Whose Genocide?

Since I posted last, I have received several not-so-friendly reactions about how my understanding and explanation of Rwandan history is "flawed", "self-interested" or "a crime against the humanity of survivors". Such statements are made anonymously, which weakens their impact. I mean, at least identify yourself so we can have a proper dialogue and debate! I would love to be wrong about the worrying trends I see on the ground in Rwanda. If I am correct, then people will die and this is the last thing I want....

At the same time, I have received many words of thanks and encouragement. For, "those of us that were there know what we saw". Because this is not a "Hutu" or a "Tutsi" issue, but rather one of individuals trying to have their experiences of genocide recognised so that they too can talk about them openly and without fear of repercussion, I am providing this excerpt from my own research on what I think happened during the genocide. For those of you that wrote to say I am a denier, I am not. I do not buy into recent debates that the RPF organised the genocide. I could be considered a revisionist as my account does differ from the official and accepted version of what the RPF says happened.

"Between April and July 1994, genocide engulfed Rwanda. Across the hills and in the valleys, in churches and homes, on narrow footpaths and in banana groves, in stadiums and schools, killers slaughtered at least 500,000 people, mainly ethnic Tutsi (Des Forges, 1999: 15). The genocide was carefully planned by a small élite group of powerful ethnic Hutu extremists who refused to share power under the conditions of the Arusha Accord. Through an orchestrated strategy to liquidate Tutsi and any politically moderate Hutu perceived as opposed to the Habyarimana regime, the extremists had one goal in mind: to maintain their monopoly on state power.

Unknown assailants shot down he plane carrying the Rwandan president as it approached Kigali airport; soon after the killing started in the capital during the night of 6-7 April 1994. Militias – the Interahamwe and the Impuzamugambi – led the killing with the help of the Presidential Guard, the army, and local government officials (African Rights, 1994; Des Forges, 1999; Prunier, 1995). Outside Kigali, ordinary Hutu men committed acts of genocide, often under the direction of militia or government soldiers, under the threat of loss of their own life or that of their loved ones if unwilling to participate (Straus, 2006: 122-152). Genocidal violence occurred at different times in different regions of the country (André and Platteau, 1998; Des Forges, 1999: 303-591; Guichaoua, 2005, 258-290; Straus, 2006: 53-60). In some instances, local political and business élites colluded to enlist ordinary Rwandans to genocide (Longman, 1995; Wagner, 1998). Social ties and local power dynamics often compelled ordinary Hutu to kill; others resisted participation. Some stood by while a few rescued, instead of killing intended victims (Fujii, 2008; Straus, 2006: 65-94). Not all Hutu participated, and not all participated to the same degree. Some killed enthusiastically; others killed a few (Prunier, 1995: 242-250). Some Tutsi men joined in the killing as a means to save themselves and their families (fieldnotes, 2006).

The RPF also committed widespread reprisal killings – between 10,000 and 50,000 Hutu died – while countless others of all ethnicities died as the RPF gave greater priority to military victory than to protecting Tutsi civilians (Des Forges, 1999: 16). An estimated 10,000 ethnic Twa were killed during the genocide (IRIN, 6 June 2001). At least 250,000 women – mostly Tutsi but some Hutu – were raped (HRW, 2004: 7). Some men also admit to being raped (fieldnotes, 2006). Countless others, men and women, young and old, healthy and infirm, were tortured or maimed.

The 1994 genocide is much more than a series of facts and figures about who killed, who died and who survived. Irrespective of ethnic category, ordinary Rwandans were caught up in the maelstrom. There are countless stories of survival, of friends and family who took extraordinary risks to protect Tutsi (African Rights, 2003f, 2003h; Rusesabagina, 2006; Umutesi, 2004). There are stories of Tutsi who put their own lives on the line to protect Hutu family and friends from the coercion and intimidation tactics that the killing squads used to goad ordinary Hutu into killing (African Rights, 2003b, 2003c; fieldnotes, 2006). Notorious killers protected Tutsi they knew personally, ushering them safely through roadblocks, warning them of the whereabouts of marauding groups, and even hiding them at their homes. Some individuals killed during the day, only to shelter Tutsi friends and relatives at night (fieldnotes, 2006). Many Tutsi survived because of the aid and succour of a Hutu family member, friend, colleague, neighbour, or stranger (Jefremovas, 1995). There are stories about Twa and Hutu who were killed in the genocide because of their “typical Tutsi features” (fieldnotes, 2006).

Instrumentalising the Genocide
Despite the complexity of the genocide, the RPF-led government presents it as a clear-cut affair: Hutu killed Tutsi because of ethnic divisions that were introduced during the colonial period (1890-1962) and hardened to the point of individual action during the postcolonial period (1962-1994). Ethnicity is a fiction created by colonial divide-and-rule policies. Ultimate blame for the 1994 genocide therefore lies with Rwanda’s colonial powers, who instituted policies that made the Hutu population hate Tutsi. Divisive politics grounded in decades of bad governance resulted in deep-rooted ethnic hatred of all Tutsi by all Hutu, causing the 1994 genocide (NURC, 2004a; Office of the President, 1999a). This simplistic interpretation of events forms the backbone of the programme of national unity and reconciliation, which is grounded in the need “to eradicate the devastating consequences of the policies of [ethnic] discrimination and exclusion” so that “the scourge of genocide never again happens in Rwanda” (NURC, 2004a: 19-20).

Straus (2006) identifies different motivations for different forms of killing in interviews with génocidaires. He writes, “motivation and participation were clearly heterogeneous” with different forms of killing with different motivations occurring simultaneously (Straus, 2006: 95). The forms of killing were: 1) killing, torture, rape, and mutilation perpetrated against civilians – mainly Tutsi but also politically moderate Hutu – by militias, Forces armées rwandaises (FAR) soldiers and willing ordinary people; 2) killing, torture, rape, and mutilation perpetrated against Tutsi by ordinary Hutu, typically under duress from local leaders; 3) intended killing of soldiers and collateral killing of civilians (Tutsi, Hutu and Twa) in the course of the conflict between the RPF and the FAR; 4) killings carried out by the RPF against civilians (Tutsi, Hutu and Twa); and 5) murder motivated by theft and looting as well as the settling of scores between ordinary people (Straus, 2006: 113-118; 135-140; 163-169). Ordinary Rwandans understand that all of these different types of killings took place during the genocide and they use the phrases “les événements de 1994” (the events of 1994) and “en 1994” (in 1994) to describe “everything that happened in 1994, not just the genocide” (fieldnotes, 2006).

Straus’s findings on individual motivations to kill are particularly instructive as they reveal the intentional simplification of the government in grounding its approach to post-genocide justice in the presumed ethnic hatred of all Hutu for all Tutsi. His research shows that “preexisting ethnic animosity, widespread prejudice, deeply held ideological beliefs, blind obedience, deprivation, or even greed” did not motivate individual Hutu to kill individual Tutsi (Straus, 2006: 96). Instead, Straus finds that “Rwandans’ motivations [for killing] were considerably more ordinary and routine than the extraordinary crimes they helped commit” (Straus, 2006: 96. See also, Fujii, 2008; Hatzfeld, 2005b; Longman 1995; Wagner 1998). Among ordinary Hutu, participation was driven by intra-ethnic pressure from others, usually more socially powerful Hutu, security fears in the context of civil war and genocide as well as opportunity for looting and score settling. Straus concludes that these factors “were salient in a context of national state orders to attack Tutsis [sic], war, dense local institutions, and close-knit settlements” (Straus, 2006: 97). The available evidence simply does not support Rwandan government claims that ethnic enmity drove the participation of ordinary Rwandans in the 1994 genocide. Officially, this ethnic enmity is called “genocide ideology”; much of the work of the National Unity and Reconciliation Commission is concerned with identifying and eliminating the genocidal thoughts of ordinary Hutu to prepare them to engage in state-led reconciliation activities. In practice, as will be further analysed in the next chapter, accusing an individual of harbouring “genocide ideology” is a tool used against any individual or group that steps outside the accepted boundaries of government policy. Approaching post-genocide justice on the presumption of a criminal (adult male Hutu) population is a useful mechanism that the RPF strategically deploys to control political opponents, deflect criticism of its actions during the genocide and justify its continued military presence in Eastern Congo (Jordaan, 2007; Usborne and Penketh, 2008).

The programme of national unity and reconciliation legitimates the moral right of the RPF to rule post-genocide Rwanda. The programme is supported by a historical narrative about Rwanda’s past in an effort to shape the collective memory of the genocide, a narrative which eliminates the real social and economic inequality faced by most ordinary Rwandans under colonial and post-colonial rule. In particular, it reformulates the violence against Tutsi in 1959, 1962 and 1973 and during the 1994 genocide as strictly ethnic in origin, thereby ignoring important class and regional dimensions of those conflicts. Instead, the programme of national unity and reconciliation reframes certain aspects of the genocide, while completely misrepresenting other elements, notably in its premise that the violence was the result of “seething ethnic hatred” of Tutsi rather than fear or opportunity (interview with senior RPF official, 2006). For example, the narrative of national unity and reconciliation ignores the fact that the labels Hutu, Tutsi and Twa represented status differences in pre-colonial Rwanda and overlooks the ways in which these labels became politically significant during the colonial period. In addition, it overlooks the ways in which Tutsi élites participated in and benefited from colonial rule. The narrative of national unity and reconciliation also depicts the events of 1959 as a “practice genocide” when in fact it was a social revolution of Hutu against the Tutsi élites (Kinzer, 2008: 11).

The programme of national unity and reconciliation uses this re-interpretation of history as a tool to shape the collective memory of how the genocide happened and the role of the RPF in stopping it while limiting the boundaries of acceptable public speech on the causes and consequences of the 1994 genocide. Notably, it is taboo to discuss the atrocities committed by the RPF during the genocide or speak of the partial responsibility of the RPF in creating the necessary conditions of fear and insecurity that in part caused the 1994 genocide. Instead, the RPF portrays its invasion as a necessary but principled battle on behalf of all Rwandans against the excesses of the Habyarimana regime. Rather than engage in frank discussion on what happened during the genocide, the RPF opts instead for a discourse which purports to restore Rwanda to the “peaceful harmony of pre-colonial days” (NURC, 2004a: 21), through re-education camps (ingando) about “what it means to be a Rwandan and how we used to live before the seeds of division were thrown down by the Belgians” (Office of the President, 1999a: 76). This interpretation allows the RPF to paint Tutsi as innocent victims who passively waited for the ethnic enmity of Hutu to be enacted, which in turn allows it to capitalise on its ability to liberate Rwanda from an oppressive and genocidal political leadership. This interpretation of the genocide legitimates the repressive approach of the post-genocide government in three ways: First, it invokes the heroic status of the RPF in liberating Rwandans from “oppressive rulers” (NURC, 2004a: 9). Second, it provides the RPF with a virtual carte blanche with which it can reconstruct Rwanda and “reconcile” Rwandans according to its own “vision of how things should be done” (MINECOFIN, 2000: 12); and third, it allows the RPF to continue to elide the specificity of their role in the genocide, while evoking the genocide guilt card with international audiences.

Finally, the programme of national unity and reconciliation does not acknowledge the lived experiences of most Rwandans: Tutsi and Twa perpetrators, Hutu and Twa rescuers; Tutsi, Hutu and Twa resisters; as well as Hutu and Twa survivors. The words of a Hutu woman widowed during the genocide sum up the situation well:

'For me, the genocide is what happened after the killing stopped. I lost my husband and four of my children during the events. Now I suffer without hopes and dreams. My brother is in prison, and I have no one to take care of or to take care of me. I feel alone even when I am with other people. And then the government forces us to tell the truth about what we saw. I saw a lot of bodies but never did I see someone getting killed. I heard people dying but I did not see anything. How can I tell my truth when the government has told me what I have to say? I fear being sent to prison and I think now that my neighbours do not like that I live in [the same community as before the genocide]. Where can I go, what can I do? The government says Rwanda has been rebuilt but my life and home are still not repaired…. (interview with Scholastique, a 54-year-old umutindi Hutu woman, 2006)'.

In presenting a particular set of facts about the genocide, the RPF is wiping away the specificity of individual acts of genocide, the death after death after death that are the aggregated whole. Such an approach ignores how ordinary Rwandans were enticed or coerced to participate. Each act of violence – a killing, a rape, a threat, a looting – is different and took place within a specific set of circumstances as individuals made their choice to kill, hide, resist, or stand by. This is not to downplay the magnitude of the genocide, but is to point out that in assigning collective responsibility to all Hutu, many of whom did not commit acts of genocide, the programme of national unity and reconciliation does more than simply misinterpret the nature of the genocide. It is likely to recreate, given Rwanda’s history of ethnic conflict, the same conditions of ethnic inequality and political repression that it claims to undo.

Whither International Responsibility in Rwanda?

(This post is written by a colleague, and she asked me to post it here.)

Slightly under two years ago, an expert roundtable was convened by the International Peace Institute, the UN Office of the Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide, and InterAfrica Group to revitalise the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) and the Prevention of Genocide in Africa. R2P is an ambitious set of principles that aims to prevent genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and ethnic cleansing. It came about after the 1994 genocide in Rwanda once it was clear the international community failed so tremendously in adhering to the ideal of “never again” that UN Secretary General Kofi Annan asked: when do we become responsible?

It seems as if we still don’t know the answer.

This past April, as Rwanda commemorated 16 years since approximately 800,000 Tutsi and moderate Hutu were murdered in less than 100 days, the Special Adviser with a focus on R2P restated the world’s commitment to preventing mass atrocity. Speaking on behalf of current UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, he said: “We can and must do better in the 21st century... Complacency is our enemy, and vigilance our friend”. Yet a cursory look at the lead-in to Rwanda’s upcoming presidential elections indicates that just as in 1994, with tensions climbing and violence on the rise, the international community is choosing to look the other way.

In Rwanda, survivors and perpetrators of genocide comprise the majority of the population. Ethnicity remains deeply politicized and ethnic conflict is a living memory. However, since the last presidential elections in 2003, people have been required to eliminate public forms and expressions of ethnic identification. The RPF government, which controls most state institutions, has prohibited claims for ethnic representation in politics, education, and the economic sector in the name of preventing “divisionism” and “genocide ideology.” Those who criticize or question the government’s policies are arrested, killed or disappeared. President Kagame and the RPF regime justify such actions as necessary for preventing another genocide, but what sort of peace is built on a foundation of repression? If Rwanda’s history indicates anything, it is that long-simmering inequalities do not go away on their own; rather, they burn at slow pace until the cauldron bursts and violence erupts.

Many praise Rwanda for its social and developmental achievements without recognizing that the proceeds of economic gain are largely serving to further the interests of Kagame’s elite, English-speaking Tutsi minority, most of who grew up in neighboring Uganda. Secretary Clinton described Rwanda as “a beacon of hope for other African nations” and Philip Gourevitch, in a recent New Yorker article, wrote that in Rwanda, “The reconciliation defies expectations.” Further, in the last two years, President Kagame has been named one of Financial Times’ 50 greatest leaders of the past decade, a Time Magazine Man of the Year, winner of the Clinton Global Citizens Award for Leadership in Public Service, and winner of the International Medal of Peace. Rwanda was the World Bank’s top reformer of 2009 and was accepted in to the Commonwealth last November.

How is it that diplomats and journalists alike are continuing to ignore the tragic realities of life for the average Rwandan? While Kigali is gleaming, 90 percent of the population is mired in poverty; mostly these are Hutu, but Tutsi not connected to the RPF regime suffer tremendously as well. However, to challenge a system that perpetuates such inequalities means almost-certain imprisonment, if not death. Rwanda, following closely behind the US and Russia, has the third largest incarceration rate in the world. Where is our vigilance? When will we speak out for those who unable to speak for themselves?

It is clear that violence is increasing as we near this summer’s elections: in the last month alone, there was an attempted assassination of Lt General Nyamwasa in South Africa who, along with several other senior military officials, had fled Rwanda after disagreements with President Kagame. Almost immediately afterward, the newspaper editor who called for an investigation in to the General’s death was gunned down in front of his home in Kigali. Another editor in Rwanda was arrested on charges of defaming the president and espousing genocide ideology one week later.


Yet the voices quashed are not just those of the Rwandan media: A Human Rights Watch researcher was recently expelled, American law professor Peter Erlinder was arrested in May while preparing a case for charges of genocide denial against opposition presidential candidate Victoire Ingabire, and she herself, in addition to other serious contenders for president and their supporters, was charged with genocide ideology and banned from registering her candidacy. Two weeks ago, Green Party candidate Andre Kagwa Rwisereka was found nearly decapitated in South Rwanda, his body dumped on the side of the road. Still Kagame, with US and UN support, maintains that the story of Rwanda since the genocide is one of success and prosperity.

Whither our responsibility?

Certainly, there is no easy solution; it would be wrong for the US and UN to push open the doors of democracy and force Rwanda to hold free and fair elections. It is also too late to even try; such an act would be dangerous not only for American interests in East Africa (a whole other quagmire) but for average Rwandans who continue to suffer under a regime that manipulates the worst of its history to further oppression in the present. We should not, however, stand idly by, either. Those who care about “never again” should at least begin by advocating for political dialogue in Rwanda, pressing for open economic opportunities, and supporting freedom of speech and conscience in a country where talking politics in a way the government does not approve means that your life is at risk. Indeed, if we are not vigilant about our responsibility to protect, another round of mass political violence in Rwanda will be the shame of us all.

To get involved in this important issue, contact the office of Senator Russ Feingold, chairman of the Subcommittee on African Affairs (http://feingold.senate.gov/contact_opinion.html).

The Search for Legitimacy Continues....

I have just learned from colleagues in Rwanda, and in the diaspora here in Canada, that the Criminal Investigation Department of the Rwandan National Police have summoned Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza to return for further questioning on Monday 22 February at 1pm Kigali time.

This is best interpreted as another RPF-led search for legitimacy for its policy of genocide ideology. There is no actual proof (based on Mme. Ingabire's speeches and the vague definition of the genocide ideology law) that any transgression has occurred.

This, of course, is besides the point. It is but another example of the authoritarian and arbitrary rule of the RPF.

It must also be said that the more the RPF harrasses and seeks to intimidate Mme. Ingabire into submission (compliance to its policies and politics?), the greater the burden on Mme. Ingabire, should she be allowed to stand as a presidential candidate, to seek consensus among Rwandans of all ethnicities, social groupings and economic classes.

We've yet to see a platform from Mme. Ingabire, and we don't know much about what are her plans for Rwanda. Memorializing the lives lost during the genocide and all the lives lost before, during and the after the genocide. What about the economy? Who are her main aides and allies? Does she enjoy popular support in the hills? Perhaps this is because she has yet to officially register as a candidate, and consequently cannot campaign.

Mme. Ingabire's continued harassment at the hands of the RPF makes it difficult, if not impossible, for her to get on with the business of being a politician.

Because the law IS ambiguous

Last Friday, Rwandan President Paul Kagame told international media and diplomats to stop criticising the genocide ideology law. A summary of the speech is here.

In typical dictatorial style, Kagame was all bravado and no substance. The reason international observers, and some Rwandans, including opposition politicians from the Green Party and the UDF, criticise the law precisely because it is ambiguous. Article 19, in an excellent Comment writes, "that the Genocide Ideology Law is counterproductive to its apparent objectives (2009: 3).

Indeed, the objective of the law is to eliminate the genocide ideology from the hearts and minds of Rwandans. First, as the Article 19 Comment notes, the law is poorly defined: what is genocide ideology anyway? The government has never answered this question to the satisfation of international observers, despite publishing a Senate Report on the eradication of genocide ideology in Rwandan society in 2008. (This Report appears not to be available online. I have an electronic copy which I can share). Broadly stated, genocide ideology equates with ethnic enmity, meaning the hatred that Hutu have for Tutsi which caused them to kill in the first place. This simplistic interpretation of the root causes of the genocide ignores the prevailing academic research which finds that “Rwandans’ motivations [for killing] were considerably more ordinary and routine than the extraordinary crimes they helped commit” (Straus, 2006: 96). Among ordinary Hutu, participation was driven by intra-ethnic pressure from other Hutu, usually more socially powerful Hutu, security fears in the context of civil war and genocide as well as opportunity for looting and score settling. Ethnic enmity was not the main factor that pushed ordinary Hutu to kill their neighbours. It was the state-sanctioned order to kill combined with the context of fear and insecurity that made killing an option.

Yet, the genocide ideology law, and the sentiments behind it remains a fact of life in contemporary Rwanda. As a senior RPF official told me during my re-education in 2006, "“we [senior RPF members] would rather be conscious of our enemy [read Hutu] than naively pretend, like you whites, to think we have no enemy out there planning to exterminate us but instead to hopelessly fantasise about a utopian Rwanda”.

This sentiment, which I believe is widely held among Rwanda's current political and economic elite, is what drives Kagame's angry reaction to international critics. He sincerely believes that the RPF is dealing with an internal enemy. It is this belief that makes peace and reconciliation so elusive in Rwanda and the Great Lakes Region