# Félix Tshisekedi President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo since 2019, and the author of the minerals-for-security offer that reorganised US policy toward central Africa. In February and March 2025, with [[M23]] taking Goma and Bukavu and the Congolese army collapsing, Tshisekedi publicly offered American companies preferential access to Congolese minerals in exchange for security backing. Lobbying contracts followed within weeks — Ballard Partners, Earhart Turner, Von Batten-Montague-York on the Congolese side, Yorktown Solutions on Rwanda's. See [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]. The offer produced two instruments on **4 December 2025**: the [[Washington Accords for Peace and Prosperity]] with [[Paul Kagame]], and the [[US-DRC Strategic Partnership Agreement]] with the United States. The second is the substantive one, and its terms are unusually far-reaching — a Strategic Asset Reserve of mining sites held for US companies, a right of first offer ahead of Congolese investors, and a commitment to amend Congolese mining law, tax policy and potentially the constitution within twelve months. **It was never presented to the Congolese parliament.** In January 2026 Congolese lawyers and human-rights defenders filed a challenge in the DRC Constitutional Court arguing it violates Articles 214, 9, 217 and 12 of the constitution. As of August 2026 no ruling has been reported. The turn that most concerns analysts came next. Carnegie's Christian-Géraud Neema reported in July 2026 that **Tshisekedi is citing the agreement's constitutional-reform language as justification for an amendment enabling a third term** — with the result, in Neema's phrasing, that "Tshisekedi is implicating Washington in his pursuit of a third term." The Council on Foreign Relations frames the same dynamic as "minerals for regime security." **It has since advanced.** Parliament adopted a referendum-organisation law in mid-June 2026 allowing a constituent assembly to propose constitutional revision on a finding of "major institutional dysfunction." On **17 July 2026** the Constitutional Court declined competence over a pre-adoption challenge; on **28 July 2026** it declared the law **admissible and constitutional**, with reservations on provisions touching presidential powers. Tshisekedi has not yet promulgated it and no referendum is scheduled. A *ville morte* shutdown protest took place on 3 June 2026, and the opposition coalition called a further mobilisation for **15 August 2026**. His second term ends in 2028. Meanwhile the war he made the offer to end has not ended. M23 still holds Goma and Bukavu; the FDLR sequencing deadlock is unbroken; and on 5 February 2026 his government formally offered the [[Rubaya Coltan Mine]] to the United States while rebels were sitting on it. ## See also [[Conflict Minerals Watchlist]] · [[US-DRC Strategic Partnership Agreement]] · [[Washington Accords for Peace and Prosperity]] · [[M23 Offensive of 2025]] · [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]] · [[Conflict Minerals Hub]]