Hey Carl,
I'm thinking much like MA herein

Most of the French articles use words like "temporarily occupied" and "disruptive" as if it was a power outage in Kinshasa (of which there were many).

Bemba was and perhaps still is a big deal in Equateur. He certainly was when I lived next-door to him (loved his .50 cal machine gun nest at the front gate ).

Not too sure about the witchdoctor twist. The Zairois were always a bit superstitious, but they mostly stoned and killed them (similar to killing someone in a car accident and taking revenge on the living driver/passengers).