Opposition is building in the Democratic Republic of Congo over a minerals partnership that President Felix Tshisekedi put forward after returning from a trip to Washington for a critical minerals summit, a package in which U.S. lawmakers and U.S. President Donald Trump publicly praised his pitch. The proposal would offer U.S. companies access to eastern Congo’s mineral-rich areas, with the deal framed as a mutual bargain: U.S. support for Congo’s efforts to confront rebels and develop infrastructure in exchange for access to strategic minerals.
Tshisekedi’s outreach included a series of meetings during the Feb. 4 Critical Minerals Ministerial in Washington, where he led a Congolese delegation and discussed an implementation framework tied to a list of strategic assets submitted by Congo. The U.S. State Department said the discussions focused on reviewing those assets to determine investment opportunities for American companies, building on the strategic partnership agreement signed between Washington and Kinshasa in December.
In describing the approach, Tshisekedi told the U.S. Chamber of Commerce that Congo was “open for business” and “serious about doing business the right way,” according to the report. Under the strategic partnership agreement, the deal is presented as a means to secure supply chains for minerals like cobalt, copper, lithium and coltan for the United States, with Congo receiving promised U.S. help for key infrastructure.
The opposition to the arrangement centers on what critics say the deal does not adequately address: the absence of lasting security in eastern Congo, where Rwanda-backed M23 rebels seized major cities last year and remain in control of mineral-rich territories. Analysts and residents cited in the report said they have not seen evidence that U.S. involvement in Congo’s minerals sector would deliver the permanent peace and stability that they view as most urgent.
Critics also point to how the mineral economy already intersects with conflict. The report says rebels control areas including the Rubaya coltan mine, which produces around 15% of the world’s coltan, and notes that at least 200 miners died recently after a part of the mine collapsed there. Against that backdrop, American companies have historically avoided Congo, in part due to insecurity and corruption, a gap critics say Chinese companies have been able to fill.
Moïse Katumbi, a leading opposition figure, raised concerns about whether the partnership can be implemented under existing security conditions in the mineral-rich east, and he called for a national dialogue as a better route to investment than the current framework. In Kinshasa, a group of lawyers and human rights activists filed a lawsuit saying the partnership threatens Congo’s sovereignty, with lawyer Jean-Marie Kalonji saying that “We are assuming our responsibility as Congolese citizens to protect the sovereignty of our country and preserve our heritage for future generations.”
The report also includes criticism from religious leadership. Archbishop Fulgence Muteba, president of the National Episcopal Conference of Congo (CENCO), compared the partnership to “selling off the minerals of an entire nation to save a regime or a political system.” Muteba’s criticism, as cited in the report, said the partnership would sacrifice development for the population and “confiscat[e] the happiness of future generations.”
In rebel-controlled areas, residents said they do not see a major U.S. commitment to restoring peace and stability. Christopher Muyisa, described as a youth activist, said, “We think this agreement will generate more conflict instead of actually providing solutions because the actors are not sincere.”
Others linked the deal to broader U.S.-China competition for strategic minerals. The report quotes Josaphat Musamba, a doctoral researcher at Ghent University, saying the “battle between China and the United States for access to and control of strategic minerals will intensify concretely on Congolese soil.” It also quotes Yvon Muya, a research associate at Canada’s University of Ottawa, saying the immediate gain for Tshisekedi and his government is primarily political, focused on “strategic recognition from Washington.”
The dispute over the partnership is unfolding as the Trump administration seeks to create a minerals trading bloc with allies in part to reduce reliance on China, which the report says accounts for nearly 70% of the world’s rare earth mining and controls roughly 90% of global rare earth processing. With Congo now weighing how new access arrangements could be shaped by insecurity, legal challenges, and political concerns, the road from agreement to implementation is likely to be contested.