Photo Gallery Congo Prepares for Historic Elections
Current President Joseph Kabila is seen as the favorite in the election on Sunday. Here, a fully loaded taxi passes by an election poster for Kabila, who came to power in 2003 when his father Laurent Kabila was assassinated by his body-guard.
While some militia groups have laid down arms in the eastern part of the country ahead of the vote, many more have not. Ongoing violence in the east of Congo results in some 1,000 civilian deaths a day, according to the UN.
Campaigning in Congo is made difficult by the fact that there are only some 500 kilometers of paved roads in a country the size of Western Europe. Here, supporters of the Social Movement for Renewal campaign in the shadow of Nyiragongo volcano in Goma.
A massive campaign rally for presidential candidate and former rebel leader Jean-Pierre Bemba was held in the capital Kinshasa on Thursday.
The rally got out of hand when Bemba's campaign headquarters burned to the ground. The cause of the fire is unknown, but subsequent violence resulted in the deaths of seven people.
Congolese security forces attempt to hold back the crowd during the campaign rally on Thursday...
...where presidential candidate Jean-Pierre Bemba spoke at a stadium in Kinshasa.
During the rally at the stadium, thick smoke billowed out of Bemba's headquarters. It was the final day of the campaign with voters heading to the polls on Sunday.
Election workers have much to do to transport some 1,200 tons of ballot material to 53,000 polling places country-wide.
