Allez les Léopards: You deserve better than politics on football's biggest stage

On June 24, 2026, Les Léopards, DR Congo's national soccer team, is going to play their second tournament match against Colombia. After drawing their opener against Portugal, this fixture looks far more winnable. ALSO READ: FIFA World Cup: Why an African nation could lift the 2026 trophy A win will send them through to the next round, sparking celebration from Kinshasa to the wider East African Community (EAC), where DR Congo flies the flag as the bloc's only representative. ALSO READ: Tshisekedi's endorsement of a Congolese Hutu national day raises questions Before the Portugal game, I watched fellow Rwandans pull on the iconic leopard-print suits, and it moved me. Born in DR Congo, I have cheered for this team since their first World Cup run in 1974. Seeing my compatriots ready to back them, despite the political tension between our two countries, made the moment special. The hard-fought draw united the region. Celebrations spread from Kinshasa, Goma, and Bukavu to Bujumbura, Kampala, Nairobi, and Dar es Salaam. In Kigali, Congolese and Rwandan fans celebrated side by side, the party running late into the night at Zaria Court, the city's premier sports and lifestyle hub in Kigali Sports City. What followed was a missed opportunity. At a post-match event in Houston, President Félix Tshisekedi turned the moment into a platform for division instead of unity. He called on Congolese to hate Rwandans, and Rwandans to hate Congolese. Years of stoking anti-Rwanda sentiment among Congolese audiences in Kinshasa were apparently not enough. Tshisekedi needed Houston, a stage built around global football unity, to carry that message to an international audience. Whatever grievance he holds toward Rwanda, using a World Cup platform to recruit the world into his vendetta, against Rwandans and against his own citizens, is indefensible. In his own words, Tshisekedi said: The enemy had entered, we were distracted. They even threw out our country's great son, and put in their dog, whom they could use as they pleased. The whole world feared Cristiano Ronaldo, but we, a country at war, stopped him. He added: The Congolese army is currently crushing the enemy, (as we crushed Cristiano Ronaldo,) and We thought witches were only in Rwanda, but they're already under our pants. The contradiction in his own statement is plain. He claims Rwanda, the enemy, entered the country and distracted its people, then accuses Rwanda of expelling our country's great son and replacing him with their dog. The son he means is Laurent-Désiré Kabila, the man Rwanda brought from Dar es Salaam to help liberate Kinshasa. The dog he refers to, Joseph Kabila, was brought to Kinshasa by Zimbabwe, a country fighting Rwanda on every front at the time. How does he accuse Rwanda of installing a man who gave him power peacefully, when it was Zimbabwe that brought him to Kinshasa? The accusation collapses under its own timeline and does not survive basic scrutiny. I set Tshisekedi's grievances aside and return to the game itself. The most visible campaign of this World Cup runs on the slogan Football Unites the World. Tshisekedi's remarks did the opposite, they divided where the tournament was meant to unite. I refuse to let that agenda define this moment. I stand behind the African teams competing in this World Cup, and I expect readers across the region to do the same. Allez les Léopards. A win over Colombia puts you in strong position to be one of the African nations reaching the knockout stage, alongside an expected win for Côte d'Ivoire over Curaçao and a must-win for Morocco against Haiti, Egypt that needs a draw against Iran, and Cabo Verde that can overcome South Arabia. Hoping that three other African nations may also qualify, making it six teams in the knockout round. The writer is a media specialist, historian, and playwright.

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Allez les Léopards: You deserve better than politics on football's biggest stage