SOMETHING ABOUT RWANDA GENOCIDE

By Denis Mpagaze, February 21, 2007, Issue No3, St Augustine University of Tanzania
“About forty-eighty methods of torture were used country wide. They ranged from burying people alive in graves they had dug up themselves, to cutting and opening wombs of pregnant mother. People were quartered, impale or roasted to death.

On many occasions, death was the consequence of ablation of organs, such as the heart, from alive people. In some cases, victims had to pay fabulous amounts of money to the killers for a quick death” writes Mohmood Mamdani in his book, “When Victims Become Killers: Colonialism, Navitism, and the Genocide in Rwanda” (p.6)

Sorrow seized my heart when I was reading this book, to the extent of meeting me in some sort of conversation in my mind as, “if major Paul Kagame, the current president of Rwanda was a real initiator of the 1994 Rwanda Genocide by downing the Habyarimana’s plane, he deserved and deserves a severe punishment”.

When the French judge Jean-Louis Bruguiere accused Kagame of ordering the shooting down of the Habyrimana’s plane on 6th June2004 was supposed to be tried to International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), I thought the lawyer had a wrong choice. According BBC to report 24th November 2006, the judge claims to have proof indicating Rwanda's President Paul Kagame ordered his rebels to shoot down the plane carrying President Juvenal Habyarimana in April 1994.

According to the proof of Paul Mugabe, the ex- member of the RPF High Command Unit, Major General Paul Kagame had personally ordered the shooting down of President Habyarimana's plane with a view to taking control of the country. He was fully aware that the killing of Habyarimana would let loose "a genocide" against Tutsi civilians. RPA forces had been fully deployed in Kigali at the time the ethnic massacres took place and did not act to prevent it from happening.( Global Research, November 23, 2006)

Also the USA lawyer, Paul Erlinder seconded the claim of French judge that there is evidence which supports that Kagame was involved in downing the plane as, he ordered his troops to shoot down the plane when it was coming to land at Kigali Air Port, when he was the leader of National Resistance Army (NRA).Juvenally Habyarimana was killed together with Cyprian Ntaryamira, the then Hutu president of Burundi. The incident was the final spark to a powder keg of ethnic tension dating back to colonial times between the dominated Tutsi minority and the majority Hutus.

Some thing bad Kagame did was to send Claude Dusaidi and Charles Muligande to New York and Washington to stop the UN military intervention which was supposed to be sent and protect the Rwandan people from the genocide. In this regard why shouldn’t Kagame bare a punishment?

This accusation up on Kagame made by foreigners from France and USA , I thought it was a trick of the white to disunity Africans again like how they did during colonial era. Mapunda in his Book “Historia ya Mapambano ya Matanzania,”writes that white people have being using their philosophy of “Watenganishe uweze kuwatawala” Divide them to more easily colonizing them.( pg91).
And there are some Africans who are strongly opposing the report about Kagame accusations, as they claim Kagame to have not involved alone, however with his troops .I am strongly against with these people as, Kingsley Moghalu, a former special counsel of the Tribunal, reached a horrible conclusion in his recent book, "Rwanda's Genocide: the Politics of Global Justice". He claims that if Mr Kagame and the Tutsi rebels he led in April 1994 shot down the President's plane, then they triggered the genocide. Therefore, guilt for the genocide would need to be divided between the Tutsis and Hutus of Rwanda.
What I can say with regard to the conclusion of Moghalu is that, he should have thought whether it was possible for all rebels to have the same inspiration at a time of downing the plane. There might be initiator, and the initiator is the one to start with in providing reword or punishment. Since the initiator was their leader-Kagame, let the court start with him, and then others will fall as, goes an adage, “The best way to eat an elephant in your path is cut him up into little pieces”.
After downing the plane, there followed the coup d’etait where Kagame came on power as a president. From there pogrom if not genocide took position. Since I was touched by these killings I decided to probe and trace the profile of Kagame to prove whether he was real the initiator of the Rwanda suicide.
I came to realize that the being of Kagame was destroyed during 1954-64 Hutu revolution as result he ended with wrong choice. When human intelligent is interrupted, a person is likely to fail to reason, understand and making choice which, will result in objective happiness. After this Hutu revolution, Kagame fled with his parents to Uganda where more Tutsi had run too.

According to American researcher Vehakn N .Dadrian in his research of 20th Century, Germany Colonizers introduced different racial attributes by showing the Tutsi as the overlords, endowed with physically superior traits, and portraying the Hutu as mere peasants.

The situation became worse when the Belgians arrived in early 20th Century introduced an ethnic identity card to more easily distinguish the two. This led to 1959 Hutu Revolution where 1962-64 came the final Institutionalization of the Hutu-Tutsi conflict. The existing arrangement of power relations reversed-the Tutsi minority ceased being the dominant group and the Hutu majority rose to power.
Thereafter Kagame fled to Uganda and after years he joined the Yoweri Kaguta Museven troops of National Resistance Army (NRA) and 1979 joined the forest battle.

After serving to NRA for a while Kagame and his friend Fred Rwigema established the Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF) supported by the US and Britain. Tutsi refugees in Uganda supported the RPF for the aim was to overthrow Habyarimana and secure their right to return to their home land. In 1990, the RPF invaded Rwanda for the first time. At that time Kagame was in United State of America (USA) for army training. After the death of Fred in the second day of invasion, Kagame became the Army Commander of RPF.

The conflict Hutu-Tutsi led to most of Rwandans to fled from their home to Uganda, Tanzania, Congo,others have gone to abroad and other lost their life. Other lost their lovers.As Immaculee Ilibagiza a victim of 1994 genocide has written a book “Left to Tell” says that her mother, father and two of three brothers were killed in the genocide, as were some 800,000 others.The killings were done by Interahamwe militia.

This violence has gone beyond borders as it is threatening the life of Congoles.As there is a troop in Bukavu that has killed over 160 civilians.For example 2004 they killed and raped dozens of people.In one incident they raped a mother in from of her husband and children wile another soldier raped her three year-old daughter.

No one can say with certainty how many Tutsi were killed between March and Jully 1994 in Rwanda.A section of the army and civilian leadership organized the Hutu majority to kill all Tutsi, even babies. In the process, they killed not only the Hutu political opposition, but also many non political Hutu who should reluctance to perform what was\as touted as a “national” duty ten to 50 thousand were Hutu killed,500,000 and million Tutsi. Tutsi were killing in groups recalling Germany’s Jewish population.

Tutsi women married to Hutu were killed. The administration forced Hutu men killed their Tutsi wives before they go to kill any one else-to prove they were true refuse. He was told he must choose between the wife and himself. He then chose to save his own life.
It is not wise to jump into a situation before thinking about it. Was Kagame a wise or a fool?