On May 15, 2026, sexist and misogynistic remarks from the speaker’s podium of the National Assembly in Kinshasa shook the Congolese political scene. A widely shared video shows national deputy Micheline Mpundu finishing her information motion and leaving the podium. The second vice-president, Christophe Mboso, who was presiding over the plenary session, publicly commented on her physical appearance: “Thank you colleague, she is very beautiful… eh.”
He continued in Lingala: “Look at her yourselves” and laughed, raising his hands to mimic the deputy’s body shape, adding “God created her” and “these are the things (the goods) of another,” prompting hearty laughter and applause from the hemicycle. The session proceeded as if nothing had happened.
Only after indignation from political figures, social activists, and human rights defenders, as well as internal pressure from his superiors, did Mboso apologize several days later—without facing any sanction.
This recent case of sexism and verbal violence raises once again a crucial question: When will African parliaments, especially the DRC’s, cease to be hostile spaces for the women they are meant to represent?
This incident is not an isolated lapse but a structural problem. From a comparative African perspective, it reveals the gap between what DRC authorities have pledged on paper and what elected women actually experience in the chamber.
A phenomenon not limited to the DRC
Parliamentary violence is part of the broader pattern of violence women face in politics, both in the DRC and elsewhere. Before the Mboso video surfaced in Kinshasa, other sexist episodes had been documented, highlighting a serious obstacle to women’s full participation in decision-making.
Women’s political participation surged in the early 1990s with democratization waves, tripling the number of women legislators between 1990 and 2010. It was widely believed that gaining elective office would transform institutional culture. That illusion quickly shattered. This presence was met with deep structural resistance, often from male colleagues across party lines. Some openly assert that politics is a male domain where women are unwelcome.
Data from global surveys show that over 65% of women parliamentarians report repeated verbal attacks and insults during their mandate. Most of this violence comes from male colleagues. Society often questions not their political record but their very right to be there, scrutinizing their appearance, marital status, and conformity to traditional roles rather than their contributions.
Sexism does not stop at parliament’s doors; it enters with the elected members and sometimes flaunts itself from the podium itself, as seen in the DRC. Regional studies confirm persistent inadequate progress on women’s effective political participation.
The applause in the video is telling. The problem is not Mboso alone but a system that produces and tolerates such behavior—a mechanism of control that keeps women subordinate even in democratic institutions. This control does not always require physical violence. Gestures, words, and laughter from the podium—a form of semiotic violence—remind elected women that in the eyes of some colleagues, they are bodies before legislators. Mboso’s mimicking of his colleague’s body illustrates this reality.
The coloniality of gender explains the naturalization of hierarchy between sexes as a colonial legacy, highlighting a contradiction: women parliamentarians are elected by the same voters under the same constitutional texts as their male counterparts, yet remain subject to patriarchal controls that reduce them to something other than legislators.
African cases
Many observers of the Mboso video recalled other African incidents. In Senegal, deputy Amy Ndiaye, who was pregnant, was slapped and kicked in the stomach in 2022 on the floor of parliament in front of cameras. In 2025, Nigerian senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduagha was suspended not for professional misconduct but for daring to name the sexual harassment she faced from the Senate president. It is no coincidence that Ndiaye, Akpoti-Uduagha, and Mpundu—three women from three different countries—experienced such violence. These facts show that while African parliaments tolerate women’s voices, their dignity is not yet fully respected.
Congolese cases
On April 30, 2020, Thambwe Mwamba, former president of the Congolese Senate, demeaned a woman during a plenary session broadcast on national television. He disclosed all their secret meetings, claiming senator Bijoux Ngoya had approached him to seek support for her candidacy for quaestor, subtly accusing her of making advances. The session ended in chaos amid outrage from several lawmakers.
On July 15, 2021, when deputy Christelle Vuanga dismantled a colleague’s arguments during a constitutional debate, Nsingi Pululu interrupted her with just two words in Lingala: “You are a woman.” It was a way to diminish her capacity to speak on a sensitive issue simply because of her gender.
The Mboso affair comes as no surprise. The DRC has ratified conventions, adopted laws, and signed commitments, yet nothing has changed in the hemicycle. The gap between text and practice is well documented. What is new is the pretense that it does not exist.
A reflection that continues
French feminist philosopher Simone de Beauvoir wrote in 1949 that women were defined as “the Others.” In 2026, this otherness persists in the Congolese parliament: elected women continue to be reduced to their bodies rather than their political speech. These incidents signal that the patriarchal system undermines democracy from within. As long as sexist behavior remains unpunished—as shown by the applause in the video and the lack of sanction against Mboso—the Congolese parliament will remain a misogynistic space, while it is meant to represent the women who sit there: 65 women out of 477 deputies, barely 13% of the chamber in a country where women make up nearly 51% of the population. Underrepresentation does not justify tolerating such behavior.
Other parliaments have found solutions through campaigns like #NotTheCost and #NotInMyParliament, proving that culture can be changed through concrete sanctions and victim protection. The DRC has good laws—the bill on violence against women examined by the Senate in October 2025 is one example—but a law without implementation remains a wish. Silence is no longer an option. Failing to sanction Mboso sends a clear signal to all Congolese women considering a political career.
