MR Laurent Kabila, the self proclaimed president of Zaire, which he has now been renamed as Congo, may enter Kinshasa today, a spokesman for his presidency said yesterday evening in the rebel stronghold of Lubumbashi.
In Harare, the South African President, Mr Nelson Mandela, announced that Mr Kabila would visit the Zaire Congo capital today and address the nation.
The victorious rebel alliance yesterday brushed aside international pressure for early elections, saying polls would be held only when reconstruction was under way and the population "re-educated".
A spokesman said that 32 years of Mr Mobutu Sese Seko's dictatorship had brainwashed the population into submission. "We must reawaken the population politically. It is our first duty," he said. "The aim is to avoid the possibility in the future that any one man can confiscate power."
The Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Congo Zaire, which described its victory as a "David and Goliath" struggle against the deposed regime, said political training would begin with collectives in the villages.
The alliance said it would fulfil its commitment to form a constituent assembly within two months to hammer out a new constitution. In the meantime, a new government is expected to be announced.
South Africa has recognised the new regime, as have Rwanda and Burundi, which backed the rebel force. Britain has yet to state its position, but the former Zaire's embassy in London has begun flying the new Congo's flag.
The name "Zaire" was torn down and painted over throughout Kinshasa. There were ritual burnings of the old flag.
In the chaos of post Mobutu Kinshasa, scores are being settled against those said to have been too loyal to the old regime, or too corrupt. In several areas civilians and former regular soldiers have been shot dead residents and aid workers said. At least 200 people were killed over the weekend.
The Reference Plus daily reported yesterday that women in one area had stoned the wives of soldiers. The paper also said two former soldiers from the Ngaba district were denounced by the local population and shot dead.
Near the city's central market a woman accused of working for Mr Mobutu was stripped and sexually assaulted by a crowd, until she was saved by a soldier from the alliance. Nearby a short while earlier, a man escaped with his life after another crowd ringed him with tyres, threatening to set him alight, before he also was saved.
The whereabouts of the deposed leader, who fled the country on Sunday, remained unclear. More than 100 members of his extended family were trapped in Brazzaville, across the river from Kinshasa, after the crew of Mr Mobutu's jet abruptly resigned. But other relatives of the former president remained in Kinshasa.
Civil servants lined up outside their ministries to serve the new regime, even though there are no ministers. Some were enthusiastic about the new order.
One group was truly liberated by the arrival of the rebels. Some 800 prisoners in Kinshasa jail escaped on Sunday as people in the surrounding neighbourhood broke into the prison to loot it.
Two Russian pilots, jailed after their plane crashed into a market killing 200 people, also made a getaway as Kinshasans flooded into the prison.