Why does DR Congo sometimes appear as Congo, Congo DR, Zaire or DRC?

The name DR Congo is appearing at the FIFA World Cup for the first time in 2026, although the country has competed in the tournament before under one of its previous names: Zaire.

The African nation qualified for the 1974 World Cup in West Germany, where it lost all three group-stage games by an aggregate score of 14-0. That included a 9-0 thrashing at the hands of Yugoslavia, tied for the biggest margin of defeat in the competition’s history.

Although drawn into a tough group alongside Portugal, Colombia, and Uzbekistan, expect DR Congo to fare considerably better than Zaire did 52 years ago.

From Belgian Congo to DR Congo

The country, officially called the Democratic Republic of the Congo, has gone through a complex series of name changes throughout its history, which has in turn affected its national soccer team.

It played its first unofficial international game in 1948, when the Democratic Republic of the Congo was a Belgian colony known as the Belgian Congo.

After the country gained independence from Belgium in June 1960, it adopted the name the Republic of the Congo, which proved to be short-lived. Two months later, Middle Congo, a neighboring French colony, also became independent and adopted the same name: the Republic of the Congo.

To differentiate between the two, the former Belgian colony added “Democratic” to its name in 1964, becoming the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the name it uses today.

But the story doesn’t end there. After Mobutu Sese Seko became the country’s second president in 1965, he renamed the country Zaire and imposed a dictatorship which ran from 1971 until 1997.

Following the end of his rule, which came in the middle of qualifying for the 1998 World Cup, the country reverted to the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Why the DR Congo national team was once called Zaire

The national soccer team became a FIFA member in 1962 and joined CAF, the Confederation of African Football, in 1963. In its early years, it competed in the Africa Cup of Nations once as Congo-Léopoldville and twice as Congo-Kinshasa, winning the tournament against the odds in 1968.

Kinshasa, DR Congo’s current capital, was founded in 1881 as a trading post and named after King Leopold II of Belgium.

The team repeated its Africa Cup of Nations success in 1974, the same year it gained worldwide recognition by qualifying for the World Cup for the first time before the current tournament.

Although the Democratic Republic of the Congo is commonly abbreviated as DR Congo or DRC, FIFA officially refers to the team as Congo DR, while CAF lists it as DR Congo.

Informally, the country is sometimes referred to simply as Congo or the Congo, which often leads to confusion with the neighboring Republic of the Congo. Older generations may also still use the name Zaire, presumably out of habit.

Either way, the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s national soccer team will be out to make a name for itself when it takes on household names such as Cristiano Ronaldo and James Rodríguez at the 2026 World Cup.

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