Trip May Signal End of Zairian Regime

KINSHASA, Zaire — President Mobutu Sese Seko announced plans Tuesday to travel today to a summit of regional leaders in Gabon in what appeared to be the first step in an exit strategy before a threatened assault on this capital by rebel troops.

Spokesmen for the president insisted that Mobutu will return to Kinshasa immediately after the three-day meeting in Libreville, Gabon’s capital, but several Western diplomats said they would not be surprised if Mobutu--whose military continues to crumble before rebel advances--decided not to come back.

The stated reason for the hastily arranged summit was for Mobutu to consult heads of state from neighboring French-speaking countries.

The announcement came amid an intensive behind-the-scenes effort by South African and U.S. mediators to persuade Mobutu to step aside and transfer authority to a transitional government led by rebel chief Laurent Kabila. According to a diplomatic source Monday, a deal now being finalized would allow Mobutu to exit in dignity while rebels enter Kinshasa without a fight, sparing the city’s 5 million inhabitants.

Diplomats on Tuesday said Mobutu’s trip to Gabon seemed in keeping with that plan, but they could not confirm that Mobutu has decided to bow out that way.

The Gabon meeting had not been previously announced, and Mobutu’s spokesmen offered only the barest of explanations. “The president will go to Libreville on Wednesday and will return Friday,” spokesman Kabuya Lumuna said. “The meeting is linked to the international mediation on Zaire.”

Mobutu is to meet with the presidents of Gabon, Togo, Congo and possibly Chad, all French-speaking countries. One diplomat said he believed Mobutu wants to explain his position and review his options with sympathetic neighbors before making a final decision to give power to Kabila.

U.S. special envoy Bill Richardson, who had been on an eight-day shuttle diplomacy mission to help end the Zairian fighting, sounded upbeat after a meeting with South African Deputy President Thabo Mbeki in Cape Town. “The peace process is very much on track. I’m very encouraged,” Richardson said.

Richardson planned to go to Paris today to brief the French government, which is the Western government Mobutu is most likely to listen to. France has been sympathetic to Mobutu and hostile toward Kabila in the civil war that erupted in October.

The announcement of Mobutu’s travel plans came as rebels defeated resistance from government troops around the town of Kenge, 120 miles east of Kinshasa, and as rebel leaflets circulated in Kinshasa calling for the city to surrender in a few days. A rebel occupation of the capital appeared inevitable, probably within a week, one Western military expert said.

Rebel spokesman Raphael Ghenda, speaking from the rebel-held southeastern city of Lubumbashi, claimed that the rebels have already infiltrated the capital.

“We would like to avoid bloodshed. Our main task is to protect the population against the extremists, against looting and against violence,” Ghenda said, according to news services. “We will target only military installations in the city.”

The news that Mobutu was leaving for Libreville set off a fresh wave of rumor and fear in Kinshasa. Many residents fear that when Mobutu and his cronies leave, government troops will take that as their signal to pillage the city before the rebels arrive.

The poorly paid Zairian army went on rampages in 1992 and 1993, leaving hundreds of people dead.

In an apparent effort to get the government troops under control and avoid bloodshed, rebel radio on Tuesday broadcast an appeal for government soldiers to prepare to surrender.

“We appeal to all government soldiers in Kinshasa to leave and present themselves to alliance commanders and troops,” the broadcast by Voice of the People radio said. Kabila’s movement calls itself the Democratic Alliance for the Liberation of Congo-Zaire.

After weeks in which government troops seemed to be doing nothing to defend Kinshasa, the government Tuesday reported that it was mounting a counteroffensive to try to take back Kenge. A military spokesman said government forces had killed several hundred rebels. “Intense fighting is taking place,” said Capt. Aime Atembina, a government military spokesman, at a news conference.

Diplomatic and church sources confirmed that there was heavy fighting around Kenge, in what one Western military expert called the first serious military resistance shown by the government since the fall of Lubumbashi last month.

But the same Western military expert scoffed at the claims of casualties and said it appeared the rebels already had the upper hand.

Western diplomats said that the rebels’ claims to being within 60 miles of Kinshasa probably were exaggerated but that the rebels certainly had reached the Kwanga River, which is 90 miles from the city, and that reinforcements were pouring into the area.