they are 70, 80, 90 and even 100 years old… and still not retired

Some have been waiting for more than thirty years. Teachers or administrative agents, they are civil servants in the Democratic Republic of Congo and still work, desperately waiting for a nest egg, a pension and recognition that does not come. “I would like the State to send me away with honor!”, says Bayard Kumwimba Dyuba, 84, a primary school teacher in Lubumbashi, in the southeast of the country. The mind is sharp, but the back hunched and “difficult hearing”excuses the jovial little man, yellow shirt and blue cap, asking that the question be repeated.

“I started teaching in 1968, September 9. It’s the job I chose…I don’t want to give it up. But I’m at the end of my tether.”

Bayard Kumwimba Dyuba, 84, teacher

at AFP

Why doesn’t he retire then? “I want to go !, he throws. But not like that, without anything! I want to be given what I deserve.” A sum for his “final countdown”, something like 30,000 dollars (27,316 euros), he hopes, followed by a pension paid regularly. But for years, many state officials have been forgotten, despite a 2016 law stipulating that those who have reached the age of 65 or have accumulated 35 years of career are eligible for retirement.

“We are abandoned, almost abandoned”, notes the old professor who says he earns a monthly salary of 370,000 Congolese francs (166 euros). In a primary school close to hers, the director is 78 years old. Françoise Yumba Mitwele entered teaching in 1962. “It was my vocation, I love to teach”, she smiled, straight and dapper as a whole in a colorful loincloth. Like Bayard, she is “tired” but keep on working, because she’s waiting “a sum to leave”, which she estimates at 25,000 dollars (22,700 euros), enough to buy a house for her children, for example.

Last September, the Minister of Public Service, Jean-Pierre Lihau, had estimated at 350,000 the number of agents eligible for retirement. “14,000 are over 90 years old, 256 are centenarians. The oldest is 110 years old”, he detailed, stating that he wanted to work towards a “gradual departure of the concerned to a retirement which is worthy compared to the past”.

“It’s already heard, every minister says the same thing and then nothing happens!”, criticizes Hubert Tshiswaka, director of the Human Rights Research Institute, which defends in Lubumbashi the files of former employees of public companies eligible for retirement.

“The pensions do not arrive and the old dads and old moms die in misery.”

Hubert Tshiswaka, Director of the Human Rights Research Institute

at AFP

Francoise Yumba Mitwele is also skeptical, because nothing has changed since the minister’s statements.

“I would like to leave with my head held high. We don’t even have a medal, which we could leave to our grandchildren…”

Françoise Yumba Mitwele, 78, primary school principal

at AFP

At the other end of the country, in the capital Kinshasa, “Petit Pierre” climbs, clinging to the banister, the bad staircase which leads to his office, on the 1st floor of a blue house in the Singa Mopepe district of which he is the chief, in Lingwala commune. At 80, Yantula Bobina Pierre Elengesa, his real name, is also happy to work “for a great service of the State”. As head of the district, he receives the inhabitants, settles their neighborhood or housing problems, takes censuses…

In 1960, he was a percussionist in the orchestra of Joseph Kabasele, alias Grand Kallé, author of the cult title Independence Cha Cha. He quit music after a serious car accident in 1963 when his leg was amputated. “I have a prosthesis, I’m used to…” Every day, except Sunday, he wakes up at 3 a.m. to avoid traffic jams and come to his office.

“You see that at my age, it’s time to rest… But retirement isn’t coming. We’re here, we’re waiting.”

Yantula Bobina Pierre Elengesa, 80 years old, neighborhood chief

at AFP

The Ministry of the Public Service did not specify what measures were taken to allow the departure of its old agents and did not respond to requests from AFP.