DRC: One year after the Goma Massacre, relatives of victims call for “true justice”

Aline is still haunted by what she saw on August 30, 2023.

On tha fateful day, Faida witnessed the killing of more than 50 people by military personnel in a church in Goma, eastern DRC.

Most of the victims were members of a mystic religious group, the Natural Judaic and Messianic Faith Towards the Nations or Wazalendo as they are known locally.

They were preparing a protest to demand the departure of foreign NGOs and the UN force in the country (MONUSCO) from the North Kivu province.

"The military men came, they were dressed up, slender and armed. Then they opened fire, killing people and then set the church ablaze. It is only thanks to God that I am alive today," Aline recounts.

"So many of us have suffered, it's only thanks to God that some fled and made it out alive. But others got arrested."

Those who were arrested are still detained at the central prison of Goma.

On the first commemoration of the tragic event, relatives of the victims and congregants attended a ceremony.

Pain and anger were palpable inside their new temple. About a hundred people were gathered on Friday (Aug. 30).

"When someone mourns his brother who was cowardly killed by the very ones who were supposed to protect him, of course he will have a sad face. That is why people you saw didn't have joyful faces. This is sadness, our wounds are still open," a man who attended the ceremony says.

Civil society groups maintain about a hundred people were killed, higher than the official death toll. A trial followed the bloodshed and the main suspect colonel Mike Mikombe, a Republican Guard commander at the time, was handed death penalty.

But a year on, faithful and rights groups still call for what they term as "true justice."