Diplomats who met him regularly were often impressed by his knowledge of world affairs and understanding of the region. A favorite rhetorical tool he liked to use was to defend his record by comparing the Congo with western countries. “You criticize democracy here, but our elections turnout was over 80 percent—in the U.S., barely half of the voters show up,” he told an American diplomat.20 When confronted with allegations of corruption, he countered with the Enron scandal in the United States and Silvio Berlusconi’s manipulation of laws to protect himself from prosecution.
