The rationale for central government to devolve resources for service provision has been debated in decentralization literature. Decentralization enhances democracy, encourages participation in local development initiatives and promotes local political accountability. This discourse has been complemented by the implementation of fiscal decentralization to increase the ability of sub-national government in financing municipal service delivery. Fiscal decentralization has often been adopted by African states since the onset of the New Public Management era in an effort to improve the standard of governance. The concern is that African states have taken minimal steps to adopt fiscal devolution that promotes revenue assignment which in turn limits sub-national governments’ ability to generate own source revenues. This article examines the revenue assignment function of fiscal decentralization in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in the light of decentralization concerns that have been raised by civil society, as the country charts its course to democracy. The article is a desktop study that will consider documents and policies in the DRC on the national, provincial and local level as far as state revenue sources are concerned. Revenue assignment should enable DRC’s provinces and local authorities to generate significant revenue independently. However, post-conflict reconstruction and development efforts in the Great Lakes region and in the DRC have largely isolated decentralization which would otherwise entrench local fiscal autonomy in financing for local services and development. The article concludes that revenue generation for local authorities and the provinces in the DRC is still very centralised by the national government. The article proposes policy recommendations that will be useful for the country to ensure that decentralization efforts include fiscal devolution to enhance the financing for local development initiatives.