Post #304

A Corridor or a Berlin Wall? [ Cost of Greed ] How the US-backed Lobito Corridor will affect local lives — a report from the ground 🛤 In 2026, the Africa Finance Corporation plans to begin implementing parts of the Lobito Rail Corridor project — a US-backed initiative aimed at easing resource exports from the DRC and Zambia to ports on the Atlantic Ocean. Against this backdrop, the international NGO Global Witnesshas released a report focusing on the forced eviction of local residents whose homes stand in the way of trains. 🚩 In the DRC, researchers estimated that between 3,500 and 6,500 people could be affected by the reconstruction and expansion of a colonial-era railway from Kolwezi to Dilolo built in the 1930s and abandoned in the 1970s. Residents have already experienced first heavy copper trains passing through their backyards. 📃 Local officials orchestrating the relocation of people often resort to the argument that “they are living there illegally,” thereby dodging any compensation for displacement. 📌 Indeed, local residents have very few ways to prove their land ownership rights, especially since many houses were built chaotically and informally or on the basis of documents issued unlawfully. In one case, even DRC’s national railway operatorSNCC itself in a very feudal manner used to pay its workers in land near the railways. While some locals do hope for new investments in the communities along the railway following the projected revitalization of the road, there are serious concerns that the investments won't go beyond fences separating residents from the tracks. #CostOfGreed Devils Below