The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) on Tuesday repatriated three Americans accused of participating in a failed coup attempt against President Felix Tshisekedi in May 2024.
The three Americans were among 37 defendants sentenced to death for the coup plot by a military court in September 2024. Their sentences were commuted to life in prison last week.
The American citizens repatriated on Tuesday morning include Marcel Malanga, 21, son of slain DRC opposition leader and alleged coup mastermind Christian Malanga; Marcel’s friend and classmate Tyler Thompson Jr.; and Benjamin Reuben Zalman-Polun, 36, a former business associate of Christian Malanga.
Christian Malanga was a naturalized U.S. citizen who lived in Utah for over 20 years before hatching his coup plan, a grandiose scheme that involved recruiting commandos to simultaneously assassinate Tshisekedi, Economy Minister Vital Kamerhe, and other top officials in the DRC capital of Kinshasa.
Despite having lived in the United States for decades, Malanga created his own political movement to overthrow the “dictator” Tshisekedi and install himself as president of “New Zaire.” He had taken to billing himself as a “president-in-exile of New Zaire.”
The DRC was known as the Republic of Zaire from 1971 to 1997, becoming the Democratic Republic of the Congo following the overthrow of dictator Mobutu Sese Seko, two years before Malanga moved to the United States. Malanga’s followers were known for using the old flag of Zaire.
Malanga recruited muscle for his coup attempt under various false premises. He showed keen interest in recruiting his son Marcel’s fellow college athletes, offering some of them up to $100,000 for a “security job” in the Congo. Thompson’s family said Malanga invited him on a vacation to South Africa and Eswatini, only to press him into service as a coup commando.
“He is a good kid, a hard worker, and a respectful young man. We’re so lost as to how he ended up in this mess,” Thompson’s stepmother, Miranda Thompson, exclaimed when news of the coup attempt reached her.
Marcel Malanga testified during his trial that few of his father’s recruits spoke the languages used in the DRC, so it was not difficult for Christian Malanga to mislead them.
Malanga launched his attack in Kinshasa on the morning of Sunday, May 19, 2024. It did not go well. Some of his commandos got lost looking for their targets. Six of them were killed by DRC security forces, including Christian Malanga himself. The putschists did manage to film a video of themselves declaring the end of the Tshisekedi regime, right before the government shot and arrested them.
The Biden administration was notably disinterested in the fates of Marcel Malanga and the other Americans allegedly involved in the coup, doing little beyond acknowledging they had been tried and sentenced to death.
Their fortunes seemingly improved when the DRC began working on a deal to sign mineral rights away to the Trump administration, in exchange for military support against a violent and increasingly successful insurgency that enjoys support from neighboring Rwanda.
“This decision is part of a dynamic of strengthening judicial diplomacy and international cooperation in matters of justice and human rights between the two countries,” President Tshisekedi said when announcing the repatriation on Tuesday.
The Congo has an estimated $20 trillion in mineral wealth waiting to be tapped, notably including cobalt, which has important applications in military technology, mobile phones, and electric vehicles. Unfortunately, instability in the southern and eastern parts of the country makes those minerals very difficult to access, and China currently controls about 70 percent of the Congolese cobalt trade.
Miranda Thompson appeared pleasantly surprised by her stepson’s repatriation, telling the Associated Press (AP) on Tuesday that she didn’t know all of the details, but “we’re so excited to have him on American soil again.”
The Thompsons and other family members of the three Americans said they were treated poorly in a DRC military prison, where they developed health problems and struggled to pay for their own food.
There is currently no indication that the prison sentences of Thompson, Malanga, or Zalman-Polun will be reduced or nullified upon their arrival in the United States. The U.S. government usually honors the prison sentences handed down to repatriated convicts by foreign courts. Doing otherwise would make it much more difficult to arrange repatriation.
Human rights attorney Jared Genser told the AP the three Americans could plead for reduced sentences on the grounds they were under duress when they consented to the prisoner transfer, but “it would be very hard to prevail in such a case, as there would be enormous implications for other potential transfers in the future if the U.S. failed to abide by such agreements.”
The State Department on Tuesday confirmed the three Americans had been transferred to the United States, but referred questions about their ongoing legal status to the Department of Justice (DOJ).
“They’re in our custody,” said State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce.
“We also strongly condemn the armed attacks of May 19th and support the DRC authorities in holding those responsible appropriately accountable,” she said.
“At the same time, we seek consistent, compassionate, humane treatment and a fair legal process on behalf of those U.S. citizens,” she added.
Three of the other prisoners sentenced to death in the Malanga coup affair were foreign nationals, including a Belgian, a Briton, and a Canadian. Their current status has not been publicly disclosed as of Wednesday afternoon. A fourth suspect with dual nationality, Belgian-Congolese researcher Jean-Jacques Wondo, was repatriated to Belgium in February due to poor health.
