Congolese Australians are a people who were either born in the Democratic Republic of the Congo or the Republic of the Congo, or are of Congolese heritage, who have since settled in Australia. The Congolese Australian population has seen a marked increase since the end of the 20th century, growing from 21 individuals in 1996, to 5,522 by the 2016 Census. The influx of Congolese immigrants in the 1990s were initially the result of the First Congo War, a civil war in the country of Zaire (present-day Democratic Republic of the Congo), as well as the effects of the Rwandan genocide on the eastern border of the country, which created rebel militia groups, completely destabilizing state authority at the time. According to the 2016 Census, approximately 80% (3,228) of all Congolese-born Australians arrived in Australia between 2006 and 2016, this sudden increase in Congolese immigration was the result of a conflict between the Democratic Republic of the Congo's conflict against the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda, an ongoing conflict beginning in 2004. The Congolese Australian population have settled evenly across the country's states and territories, with the largest populations being located in Queensland, Western Australia, and Victoria. Like most African Australians, it is not uncommon for Congolese Australians to experience racism, and research on their experience has been ongoing following their arrival in the early 2000s.
History
The Congo attained independence from Belgium in 1960, however the Belgian preparation of the Congo for this was hasty, and therefore there was not sufficient infrastructure for a new Congolese government to effectively function, and as a result, the 1960s and 1970s saw a couple of internal conflicts.
These internal tensions, resulting from resistance to the rule of the current President Mobutu Sese Seko, existing tensions between existing ethnic groups, and the Rwandan genocide forcing 1.5 million Hutu and Tutsi people to seek refuge in the Congo in 1994 were the causes of the First Congo War, lasting from October 1996 – May 1997, and caused hundreds of thousands of deaths, both of combatants and civilian groups. The government installed after the war by the AFDL (consisting of Rwanda, Uganda, Burundi, Angola, SPLA, and Eritrean aggressors) faced the same issues as Mobutu's administration, and therefore caused the outbreak of the Second Congo War. The 1990s and 2000s saw continuing conflicts, and thereby caused the exodus of 300,000 Congolese people into neighboring countries. Most Congolese people who have arrived in Australia since 2004, have immigrated through the Australian Government's Humanitarian Program. The 2016 Census records that Congolese immigration to Australia prior to 2001 was very small, however, 38.9% (1,596 people) of the Congolese-born Australian population arrived between 2006 and 2010, and an even greater proportion, equaling 39.8% (1,632) arrived between 2011 and 2016, showing a clear increasing trend in the immigration of Congolese nationals to Australia
Population Distribution
Australia's Congolese population has distributed across all the states of Australia since their arrival, the largest concentration of Congolese Australians are located in Queensland, with 1,183 people as of 2016. Victoria, Western Australia and South Australia also have large populations, all over 600 Congolese born people, smaller states and territories; the Northern Territory, Tasmania and the ACT, have a small population. Further, despite being one of the more populous states, New South Wales has a comparatively small Congolese population, with only 550 individuals stating they were born in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Language
In terms of languages, the Congolese Australian community is for the most part, heterogenous; English, French, Lingala, Nyanga and Swahili are the most commonly spoken languages by people who have arrived from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, there is also a wide variation of dialects in their Swahili, leading to difficulty in interpreting and translating; Congolese Swahili, by comparison to Standard Swahili, uses more words with an etymology similar to Bantu, than Arabic. Other official languages of the Democratic Republic of the Congo that may be spoken by Congolese Australians are Kongo and Tshiluba.