Pumping his fist in the air, Nobel Peace Prize winner Denis Mukwege has pledged justice, dignity and credibility in his campaign for DR Congo's presidency against a field of old political hands.

The energetic 68-year-old surgical gynaecologist, who won the Nobel for his work with rape victims, may be a political newcomer but he has long been a government critic.

In fiery tones on the stump, he has promised to end poverty, conflict and corruption in the central African country if he wins on December 20.

As an alternative to the venal political class in the Democratic Republic of Congo he has long denounced, analysts say his outsider status is both an asset and a handicap.

Mukwege's public image is clean but relatively obscure in the vast country, where he lacks both a large voter base and the financing needed to run an effective campaign.

"He gives me the impression of being more serious than all the others who parade here," said Alphonsine Zawadi at a recent rally in the northern city of Kisangani.

Pierrot Kono, who also came to hear Mukwege speak, said the candidate had never embezzled money and could "get us out of the vicious circle of war and poverty".

But Samson, a student, echoed a widespread view that Mukwege's candidacy was unrealistic.

"He has no experience of politics and it's too early to award him the presidency," he said.

Mukwege is best known for founding the Panzi hospital and foundation in conflict-torn eastern DRC, after witnessing the horrific injuries and diseases suffered by rape survivors.

In 2018, he was jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize alongside Yazidi activist Nadia Murad for efforts to end sexual violence as a weapon of war.

At the time, Mukwege was one of the leading critics of then-president Joseph Kabila, who ceded power to incumbent President Felix Tshisekedi after a 2018 election.

The doctor remained as critical of the new government as he was of the last.

After months of speculation, Mukwege announced he was running for president in early October.

"Our country's in a very bad way," he thundered at one of his rallies, blasting the "corrupt and predatory practices" that keep most Congolese poor.

Sexual violence

The son of a Pentecostal pastor, Mukwege was born in 1955 in the then-Belgian Congo and studied medicine in neighbouring Burundi.

After his studies, he returned home to work at Lemera hospital in eastern South Kivu province, where he encountered women suffering from genital lesions.

Mukwege subsequently left to specialise in gynaecology and obstetrics in France.

But he returned to Lemera in 1989 to run the gynaecology department and stayed as the First Congo War broke out in 1996 which would devastate the hospital.

In 1999, Mukwege set up the Panzi hospital in South Kivu's capital, Bukavu.

Initially designed as a maternity facility, it became a rape clinic as the surrounding region descended into the Second Congo War, which was marked by severe sexual violence.

Mukwege has recounted how the hospital's first patient was a rape victim who had been shot in her genitals.

'The man who mends women'

He earned the epithet "the man who mends women" from the title of an acclaimed 2015 film about his work.

He says the war on women's bodies is still raging in the DRC, where brutal militias continue to plague the east, a legacy of the regional wars.

Mukwege's tireless advocacy has landed him in trouble on several occasions.

In 2012, he escaped an assassination attempt. He currently lives under protection of UN peacekeepers at his Panzi foundation when he isn't giving lectures abroad.

He has also found himself at the centre of tensions between the DRC and Rwanda.

In 2021, Rwandan President Paul Kagame denied that his country's troops committed crimes during their involvement in the regional wars of the 1990s -- and implied that Mukwege was part of an anti-Rwanda conspiracy.

President Felix Tshisekedi hit back, saying Mukwege was a "figure of national pride" and the Nobel laureate had "all of our support".