DRC: Former RFI journalist, Kasongo Mwema Yamba Yamba, died
Kasongo Mwema Yamba Yamba died this Saturday, November 12, 2022. © Presidency of the Democratic Republic of Congo
Text by: RFI Follow
2 mins
He had just turned 70.
RFI learned, this Saturday, November 12, of the death of one of its former voices.
Kasongo Mwema Yamba Yamba passed away this Saturday morning following an illness.
Former spokesperson for Félix Thsisekedi, he had, before that, led a very long journalistic career.
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It was in 1972, at the Voice of Zaire, the Congolese National Radio-Television, that he began.
First in Lubumbashi, where he was born twenty years earlier, before joining Kinshasa.
Kasongo Mwema Yamba Yamba rose through the ranks and became deputy director in charge of reporting teams based at the presidency of the Republic.
But in the early 1990s, when Mobutu Sese Seko announced the beginning of political pluralism, he was ousted from his post because he, along with other journalists, spoke out in favor of freedom of information in the media. public.
Kasongo then left Kinshasa to join Paris.
We are in 1992. It was on this date that he joined RFI where he remained for 16 years.
He is a very committed, cultured, endearing, funny journalist who will occupy the positions of presenter of the Africa and World newspapers.
In 2008, end of the adventure.
He left the radio du monde to return to his native land where he became a journalism professor at the University of Lubumbashi.
"
A library that leaves us
"
In 2019, his career took a new turn.
Kasongo Mwema Yamba Yamba became spokesperson for President Félix Tshisekedi before becoming, last October, chairman of the board of directors of the Agence congolaise de presse (ACP), a position he still held.
RFI today salutes the memory of a great colleague who contributed a lot to freedom of information in the Congo and in Africa.
Reached by RFI, the spokesperson for the Congolese government, Patrick Muyaya, paid him a strong tribute.
“
We are deeply shocked to learn of his death.
What was good with him was that he always brought you back to the past, to events.
He always knew how to put everything into perspective.
He brought the necessary dose of wisdom and experience.
It is a library that is leaving us.
He could not leave us indifferent with always his jokes, his sense of humor which embellished our meetings, sometimes the most difficult.
It's really a big loss for us
,” he said.
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