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Genocide in the “ghost of Rwanda”

Research paper

Abstract

The world has seen a lot many man- made disasters like wars, genocide, conspiracies, untouchability, nuclear wars, tech wars and what not. Genocide is one of the grave and heinous among all. The world has seen a lot many cases of genocide like in Bangladesh, Yugoslavia, Rwanda, Kashmir (India) etc. The major thing observed among them was the huge loss of mankind. This was accompanied with violation of human rights. This was the result why, by May 2019, 152 countries have become parties to the convention on The Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, 1948. This research paper would highlight the various aspects of the genocide especially focusing on the case study of Rwanda. How the conflict between two major communities led to such a massacre. War brings no victory. It only leaves some victims, trauma, bad memories, orphans, homeless victims and accused too. Nobody prospers and the world comes at a still. The explosion of 1994 is critically analyzed here, discussing the various aspects and reasons for the same. Discrimination induces trauma and helplessness irrespective of the placement of an individual in the social position in a society. This study of Rwandan genocide is one of the best examples of such trauma.

As said by Justin Cronin in The City of Mirrors “Consider the species known as man. We lie, we cheat, we want what others have and take it; we make war upon each other and the earth; we harvest lives in multitudes. We have mortgaged the planet and spent the cash on trifles. We may have loved, but never well enough. We never truly know ourselves. We forgot the world; now it has forgotten us.”

Keywords

Introduction, genocide,Objective, history, role of media,Death Of The President, Genocide in Rwanda ,present Rwanda,Establishment and statute of International Tribunal for Rwanda , Research Methodology ,Literature review ,Suggestion, Conclusion 

Introduction

Rwanda is now known as Singapore of Africa. It is a poor country where 90% of the population is still engaged in agriculture. It is one of the neat and clean countries. Rwanda is a state whose GDP had fallen -50% in 1994. It is a country whose 15% of the population died in a horrifying genocide. It is a small land of Africa and is also known as the land of thousand hills as there are many small islands. It is a landlocked country. It has Uganda in the north, Tanzania in the east, Burundi in the south and Congo in the west historically; there were 18 different clans in Rwanda. Each of this clan has their way of socio-economic categorization. People were divided into Hutu and Tutsi. Likewise, these people used to live happily. Rwanda has one of the youngest populations in the world, with the average age being 19 years. Rwandans are drawn from just one cultural and linguistic group, the Banyarwanda. However, within this group there are three subgroups: the Hutu, Tutsi and Twa. The Twa are a forest-dwelling pygmy people and are often considered descendants of Rwanda’s earliest inhabitants.[1] It has a mostly Christian population. The proclamation of Rwanda on 1 July 1962. It was admitted to the United Nations on 18 September 1962. It has a unitary presidential republic under a dictatorship. The current president is Paul Kagame and the current prime minister is Edouard Ngirente.

Music and dance is an integral part of this country of Africa. They celebrate festivals, ceremonies, social gatherings etc. The best known dance here is the National Ballet. Such a happy and peaceful country with such a dreadful past.

The country is a member of the African Union, the United Nations, the Commonwealth of Nations, COMESA, OIF and the East African Community. In June 2022, the country hosted the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) originally scheduled for 2020, when it was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[2] 

Genocide

As per the article 1 of The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide defined genocide as an international crime irrespective of whether it is committed in time of war or peace.[3] Genocide is like a commitment of certain acts with intends to destroy in whole or in part a national, ethnic, racial or religious group. It may include crime against humanity like mass rapes, prevent new born of that country, killing of male and forcibly marrying the females of such community.

Objective

A large proportion of the discussion is on genocide and its effect on a nation. The role of media is critical and the political leaders who in order to get mass support make the people violent for petty things. The discussion will let the readers know the result for such conflicts. The fate of a nation gets tampered. All over the world there is one or the other dispute over petty things like religion, caste, race, sex, communities and what not. The author tries to explain the consequences with the help of a case study over Rwanda.

History

Rwanda was ruled by Germany and then Belgium. A policy of divide and rule, as followed by Britishers in India, the colonizers came to Rwanda and adopted a similar policy. This led to differences between these two major communities and was looked at as two different races. Especially, when Belgium issued racial identity cards in 1932. Interestingly, this division was made to rectify people of both communities on the basis of their physical appearance. Like, people with a certain shape of a nose would be Hutu or people with a certain shape of mouth would be Tutsi. Interestingly, they said that a person with more than 10 cows will be Tutsis. And less number cows, means they will be Hutus. It was estimated that approximately 85 % population were Hutu and rest were Tutsi. Now, the monarch was a Tutsi and Tutsi community the elites of the country. It was under the control of Belgium. Belgium forced Hutus to grow coffee and gave benefit to the well established Tutsi. Belgium attained a lot of profit by the forced labor. Though the scene changed after World War II. Now, they (Hutus) started taking revenge of the misfortunes and torture that happened over them. And the feeling of revenge led to the massive disaster. The exploitation led to the feeling of revenge.

When this nation got independent on 1 July 1962, there was a lot of hatred between these two major communities and politicians gave their best to nurture this feeling of hatred.

A statement by one of their politicians –“the Hutu and the Tutsi communities are two nations in a single state. Two nations between whom there is no intercourse and no sympathy, who are ignorant of each other’s habits, thoughts and feelings as if they were the habitants of different zones or planets”.

Now this hatred escalated slowly and gradually. This led to outbreaks of ethnically motivated violence that sent thousands of Tutsi refugees into neighboring countries. Children were segregated in the school. Militia groups began forming. They claimed that they were advocating ‘hutuness’. The local people took weapons and established slogans of proud Hutu. And demanded a Hutu state.

Role of media

As said by Rwandan genocide perpetrator, interviewed by Straus in 2007 that “the radio encouraged people to participate because it said ‘the enemy is the Tutsi’. If the radio had not declared things, people would not have gone into the attacks”.

The media played a crucial role. The radio Rwanda spewed hatred by saying that Tutsi were dirty people and they must be exterminating them. Statements like Hutus should not marry Tutsi and if they are married then they must desert that person. They should not do business with any Tutsi too.

Death of the President

On 6 April 1994, the thing was at its height. The president of Rwanda Juvenal Habyarimana, who was a Hutu, was on an airplane. And that airplane was shot down. All the people in that plane were shot dead including the president. Interestingly, it is still a mystery who shot the plane down but Hutus extremists blamed RPF (RWANDAN PATRIOT FRONT), which was a Tutsi rebel group. On the other hand the RPF blamed Hutus extremists that they shot it down in order to start genocide. Some people also say that it was a pre planned act. It was so because as soon as the plane crashed, the army started putting barricades and told the people to do massive killing of the Tutsis. It appeared as if they had pre-knowledge of the incident.  Now, ultimately this incident added fire to the injury and led to a mass genocide, which is also called as Rwandan genocide. Within 100 days, 8000,000 people were killed in Rwanda by the Hutus extremists. Interestingly, the death included both Tutsi and moderate Hutus .it was one of the most terrifying genocide ever. Almost 1 million people died out of 7 million populations. The people were thirsty for the blood of each other. There is a place in Rwanda where they have written “genocide never again.”

Genocide in Rwanda

Mark the date from 7 April to 15 July 1994. A tenure of mere 100 days resulted in the slaughter of almost 1% of the population, that is almost 10 lakhs of people were killed. It also means that almost 10,000 people are killed daily. The people who killed them were their good Hutus neighbors and the person who was killed was Tutsi and moderate Hutus. Teachers, fathers, neighbors all of them became the servants of the master and started killing indiscriminately. Surprisingly, the police and army too had orders to kill the minority Tutsi. The killers were awarded. NO United Nations, no United States Of America, no Britain came to help them out. The people used all sorts of weapons to kill Tutsi. Tutsi ran to save their lives. Surprisingly, the people used kerosene to burn that building off. The hatred was at the peak. The people were burned alive. The people went to the church as well but that father along with the crowd killed them too. Most strangely, the Hutus husbands killed their own Tutsi wives! The people witnessed tones of dead bodies in the Rusumo falls. Rusumo falls is situated between Rwanda and Tanzania.

The so called super power America embassy knew about the massive disaster but was silent and passive. Even they funded and supported them with weapons too. Freedom of information act led to a massive transparency of the acts done by America at that time. It displayed that how Clinton government was least bothered about the massive deaths and genocide in Rwanda. Though Clinton apologized several times, the question is will this apology bring justice and lives of the victims. France too supported the militants. They provided every possible aid to the government of Rwanda. The major reason behind it was that they believed that if RPF (RWANDAN PATRIOTIC FRONT) made the government then the impact of France might get reduced. This was the reason why the army of France took no major step and in certain cases was involved in the disaster too.

In 2010, France’s then President, Nicolas Sarkozy acknowledged that “mistakes” were made during the genocide, but stopped short of the formal apology Rwanda requested. French officials didn’t attend the ceremony in the capital, Kigali, after Rwanda barred France’s ambassador from the event, France’s Foreign Ministry said. The diplomatic spat was the latest episode in a long-simmering debate over whether France played any role in the genocide, which claimed an estimated 800,000 lives when Rwanda’s ethnic majority Hutus targeted minority Tutsis.

Though on the 20th anniversary of its (Rwanda) genocide in a solemn ceremony that unfolded against a backdrop of rekindled diplomatic tensions with France.”No country is powerful enough—even when they think they are—to change the facts,” Rwandan President Paul Kagame told the crowd, in an apparent reference to France. Switching to French, he added: “Facts are stubborn.” Mr. Kagame didn’t directly address the French ambassador’s absence, and his government didn’t respond to requests to comment on the matter.[4]

In other article published on 27 may 2014, French President Emmanuel Macron publicly acknowledged his country’s “terrible responsibility” in Rwanda’s 1994 genocide and asked for forgiveness in a bid to reset relations during the first visit by a French leader to the East African nation in more than a decade. In a sober statement at the Gisozi genocide memorial in the capital, Kigali, where nearly a third of the 800,000 victims are buried, Mr. Macron said that France made errors of judgment in standing by a genocidal regime during the 100 days of massacres.“France has political responsibility in Rwanda, it has a duty to recognize the share of the suffering it inflicted on the Rwandan people,” Mr. Macron said, shortly after laying a wreath at the memorial. “I have come to recognize our responsibilities; only those who survived can perhaps forgive.”[5]

Félicien Kabuga was a businessman. He was believed to be the one who funded for this genocide. He escaped and was captured in France. He used to live by some different identity. Now, after 23 years, he was captured and prosecuted at the age of 84.

An interview was published in The New York Times between a mother and her daughter. Mother Justin and her daughter Alice .One day Justin called her daughter and said , that whether she knows about the horrific genocide that took place in Rwanda .That incident took the lives of thousands. This incident includes rapes of mass public. Those rapes resulted a lot many pregnancies and resulted in the birth of so many children. These children have no fathers. Justin was one of them. She said that she don’t know that out of the number of rapes that happened upon her , which rape resulted in the birth of  her daughter , Alice. She said that she don’t know who her real father is!

Present Rwanda

Interestingly after 20 years, the genocide ended when the Tutsi dominated rebel group RPF recaptures Kigali. The existing Hutu government was overthrown. A new constitution was constituted which guaranteed equal rights for all Rwandans. Then a transitional government is made with President Pasteur biz, a Hutu and vice president named Paul Kagame, a Tutsi. Later Paul became president of Rwanda. GDP per capita of 4% and almost 7 percent of GDP growth in twenty years. An extreme focus on education and health, which led to extreme growth in the society. They allocate 15% of GDP on education, isn’t that amazing? By 2018, 73 % literacy rate. Almost 55 years of life expectancy changed to 69 years by 2020. Rwanda became 3rd least corrupted country in Africa. They even focused on business, technology and block chains too.

Though, the leader here was elected by all most 99% of votes and this is the reason why the elections here are not considered to be free and fair. The country is still poor. Quite backward in terms of reports published for analyzing the country’s welfare and betterment.

Establishment and statute of International Tribunal for Rwanda

Félicien Kabuga, one of the world’s most wanted fugitives, was arrested in France. Félicien Kabuga is wanted in the 1994 Rwanda genocide against the Tutsi minorities. Custody of Félicien Kabuga will be given to UN criminal tribunal dedicated to the Rwandan genocide. Félicien Kabuga was indicted in 1997 by the UN Tribunal on several counts including genocide, direct and public incitement to commit genocide and conspiracy to commit genocide. Around one million people were killed in the 1994 Rwandan genocide. Hutu extremists in Rwanda targeted minority ethnic Tutsis. Moderate Tutsis were also targeted. The violence started soon after the plane crash of the then-President Juvenal Habyarimana, an ethnic Hutu, on April 6, 1994.[6] To put an end to the crimes and genocides occurring at the Rwanda, the Security Council on 8 November 1994, decided to adopt the statute of the international criminal tribunal for Rwanda. It was requested by the government of Rwanda to establish a tribunal for the trial of the person accused for such crimes. The Security Council has established the statute acting under chapter VII of the U.N. charter. Under article 1 of the statute provided power to the tribunals to prosecute the persons, who were responsible for the violations of international humanitarian law committed in Rwanda. It will be remembered that the Rwanda tribunal is trying cases of genocide and crimes against humanity arising out of 1994 massacre of more than a million Tutsis and moderate Hutus extremists.[7]

As said by Desmond Tutu that “when you think of the sort of things that happen when a genocide happens, it’s again not people who are intrinsically evil.”

Research Methodology

The research methodology used in the research paper was done from various sources. The basic research was from the journal published on the website of international association of genocide scholars on genocide studies and prevention and journal of genocide research and implications for the field of genocide studies.

The various articles were read from the website of BBC News, history channel, Britannica, United Nation Website, the Hindu. The articles had a great research over this topic of Rwanda. The research is also based upon the various interviews and explanations upon the channels like lallantop and the ground report reported by Dhruv Rathee.

It also included the incidents of various other war crimes that occurred throughout the world.

Literature review

The major incident that was mentioned shows that some incidents like that of who crashed the president’s plane is still a mystery. The published reports show a lot of deaths. Though, S.K. Kapoor and H.O. Agarwal have given a wide interpretation on the topic of genocide in international law and human rights. Though the nation is improving at some instances like there are cleanliness laws. The plastic is ban completely. People are obeying the laws. But the leader who won by approx 99% vote then it becomes a matter of concern. It ranks 104th in the legatum prosperity index 2021. The GDP figure is 147 out of 196 countries. However, reports represent that it is the second best place to do business in Africa. 

Suggestion

Democracy as said by Lincoln ‘of the people, by the people, for the people’ summarizes the whole aspect of a welfare state. A democratic government does not merely mean an elected government but whose prime objective is welfare of the people. If a political leader tries to create a dispute between communities, religions, caste, or race then the citizens should criticize that government and force the government to change that ideology. People should understand that discrimination anywhere is a suicide of peace and harmony everywhere. Media is a pillar of a country. It should work efficiently. It should not be biased. A nation prospers by its citizens and not by riots, genocide ,murder, mass rapes, violence, discrimination etc. the reports that were published later after the incident displayed that the world leaders were blind folded at such a crucial hour. Ultimately, it means to make your country strong economically, socially and politically because the other nations would support it when they found an interest in it. Their interest might end the nation in no way. Ukraine, Afghanistan, and Taiwan are on the same route. They must realize that a nation would come to support when everything would come to still.

“When genocide is committed, it must be seen. People must look at it with open eyes, not minimize its impact” – Nadia Murad

Conclusion 

“Given the scale of trauma caused by the genocide, Rwanda has indicated that however thin the hope of a community can be, a hero always emerges. Although no one can dare claim that it is now a perfect state, and that no more work is needed, Rwanda has risen from the ashes as a model for truth and reconciliation.”
-Wole Soyinka 

The above analysis stresses a need for the people to read and recognize the trauma such crimes against humanity leads to. Thus, the research, unpacking the impact and addressing the discrimination, violence or disadvantage faced by them due to their placement in the societal structure. It also emphasizes the role of media in a state. People understand what the media displays. We know how significant the role the media (newspaper and radio) had upon the success of the freedom movement of India against Britain. Democracy not only means an elected government but also a government that could work in the favor of the citizens too. Genocide could be at any place. Anyone could become a victim of it. It is in the hands of people, rulers and media on how to resolve the issue before it takes a violent form. Domestic matters need domestic remedies.

“Genocide is not just a murderous madness; it is, more deeply, a politics that promises a utopia beyond politics – one people, one land, one truth, the end of difference. Since genocide is a form of political utopia, it remains an enduring temptation in any multiethnic and multicultural society in crisis “-Michael Ignatieff 

 Let us make a commitment to ourselves that “Genocide Never Again”!

Submitted by Ms. Sanya Singh

V Semester, 3rd year, B.A.LL.B. (HONS.) ,HEERALAL YADAV LAW COLLEGE

Other References:

[1] Rwanda, https://en,m.wikipedia.org , September 13, 2022, 10:04 p.m.

[2] RWANDA hosts commonwealth summit amid rights, security concerns, www.dw.com ,13 September 2022, 10:18 p.m.

[3]  H.O. Agarwal, international law and human rights(2020)

[4] Rwanda, France spar on anniversary of genocide, https://www.wsj.com , 13 September 2022, 8:47 p.m.

[5] Macron acknowledges France’s “terrible responsibility for Rwandan responsibility “for Rwandan genocide, https://www.wsj.com , 13 September 2022, 8:47 p.m.

[6]  Rwandan genocide, https://thelallantop.com , September 13, 2022, 7:25 p.m.

[7] Dr. S.K. Kapoor, International law and human rights(2021)