1
00:00:02,440 --> 00:00:07,760
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.

2
00:00:09,000 --> 00:00:11,880
Speaker 2: The ability to prove your ID for a bank account

3
00:00:12,039 --> 00:00:14,920
Speaker 2: or for public services may be taken for granted in

4
00:00:15,040 --> 00:00:17,880
Speaker 2: much of the world, but many countries still lack this

5
00:00:18,040 --> 00:00:19,320
Speaker 2: basic infrastructure.

6
00:00:20,040 --> 00:00:21,799
Speaker 3: For about a billion people on the planet, there is

7
00:00:21,840 --> 00:00:25,560
Speaker 3: no idea. They don't have anything that identifies them. Not

8
00:00:25,600 --> 00:00:27,920
Speaker 3: an easy problem to solve, but technology is coming in

9
00:00:28,000 --> 00:00:30,840
Speaker 3: the picture and things are moving really quickly. The Prime Minister,

10
00:00:31,120 --> 00:00:32,800
Speaker 3: give us a sense. Don't give us just one reason.

11
00:00:32,880 --> 00:00:34,800
Speaker 3: It's a big enough. I should give us two reasons,

12
00:00:35,360 --> 00:00:39,239
Speaker 3: two reasons why it is essential that digital IDs are

13
00:00:39,320 --> 00:00:40,919
Speaker 3: the top of your agenda in your country.

14
00:00:41,280 --> 00:00:44,160
Speaker 2: It's seen as so important that it's actually a part

15
00:00:44,159 --> 00:00:47,080
Speaker 2: of the un sustainable development goals.

16
00:00:47,240 --> 00:00:51,120
Speaker 1: For the government of the DRC. Access to citizens' rights

17
00:00:51,440 --> 00:00:55,840
Speaker 1: is a key aim to enable this. Proper population registry

18
00:00:55,880 --> 00:00:58,640
Speaker 1: and the guarantee of a unique legal identity are.

19
00:00:58,600 --> 00:01:03,400
Speaker 2: Essential, but the push for complicated biometric ID systems has

20
00:01:03,480 --> 00:01:06,679
Speaker 2: meant expensive contracts in some of the poorest countries in

21
00:01:06,720 --> 00:01:11,759
Speaker 2: the world, leaving the door open to corruption. On today's podcast,

22
00:01:12,040 --> 00:01:15,360
Speaker 2: we'll explain how a twenty five million dollar shopping center

23
00:01:15,400 --> 00:01:18,840
Speaker 2: in the DRC's second city, shows why the country still

24
00:01:18,880 --> 00:01:22,080
Speaker 2: has no ID system and how money that was supposed

25
00:01:22,120 --> 00:01:25,520
Speaker 2: to fund it may have ended up benefiting only a

26
00:01:25,560 --> 00:01:32,200
Speaker 2: few I'm Jennifer's abasadjab and this is the Next Africa Podcast,

27
00:01:32,520 --> 00:01:35,520
Speaker 2: bringing you one story each week from the continent driving

28
00:01:35,520 --> 00:01:38,520
Speaker 2: the future of global growth with the context only Bloomberg

29
00:01:38,560 --> 00:01:45,520
Speaker 2: can provide. This investigation is a partnership between Bloomberg and

30
00:01:45,640 --> 00:01:49,600
Speaker 2: Lighthouse Reports reporter Thomas Statias, who's been working on this

31
00:01:49,720 --> 00:01:51,559
Speaker 2: story and he is joining us this week.

32
00:01:51,680 --> 00:01:54,680
Speaker 4: So Thomas, thank you so much for your time.

33
00:01:54,800 --> 00:01:58,280
Speaker 2: I mean, it's a really fascinating story and there's so

34
00:01:58,280 --> 00:02:02,160
Speaker 2: many different layers to it. But maybe before we get

35
00:02:02,200 --> 00:02:05,240
Speaker 2: to the crux of the story, which is this ID

36
00:02:05,440 --> 00:02:08,720
Speaker 2: card project that was turned into a shopping center, let's

37
00:02:08,720 --> 00:02:11,280
Speaker 2: maybe take a step back and get some of the history.

38
00:02:11,840 --> 00:02:15,200
Speaker 2: What's been behind the push for biometric ideas in Congo

39
00:02:15,240 --> 00:02:18,160
Speaker 2: and other African countries, and also what made you interested

40
00:02:18,200 --> 00:02:19,560
Speaker 2: in wanting to look into this.

41
00:02:20,639 --> 00:02:23,399
Speaker 5: The behind the scenes story of the push on biometrics

42
00:02:23,400 --> 00:02:26,960
Speaker 5: starts like more or less ten years ago, when two

43
00:02:27,040 --> 00:02:32,080
Speaker 5: institutions the UN published something called the Sustainable Development Goals,

44
00:02:32,400 --> 00:02:35,840
Speaker 5: which are like the goals that the UN and humanity

45
00:02:35,960 --> 00:02:37,960
Speaker 5: was to achieve by twenty thirty, and one of his

46
00:02:38,080 --> 00:02:40,920
Speaker 5: goals is actually for any individual on the planet to

47
00:02:41,000 --> 00:02:45,360
Speaker 5: have a certain ID card and a certain identity defined

48
00:02:45,360 --> 00:02:48,760
Speaker 5: by the States. And around the same time, essentially the

49
00:02:48,840 --> 00:02:53,840
Speaker 5: World Bank, another multi electural institution, essentially start to push

50
00:02:53,960 --> 00:02:57,040
Speaker 5: also for the same goal, but with the addition of

51
00:02:57,040 --> 00:03:01,360
Speaker 5: a technology called the biometric technology, which is so to speak,

52
00:03:01,440 --> 00:03:04,919
Speaker 5: everything that makes you unique as a person, so your fingerprint,

53
00:03:04,960 --> 00:03:07,880
Speaker 5: your iris, your behavior and so on. So those two

54
00:03:07,919 --> 00:03:12,000
Speaker 5: elements combined create a real gold rush for vendors that

55
00:03:12,080 --> 00:03:14,680
Speaker 5: are mostly Western vendors, a lot of those of French,

56
00:03:14,760 --> 00:03:17,920
Speaker 5: German and event from the US to go to this

57
00:03:18,040 --> 00:03:21,160
Speaker 5: new market, which is the continent, the African continent, to

58
00:03:21,280 --> 00:03:26,720
Speaker 5: try and sell this technology to those countries. As for

59
00:03:26,800 --> 00:03:30,360
Speaker 5: the reason we wanted to get interested in that. In

60
00:03:30,400 --> 00:03:34,079
Speaker 5: this fatnonership between Bloomberg and Lighthouse Reports, the investigative out

61
00:03:34,080 --> 00:03:40,280
Speaker 5: that I'm working with is essentially there's a technoli solutionism narrative.

62
00:03:39,920 --> 00:03:41,320
Speaker 6: Behind biometric technology.

63
00:03:41,360 --> 00:03:45,040
Speaker 5: There's beside that technology can fix everything, it can fix election,

64
00:03:45,280 --> 00:03:48,080
Speaker 5: it can fix unbalanced states, et cetera, et cetera.

65
00:03:48,520 --> 00:03:50,640
Speaker 6: And this narrative is actually quite powerful.

66
00:03:50,720 --> 00:03:52,880
Speaker 5: So we wanted to have a look at behind what's

67
00:03:52,920 --> 00:03:55,720
Speaker 5: happening in some of the most extreme situations that we

68
00:03:55,760 --> 00:03:56,240
Speaker 5: can find.

69
00:03:56,480 --> 00:04:00,480
Speaker 2: Wow, and this is very extreme for people who get

70
00:04:00,480 --> 00:04:02,640
Speaker 2: a chance to read it. So then let's get to

71
00:04:03,320 --> 00:04:05,920
Speaker 2: maybe Congo, right, because this is the country that you

72
00:04:05,960 --> 00:04:09,760
Speaker 2: focus on. What was the existing ID system that was

73
00:04:09,800 --> 00:04:12,000
Speaker 2: there when you and the team started looking into this.

74
00:04:14,480 --> 00:04:16,880
Speaker 5: Essentially, when we started to have a look at Congo,

75
00:04:17,880 --> 00:04:21,919
Speaker 5: there are no kind of let's say, general identification system

76
00:04:22,279 --> 00:04:25,240
Speaker 5: as we know it in some of other country, whether

77
00:04:25,279 --> 00:04:27,320
Speaker 5: it's Southeast Asia, whether it's.

78
00:04:27,200 --> 00:04:29,080
Speaker 6: Western Europe, whether it's North America.

79
00:04:29,240 --> 00:04:32,440
Speaker 5: So in Congo, when we start to look at the system,

80
00:04:32,600 --> 00:04:35,560
Speaker 5: there are no functioning idea, meaning people did not have

81
00:04:35,640 --> 00:04:39,720
Speaker 5: driving licenses, the state has no idea how many citizens

82
00:04:39,760 --> 00:04:40,440
Speaker 5: lived in Congo.

83
00:04:40,560 --> 00:04:42,640
Speaker 6: The last census was performed in.

84
00:04:42,600 --> 00:04:45,000
Speaker 5: Nineteen eighty four, so at the time the country was

85
00:04:45,000 --> 00:04:47,680
Speaker 5: called Zaiah and the head of the state was someone

86
00:04:47,760 --> 00:04:50,680
Speaker 5: that's actually I'm sure people listening to this podcast you

87
00:04:50,720 --> 00:04:53,520
Speaker 5: know quite well whose name was Mobutu se Seco. So

88
00:04:53,839 --> 00:04:57,920
Speaker 5: it was like forty years ago and essentially the only

89
00:04:58,040 --> 00:05:02,000
Speaker 5: kind of identification that people have in day to day life.

90
00:05:01,760 --> 00:05:05,080
Speaker 6: Or voting calls, but voting call are no proof.

91
00:05:04,839 --> 00:05:08,839
Speaker 5: Of identity because essentially you can say whatever names you

92
00:05:08,880 --> 00:05:11,359
Speaker 5: want to put on your voter cards because there is

93
00:05:11,440 --> 00:05:16,040
Speaker 5: no unique identification system. So that was the starting pot

94
00:05:16,120 --> 00:05:19,599
Speaker 5: from the investigation and along all those kinds of ideas

95
00:05:19,600 --> 00:05:23,080
Speaker 5: that are not working properly in Congo. Congo had for

96
00:05:23,160 --> 00:05:25,680
Speaker 5: a couple of years one of the most expensive passports

97
00:05:25,720 --> 00:05:28,800
Speaker 5: in the world that costs one hundred eighty five dollars

98
00:05:29,160 --> 00:05:31,200
Speaker 5: each passport essentially.

99
00:05:31,440 --> 00:05:34,040
Speaker 2: And it's one of the ten poorest countries in the world.

100
00:05:34,120 --> 00:05:36,200
Speaker 2: So that seems like a contradiction.

101
00:05:37,760 --> 00:05:41,160
Speaker 5: It is a contradiction, but it is also a very

102
00:05:41,200 --> 00:05:45,560
Speaker 5: important market. The last census in the RC stated that

103
00:05:45,800 --> 00:05:49,480
Speaker 5: RC was populated of twenty million people. The protection by

104
00:05:49,480 --> 00:05:51,359
Speaker 5: the UN state that you will be one of the

105
00:05:51,400 --> 00:05:54,560
Speaker 5: giants of the African continent by twenty fifty and right

106
00:05:54,600 --> 00:05:58,880
Speaker 5: now the population is estimated around one million inhabitants in Congo.

107
00:05:59,040 --> 00:06:01,640
Speaker 6: So it is quite a big market for tho the vendors.

108
00:06:02,040 --> 00:06:05,159
Speaker 5: So it is quite a hussle for all those company

109
00:06:05,240 --> 00:06:08,240
Speaker 5: to try to set shop in the country, and there's

110
00:06:08,279 --> 00:06:10,360
Speaker 5: a lot of money to be made, which is.

111
00:06:10,640 --> 00:06:14,279
Speaker 2: Perhaps how you know we're at the situation now and

112
00:06:14,560 --> 00:06:16,679
Speaker 2: Tomas I thought it was really interesting in the story.

113
00:06:16,839 --> 00:06:20,000
Speaker 2: How you know that the fact that we mentioned this

114
00:06:20,120 --> 00:06:22,719
Speaker 2: in the intro, some people take advantage of the fact

115
00:06:22,720 --> 00:06:26,359
Speaker 2: that they have ideas, right, But in Congo, you noted

116
00:06:26,400 --> 00:06:29,960
Speaker 2: that Congolese people feel like foreigners in their own country.

117
00:06:30,800 --> 00:06:34,160
Speaker 6: They are they feel their offerings, but they're offerings.

118
00:06:34,400 --> 00:06:37,680
Speaker 5: As I said, there is no kind of notification and

119
00:06:37,760 --> 00:06:40,279
Speaker 5: it makes very concrete stuff for day to day lives

120
00:06:40,279 --> 00:06:43,240
Speaker 5: for the people working, for instance, in the University of Kinshasa.

121
00:06:43,279 --> 00:06:45,920
Speaker 5: It means they cannot check Casher check. It means they

122
00:06:45,920 --> 00:06:49,520
Speaker 5: cannot send money abroad or they cannot receive money from abroad.

123
00:06:50,120 --> 00:06:53,200
Speaker 5: I remember meeting this guy around the community center in

124
00:06:53,279 --> 00:06:57,200
Speaker 5: Kinshasa telling me that he was having an interview for

125
00:06:57,240 --> 00:06:59,840
Speaker 5: a job to be a pull attendant at the US Embassy.

126
00:07:00,360 --> 00:07:02,960
Speaker 5: That if he doesn't have any kind of identifications, you

127
00:07:03,040 --> 00:07:06,000
Speaker 5: won't be hired. Even more, you won't be authorized to

128
00:07:06,040 --> 00:07:09,920
Speaker 5: go into the building because security people from the embassy

129
00:07:10,200 --> 00:07:13,840
Speaker 5: would not let someone in that their identity is not certain.

130
00:07:14,120 --> 00:07:16,880
Speaker 5: So it means very concrete stuff you know, for day

131
00:07:16,920 --> 00:07:20,000
Speaker 5: to day life from congol citizen and this situation has

132
00:07:20,040 --> 00:07:22,320
Speaker 5: been going on for for the years. It also means

133
00:07:22,320 --> 00:07:25,280
Speaker 5: a lot of consequences for the government. How do you

134
00:07:25,360 --> 00:07:28,720
Speaker 5: live itacks, How do you know who owns which house?

135
00:07:29,160 --> 00:07:32,240
Speaker 5: How do you send the sign to someone who are

136
00:07:32,280 --> 00:07:35,000
Speaker 5: a spedding ticket to someone who's done some stuff dangerous

137
00:07:35,040 --> 00:07:37,040
Speaker 5: on the road. It's impossible if you do not know

138
00:07:37,120 --> 00:07:40,120
Speaker 5: the identity of the population. And that's been the situation

139
00:07:40,240 --> 00:07:41,400
Speaker 5: for the last forty years.

140
00:07:41,520 --> 00:07:44,200
Speaker 2: So that gets to the opportunity then that an ID

141
00:07:44,480 --> 00:07:48,560
Speaker 2: system could present. And then this additional layer of biometric

142
00:07:48,840 --> 00:07:52,200
Speaker 2: databases which you were mentioning they're expensive. We talked about

143
00:07:52,200 --> 00:07:54,760
Speaker 2: how Congo is one of the poorest countries in the world.

144
00:07:54,840 --> 00:07:57,760
Speaker 2: What was the plan here, What was it that was

145
00:07:57,800 --> 00:07:58,520
Speaker 2: being pitched?

146
00:07:58,920 --> 00:08:03,520
Speaker 5: What was being pitched the time is that essentially an

147
00:08:03,560 --> 00:08:06,960
Speaker 5: ID system costs a lot of money and supposibly the

148
00:08:07,080 --> 00:08:10,720
Speaker 5: ideas for FORI it to be very well spread among

149
00:08:10,760 --> 00:08:13,960
Speaker 5: the population. It needs to be cheap because as you say,

150
00:08:14,120 --> 00:08:17,400
Speaker 5: Congo is one of the ten poorest country in the world.

151
00:08:17,440 --> 00:08:19,760
Speaker 5: You need to have incentive for people to register and

152
00:08:19,800 --> 00:08:22,600
Speaker 5: so on. That the idea at first by this Belgian

153
00:08:22,720 --> 00:08:26,400
Speaker 5: company called Semlex, where the time approached former ARC President

154
00:08:26,480 --> 00:08:30,640
Speaker 5: Joseph Cabina. The idea was that a very expensive passport

155
00:08:30,720 --> 00:08:34,160
Speaker 5: one hundred and eighty five dollars aimed to the Congolese elite,

156
00:08:34,200 --> 00:08:37,400
Speaker 5: to the elite that's still traveling on a monthly basis

157
00:08:37,480 --> 00:08:40,920
Speaker 5: essentially that needs passport over and over the years, will

158
00:08:40,920 --> 00:08:45,200
Speaker 5: pay for the expensive ID project for normal let's say

159
00:08:45,400 --> 00:08:50,280
Speaker 5: congole Is citizens. That was being pitched in early twenty fourteen,

160
00:08:50,840 --> 00:08:54,679
Speaker 5: and that's what tried to develop around like the next month,

161
00:08:55,160 --> 00:08:59,120
Speaker 5: where two contracts essentially made their way through the administrative

162
00:08:59,120 --> 00:09:02,080
Speaker 5: system of Congolme State in Peril. One was for the

163
00:09:02,120 --> 00:09:05,040
Speaker 5: ID card, one was for the passport. But in the

164
00:09:05,160 --> 00:09:08,640
Speaker 5: end it's only the passport contract that went further that

165
00:09:08,880 --> 00:09:12,240
Speaker 5: was actually the passport were created and were delivered to

166
00:09:12,240 --> 00:09:15,320
Speaker 5: the congol citizen. And not to mention that deal, the

167
00:09:15,360 --> 00:09:20,240
Speaker 5: passport deal is currently investigated by the prosecutor in Belgium

168
00:09:20,360 --> 00:09:21,720
Speaker 5: over corruption allegation.

169
00:09:24,360 --> 00:09:26,320
Speaker 4: So then what went wrong?

170
00:09:26,640 --> 00:09:27,600
Speaker 6: What went wrong is.

171
00:09:27,600 --> 00:09:31,040
Speaker 5: Essentially, according to two sources that were very familiar with

172
00:09:31,080 --> 00:09:33,600
Speaker 5: this deal, is like the money intended to be used

173
00:09:33,640 --> 00:09:38,000
Speaker 5: to finance the ID card through different financial mechanism was

174
00:09:38,320 --> 00:09:41,080
Speaker 5: let's say not being rooted to that purposes and being

175
00:09:41,360 --> 00:09:45,240
Speaker 5: re rooted to people close to the Kabila family within different.

176
00:09:44,880 --> 00:09:47,679
Speaker 6: Ways, let's say. And one of that way that we

177
00:09:47,840 --> 00:09:50,040
Speaker 6: uncovers for the first time in that story.

178
00:09:50,400 --> 00:09:53,720
Speaker 5: Is the money was used to leverage a loan to

179
00:09:53,880 --> 00:09:58,359
Speaker 5: finance the construction of a big shopping center called Ichnos

180
00:09:58,800 --> 00:10:02,199
Speaker 5: in Lubumbashi. Bubumbashi is the second city of the R

181
00:10:02,280 --> 00:10:04,480
Speaker 5: seats in the east spouts of the R s in

182
00:10:04,559 --> 00:10:06,160
Speaker 5: the mining region of Katanga.

183
00:10:06,360 --> 00:10:07,800
Speaker 6: It's the main city of Katanga.

184
00:10:07,920 --> 00:10:11,160
Speaker 5: And this building, which is a brand new, super technological,

185
00:10:11,240 --> 00:10:15,880
Speaker 5: expensive building according to our source, it was built thanks

186
00:10:16,040 --> 00:10:19,280
Speaker 5: to the money from the that was originally intended to

187
00:10:19,280 --> 00:10:20,800
Speaker 5: be used for the idical project.

188
00:10:21,520 --> 00:10:23,600
Speaker 2: All right, stick with us, Thomas. When we come back,

189
00:10:23,679 --> 00:10:27,120
Speaker 2: we'll look at how ten years on, Congo still hasn't

190
00:10:27,160 --> 00:10:28,880
Speaker 2: managed to set up an ID system.

191
00:10:29,080 --> 00:10:36,760
Speaker 4: We'll be right back. So welcome back.

192
00:10:37,240 --> 00:10:40,160
Speaker 2: Thomas Statiez is still with us, and we're talking about

193
00:10:40,200 --> 00:10:44,640
Speaker 2: his deep dive investigation into Congo's failed attempts to develop

194
00:10:44,640 --> 00:10:48,760
Speaker 2: a national ID system. Thomas, thanks so much for sticking

195
00:10:48,800 --> 00:10:51,600
Speaker 2: with us through this pod. So there still isn't an

196
00:10:51,640 --> 00:10:54,800
Speaker 2: ID system, which you go into great detail about in

197
00:10:55,280 --> 00:10:58,640
Speaker 2: your reporting. Is the government even trying to get there?

198
00:10:58,760 --> 00:11:00,319
Speaker 2: Where are the plans at this point?

199
00:11:02,160 --> 00:11:04,520
Speaker 6: It's interesting because it's the goal.

200
00:11:04,760 --> 00:11:08,040
Speaker 5: The fact that the president announced very earlier on after

201
00:11:08,080 --> 00:11:10,480
Speaker 5: being elected that he will put out an ID system

202
00:11:10,600 --> 00:11:13,160
Speaker 5: is like a constant in the ten past years of

203
00:11:13,400 --> 00:11:17,440
Speaker 5: history of Congo. So when Felis Tshikeedi, the current president

204
00:11:17,480 --> 00:11:21,040
Speaker 5: of years, he was elected after very contestic election in

205
00:11:21,080 --> 00:11:24,400
Speaker 5: twenty nineteen, he promised very early on that he will

206
00:11:24,400 --> 00:11:27,719
Speaker 5: have an ID system like set up and so on,

207
00:11:28,080 --> 00:11:29,520
Speaker 5: and that's what happens.

208
00:11:29,120 --> 00:11:33,400
Speaker 6: Over the past four years. An attempt to again create

209
00:11:33,480 --> 00:11:34,400
Speaker 6: this side the cut.

210
00:11:34,280 --> 00:11:36,920
Speaker 5: System with the difficulty that we talked about previously in

211
00:11:36,960 --> 00:11:41,000
Speaker 5: this podcast. The government signed one of the most expensive

212
00:11:41,080 --> 00:11:44,800
Speaker 5: biometric deal in the history of Africa with the French

213
00:11:44,920 --> 00:11:49,679
Speaker 5: Bender and Malian partner for one point two billion dollars

214
00:11:49,760 --> 00:11:53,880
Speaker 5: and the contract again is suspected to be of a price.

215
00:11:54,360 --> 00:11:58,640
Speaker 5: The Finance WATCHDOB of Congo found a lot of irregularities

216
00:11:58,840 --> 00:12:02,000
Speaker 5: in the whole financing structure, let's say, of the program.

217
00:12:02,080 --> 00:12:04,720
Speaker 5: So once again the promises to have this ideical that

218
00:12:04,880 --> 00:12:06,880
Speaker 5: was made to the Congolist cities and very early on

219
00:12:06,960 --> 00:12:10,559
Speaker 5: by President Shikedi is not fulfilled and we likely not

220
00:12:10,679 --> 00:12:13,079
Speaker 5: be fulfilled in the next month. And what we can

221
00:12:13,160 --> 00:12:16,120
Speaker 5: fear is because there were some idicals that were produced

222
00:12:16,160 --> 00:12:19,640
Speaker 5: and given to a couple of Congolist VIPs, that this

223
00:12:19,840 --> 00:12:22,480
Speaker 5: idical will become like an object of collection of very

224
00:12:22,520 --> 00:12:26,120
Speaker 5: wealthy Congolist people. Because at the time, as far as

225
00:12:26,120 --> 00:12:29,440
Speaker 5: i'm our sources go, we know there's roughly one thousand

226
00:12:29,559 --> 00:12:33,080
Speaker 5: idical that were produced over this one point two billion

227
00:12:33,440 --> 00:12:34,319
Speaker 5: dollar contract.

228
00:12:34,880 --> 00:12:37,160
Speaker 2: Wow Tomas, when you went there, I mean, what is

229
00:12:37,200 --> 00:12:39,760
Speaker 2: the reaction on the ground, especially you outline that some

230
00:12:39,800 --> 00:12:42,400
Speaker 2: of the funds you founded the report were ciphoned to

231
00:12:42,440 --> 00:12:43,040
Speaker 2: this new mall.

232
00:12:43,240 --> 00:12:45,400
Speaker 4: What do is citizens say there?

233
00:12:45,880 --> 00:12:49,520
Speaker 5: I would say, any situation is not black and white, right,

234
00:12:49,640 --> 00:12:53,440
Speaker 5: there is a sense that this pattern of like misuse

235
00:12:53,480 --> 00:12:56,360
Speaker 5: of money is like an ongoing situation and never ending

236
00:12:56,400 --> 00:12:58,840
Speaker 5: situation in congost But I would say that people are

237
00:12:58,920 --> 00:13:04,160
Speaker 5: very tired also of like this corruption scheme, but also

238
00:13:04,200 --> 00:13:08,480
Speaker 5: tired of something else, tired of the whole framing of

239
00:13:08,840 --> 00:13:12,280
Speaker 5: let's say corruption as an African problem. Corruption in a

240
00:13:12,360 --> 00:13:15,360
Speaker 5: sense is also a problem of some of those companies

241
00:13:15,360 --> 00:13:18,920
Speaker 5: that are coming and are participating in those essentially scheme.

242
00:13:19,280 --> 00:13:20,480
Speaker 6: This is a two way stuff.

243
00:13:20,480 --> 00:13:24,120
Speaker 5: It's not only and solely an African government problem. There's

244
00:13:24,160 --> 00:13:27,480
Speaker 5: another investigation at least in France for instance, ongoing on

245
00:13:27,520 --> 00:13:31,240
Speaker 5: another vendor part of a very big group for corruption

246
00:13:31,320 --> 00:13:36,319
Speaker 5: allegation in Africa. So hopefully, like those the investigations, we

247
00:13:36,360 --> 00:13:39,320
Speaker 5: instead the records straight, proving that it's not only an

248
00:13:39,320 --> 00:13:42,440
Speaker 5: African problem, but also like due diligence and a good

249
00:13:42,480 --> 00:13:45,280
Speaker 5: practices that those company needs to have when they're working

250
00:13:45,320 --> 00:13:48,000
Speaker 5: in large government tendering process.

251
00:13:48,080 --> 00:13:52,000
Speaker 2: And as you mentioned, Congolese people are still waiting as

252
00:13:52,000 --> 00:13:55,280
Speaker 2: this procect carries on. Tomas, thank you so much for

253
00:13:55,400 --> 00:13:58,600
Speaker 2: joining us. It's a really fascinating report, really well done

254
00:13:58,640 --> 00:14:00,360
Speaker 2: by you and the team, and we want to make

255
00:14:00,360 --> 00:14:03,040
Speaker 2: sure everybody knows that you can read his investigation on

256
00:14:03,080 --> 00:14:05,960
Speaker 2: Bloomberg right now and we are going to put a link.

257
00:14:05,760 --> 00:14:07,640
Speaker 4: In the show notes. Thank you so much to us.

258
00:14:08,040 --> 00:14:08,920
Speaker 6: Thank you, Jennifer.

259
00:14:12,160 --> 00:14:14,920
Speaker 2: And as Tamas noted, ID systems in much of the

260
00:14:14,960 --> 00:14:17,800
Speaker 2: world are considered a basic right as citizens.

261
00:14:18,240 --> 00:14:21,040
Speaker 4: Without it, as the World Bank says, people.

262
00:14:20,760 --> 00:14:24,080
Speaker 2: Can be left feeling like foreigners in their own country.

263
00:14:24,840 --> 00:14:29,040
Speaker 2: As we approach the UN's twenty thirty Sustainable Development Goal target.

264
00:14:29,480 --> 00:14:32,040
Speaker 4: We'll watch to see what progress is actually.

265
00:14:31,800 --> 00:14:34,840
Speaker 2: Being made in granting people the ability to obtain a

266
00:14:34,920 --> 00:14:39,600
Speaker 2: legal identity and how that then affects their countries and

267
00:14:39,640 --> 00:14:47,240
Speaker 2: their public officials. This program was produced by Adrian Bradley.

268
00:14:47,360 --> 00:14:50,680
Speaker 2: Don't forget to follow and review this podcast wherever you

269
00:14:50,800 --> 00:14:54,680
Speaker 2: usually get your podcasts. I'm Jennifer Zabasaja. Thanks as always

270
00:14:54,680 --> 00:14:56,320
Speaker 2: for listening