met with members of the Congolese diaspora. Christian Lusakueno, founding journalist at Top Congo, explains. We have hosted experts in our Brussels studio, such as Colette Braeckman, a journalist from Le Soir, and have organized political interviews with Congolese candidates in regional and federal elections from different lists. We have also hosted leaders of the main political parties. To end the week, this Saturday we will interview Belgian Foreign Minister Hajja Rahbib. »

Those annoying questions

This week, Top Congo also addresses the anger that has been expressed over the silence of the international community in the face of the human tragedy that has been unfolding in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo for nearly 30 years. But discrimination in employment and housing still affects Belgians of African and mainly Congolese descent in Belgium.

“We have discussed this issue with leaders of different political parties. Explains Christian Lusakuno. We ask what they intend to do to improve the fate of non-native communities in Belgium and how they intend to position themselves in the face of Rwandan aggression in the east of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Because unfortunately we have noticed that the tragedy that affects our country receives less attention than the war in Ukraine or what is currently happening in Gaza. »

This indifference to the suffering of the Congolese people is often pointed out when we talk about Belgian-Congolese relations in Kinshasa. But despite the occasional tensions, relations between Kinshasa and Brussels remain “special” almost 64 years after the former colony’s independence. Belgians may no longer be as attached to Congo Zaire as their parents or grandparents were. But as we saw during our week in Belgium, the connection still exists. Congolese candidates and party leaders know it is important to maintain that connection. »

Back to Basics

For Christian Lusakueno, founder of Top Congo FM, this “Belgian Week” feels like a return to basics. From 1993 to 2002, at Radio Panik in Place Daly in Brussels, the journalist hosted Click Africa, an information and debate show widely followed by Congolese expatriates in Belgium. He then became a reporter for Africa N°1 before launching the new media Top Congo FM in Kinshasa on July 14, 2003.

“After 21 years of practice, we can say that we have succeededadvancing Christian Lusakuno. Top Congo FM is now one of the few Congolese media outlets that covers the entire Democratic Republic of Congo. The research company Kantar TNS even ranked us as the leading private media outlet in French-speaking Africa. Thanks to this notoriety, we managed to raise the necessary funds to produce our special broadcasts from Brussels during the election period. In just 48 hours, we raised €50,000 from advertisers. ”

The budget specifically financed a trip for a team of 10 people (6 journalists and 4 technicians) to Brussels for a week. “We are grateful to the ‘Schengen House’ in Kinshasa for issuing visas for the entire team”, “It is a sign of confidence that does not deceive,” the founder of Top Congo FM stressed. Not all Congolese who knock on the door of the “Schengen House” are treated with the same respect.

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