Thousands of people demonstrated Monday in Goma, over the perceived inaction of the East African force against the M23 rebel insurgency.
The M23, a Tutsi-led group, has captured large swathes of territory in the North Kivu province. They are now within a few miles of Goma and its one million residents.
Leaders of the seven-nation East African Community (EAC) approved the deployment of a military force to combat the rebels.
But the initial hopes of many Congolese have been frustrated as M23 fighters continued their advance.
On Monday, demonstrators erected barricades in several areas across Goma to protest the EAC force, with some looting shops and torching tyres.
“The regional force of the EAC came to fight, but that is not what we see,” said Sankara Bin Kartumwa, a member of Lucha, an activist group.
North Kivu’s military governor, Lieutenant-General Constant Ndima, appeared on the streets himself in a bid to defuse tensions.
Protesters questioned him on the role of the EAC force as well as peacekeepers from the UN mission in the DRC, known as MONUSCO.
“We have the same problem, you understand? But I ask you not to barricade the road,” Ndima told one protester in an exchange seen by an AFP reporter.
EAC leaders gathered for a summit meeting in Burundi on Saturday urged an immediate ceasefire in eastern DRC.
The Congolese government later said there were obstacles stopping the EAC’s military force but stressed that it had the mandate to conduct offensive operations.
MONUSCO also regularly faces criticism that it has failed to stop the conflict.
Civilian Casualties
Dozens of armed groups have roamed the mineral-rich eastern regions of DRC for decades since the 1990s and early 2000s.
The M23 re-emerged from dormancy in late 2021. They claimed that the DRC had failed to honour a pledge to integrate its fighters into the army.
It has continued to win victories against the Congolese military and rival armed groups.
Last month, the rebels captured the strategic town of Kitchanga, west of Goma.
The conflict has forced many Congolese to flee their homes, sparking a humanitarian crisis.
The DRC accuses Rwanda of backing the M23. A claim that UN experts, the United States and other western countries agree with. Rwanda denies the charge.
