DR Congo is making plans to install Felix Tshisekedi as its new president this week after a long and bitter election whose outcome was disputed by the runner-up and shunned by many western nations.

The ceremony, which is likely to happen on Thursday, will see the 55-year-old sworn in as president, replacing Joseph Kabila who has ruled DR Congo since 2001.

The inauguration looks set to draw a line under three weeks of growing tension over the long and drawn-out counting process after the December 30 vote, which provisionally declared Tshisekedi, one of two opposition candidates, the winner.

But the outcome was swiftly denounced by his opposition rival Martin Fayulu, who filed an appeal. He claimed he had been cheated of an outright victory by an "electoral coup" masterminded by Kabila with Tshisekedi's approval.

Although leaked figures from the provisional count appear to be heavily in his favour, the Constitutional Court dismissed his appeal.

At stake is political stewardship of the mineral-rich but notoriously unstable central African nation.

Democratic Republic of Congo has a population of some 80 million and covers an area the size of western Europe.