Joseph Kabila Kabange (/kæˈbiːlə/ kab-EE-lə, French: [ʒozɛf kabila]; born 4 June 1971) is a Congolese politician and former military officer who served as the fourth President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo from 2001 to 2019. He took office ten days after the assassination of his father, President Laurent-Désiré Kabila in the context of the Second Congo War. He founded the People's Party for Reconstruction and Democracy (PPRD) in 2002 and was allowed to remain in power after the 2003 Pretoria Accord ended the war as the president of the country's new transitional government. He was elected as president in 2006 and re-elected in 2011 for a second term. Since stepping down after the 2018 election, Kabila, as a former president, serves as a senator for life. Kabila was the country's second-longest serving president.

Kabila is credited with ending the Second Congo War and restoring relative stability to most of the country, though conflict continued in eastern DR Congo against rebel forces supported by neighboring Rwanda and Uganda. He encouraged foreign investment in the mining industry and improved the infrastructure. The size of the country's economy increased by five times during his presidency. But economic growth slowed down in the later years, and it had been very unequal. The majority of DR Congo's population still lived below the international poverty line by the time he left office. He helped organize electoral institutions and in 2006 presided over the DRC's first multi-party election in decades, though both that and his victory in 2011 faced accusations of electoral fraud and saw protests. He led an authoritarian government that was known for embezzlement, corruption, and human rights violations, including security forces killing protestors. The United States has sanctioned associates of Kabila for corruption and undermining democracy.

Kabila's term was due to expire on 20 December 2016, according to the terms of the constitution adopted in 2006. Officials suggested that elections would be held in November 2016, but on 29 September 2016, the nation's electoral authority announced that the election would not be held until early 2018. Talk focused on the need for a census before holding elections. Kabila's popularity declined and he also faced growing pressure from the international community to give up power. An agreement was reached with the influential Catholic Church hierarchy to appoint a new government and prepare to hold elections. In August 2018, Kabila announced that he would step down and not seek a third term in the December 2018 general election. Kabila was succeeded by Félix Tshisekedi in the country's first peaceful transition of power since independence. Independent observers concluded that Tshisikedi lost heavily to another candidate, Martin Fayulu, and that Kabila had fixed the official result for the candidate most likely to be most helpful to him in the latter's post-presidency period.

Joseph Kabila Kabange and his twin sister Jaynet Kabila were born on 4 June 1971. The twins were born in Hewa Bora II, a village in the Maquis of Fizi, in the present-day South Kivu Province, in eastern DRC. Rumors have abounded that Kabila was actually born in Tanzania, which would make him a citizen of that country. He is the son of long time rebel, former AFDL leader and president of the DRC Laurent-Désiré Kabila and Sifa Mahanya.

Kabila's childhood coincided with the low point of his father's political and military career. He was raised in relative remoteness, with few records of his early days. Kabila attended a primary school organized by his father's rebel forces, before moving to Tanzania where he completed primary and secondary school. Due to his father's status as an enemy of Zairean strongman Mobutu Sese Seko, Kabila posed as a Tanzanian in his school years to avoid detection by Zairean intelligence agents.

Following high school, Kabila followed a military curriculum in Tanzania, then at Makerere University in Uganda. In October 1996, Laurent-Désiré Kabila launched the campaign in Zaire to oust the Mobutu regime with his newly formed army, the Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Congo-Zaire (AFDL). Joseph Kabila became the commander of an AFDL unit that included "kadogos" (child soldiers) and likely played a key role in major battles on the road to Kinshasa, but his exact whereabouts during the war have been difficult to establish. Joseph Kabila appears to have been present at the liberation of Kisangani where media reports identified him as commander of the rebel force that took the city after four days of intense fighting.

Following the AFDL's victory, and Laurent-Désiré Kabila's rise to the presidency, Joseph Kabila went on to get further training at the PLA National Defense University, in Beijing, China.

When he returned from China, Kabila was awarded the rank of major-general, and appointed Deputy Chief of Staff of the Congolese Armed Forces (FAC), in 1998. He was later, in 2000, appointed Chief of Staff of the Land Forces, a position he held until the elder President Kabila's assassination in January 2001. As chief of staff, he was one of the main military leaders in charge of government troops during the time of the Second Congo War (1998–2003).