Country without roads

The United Nations has created the largest air fleet in Africa to move its troops and equipment around the Democratic Republic of Congo. With elections coming up on 30 July, it has another mammoth task moving hundreds of tonnes of voting material and thousands of personnel. The fleet is not large enough to assist the millions of Congolese in need. Listen to IRIN's audio piece on the DRC's transport system A print version is reproduced below: Nature provided transport from one end of the country to the other: The mighty Congo River, which curls 4,374 km from near Zambia heading north and then west to the Atlantic Ocean. But at

Not an efficient port, says Constantinos Phillis, head of TFCE, a private barge company on the Congo River

the port of Kinshasa, Constantinos Phillis, a Belgian-Greek who heads TFCE, a transport company with 30 barges and tug boats, says his barges get stuck on sand banks as the river hasn't been dredged in decades. Another problem is the government checkpoints. The 1,000km trip between Kinshasa and Kisangani in the northeast should take 15 days, he says, but with at least 20 checkpoints on the way, it takes almost twice that. "Time is money," Phillis says. That and the dangers of the Congo River make it a bad choice if you have to move urgently needed food to people displaced by conflict or move UN peacekeepers and equipment to help quell the violence. So what about roads? Michel Bonardeux, a spokesman for the UN peacekeeping mission in DRC, MONUC, says: "There was a network of roads left by the Belgians. However, no maintenance was done on them so they've basically fallen into disrepair and it can take days,

Moving voter material: UN air operations at Kinshasa airport

if not weeks, to reach an area by road." And the railroads built by the former colonial power have also not been properly maintained, "so it can also take up to two weeks to get from Lubumbashi [the southeastern-most city] to Kananga [in the centre]". "MONUC has therefore had to set up a huge fleet of airplanes and helicopters, especially heavy-lift helicopters, the MI-26 type that can lift up to 20 tons. There aren't airports or landing strips all over the country. We have to move tanks. We have to move armoured personnel carriers. We have to move food, water in many cases, generators - things that are extremely heavy, including building materials for military bases," says Bonardeux. On the tarmac at Kinshasa airport, dozens of ageing propeller planes, painted in bright yellows, blues and purples, are jammed together. But walk a few minutes down the tarmac and there's another, very different airport. Huge cargo planes and helicopters, helicopter gun ships and executive jets, all painted pristine white with just two black letters on them: UN.

Risky flying: Cargo and passengers at Mbuji Mayi airport

Major William Longwe, the MONUC flight coordinator, is in charge of planning and following MONUC flights in the Kinshasa air region. With more than 100 planes, MONUC has the largest UN fleet in the world and the largest fleet of any kind in Africa, larger than South African Airlines. Of MONUC's annual $1.1 billion budget, almost half goes on aircraft and fuel. The planes not only carry troops and equipment but now with the elections they are moving thousands of election personnel and hundreds of tonnes of material. The largest fleet in Africa is not large enough to also feed the more than two million people displaced by fighting in the Congo or assist with the many humanitarian crises. Often aid workers have trouble getting a seat on UN flights. So they rely on pilots such as Dave Jackobsen, who is heading for the remote village of Bolga in the troubled Ituri district in northeastern Congo. He says his primary mission is to preach the word of God: "I like to look at us as missionary pilots."

No roads: Ituri District 100 km north of the capital Bunia

But today he's delivering medical supplies. The big humanitarian organisations, such as the UN World Food Programme, which recently airdropped food in north Katanga, often own or charter their own planes. But some of the UN agencies and most of the NGOs depend on whatever aviation companies they can find, and one of them is Mission Aviation Fellowship, a non-profit company, although for humanitarian organisations the service is not free. Says Jackobsen: "We generally charge the humanitarian community slightly more than the mission/church. Whenever a church person asks to go from point A to point B, I'll give him a seat rate and something that could cost $300 or $400 I will charge him $50. But to us it's important that that guy can go out and share the gospel because that's what we're all about." Airfares for saving souls may be cheaper than airfares for saving bodies but they're all too low for the private airlines trying to compete with non-profit organisations, says Simon Evens, a Canadian pilot working for a little Belgian company operating in eastern Congo called TMK. "It makes it difficult for other companies to come in. Nobody else is going to start anything up," he says.

Local transport: A canoe on the Congo River near Kisangani

Airlines take enormous risks flying in the Congo, says Evens. There are accidents sometimes twice a week even with planes that are well maintained. "There's no air traffic control. There's no standard operating; and when the weather's bad, good, recognised companies have crashed into mountains around here." The dangers of flying in the Congo only add to the costs, making it one of the most expensive places in the world for delivering humanitarian assistance, says Bonardeux. "As a donor you would have to question the wisdom of flying things around a thousand even two thousand kilometres. Why a bag of flour that essentially cost $8 will end up costing $25 once it's delivered. So NGOs and UN agencies have a lot of trouble convincing donors to give enough money for transport," says Bonardeux. If, after the elections, the next government is seen as legitimate and armed groups do not resume fighting, infrastructure investment can begin for roads and train tracks and dredging the mighty Congo. Of course it'll take years. Until then, donors should expect to pay a high price for assisting the millions of Congolese in need. dh/mw/js