The Kagame I know of 1990s who could not tolerate this nonsense   called Rwanda ethnic groupings which I don’t want to mention here due to the same reasons because of the smell I abhor myself. Why the Rwandan leader now making a U-TURN and started making ethnic sentiments himself?  Does Rwanda really has these ethnic groupings or are just created by the past and present leaders for selfish political reasons?

Kagame on Terminator transfer

The question and the dilemma for RPF elites and their supporters or those who just want to eat their money and wait for the right time have argued that you cannot have genocide without mentioning the ethnic groupings of Rwanda. The question now is, is genocide a legal matter or a political matter? How many genocide convicts are already serving their sentences using the current international law?  The interpretation of the case in which the tribal or ethnic issue rose was in Akayezu who wanted to rely to the literal interpretation of genocide denials but the trial judge was quick to close that window and all those hopes by saying that genocide should not be interpreted objectively but subjectively, where the victim perceives him/herself or how the killer perceives the victim.

It is unfortunate that even some academics within the RPF ranks or some elite classes within the Rwandan academia have failed to grasp this dangerous line of taking us back to the past regimes that used ethic groupings to serve their political interests.  It is not yet clear how Rwandan can get rid of ethnic divisions without hurting anybody.  When you ask anyone in the RPF or the president himself will tell you that Rwanda does not have ethnic groupings, they have banned all those who call themselves   ABATWA, calling them those who were left behind by the times, but are they satisfied with this new name?

The bosses of this group who want to harvest from this group will fight tooth and nail to maintain their name not because it is good but because they use it to solicit money from big donors like Canada and Australia who actually for them, they are justified to call them indigenous people   because when the imperialists invaded these big countries they found the natives there, but in Rwanda the story is different Rwandan communities might have  facial and physical differences  but are not enough  to classify them as distinct ethnic groupings  because these differences appear in all the so called ethnic groupings . Why then my beloved president of 1990s becoming a hostage of some few ill-informed and self seekers to ruin the former RPF position that Rwandans belong to the same creator (GIHANGA).

The answer is simple to find, the former RPF carders who were used to academic challenges like Patrick Mazimpaka, Pasteur Bizimungu, Asiel Kabera, Seth Sendashonga, Col. Theoneste Lizinde, Cpt.  Frank Tega, Major. Alfonse  Furuma , Dr. Theogene Rudasingwa, Gen. Kayumba Nymwasa,  Col. Ndugute,  Sam Kaka, just to mention a few , were either killed, sidelined, politically or physically exterminated.  The RPF therefore is now owned or hijacked by self seekers, or some carders are just intimidated by Kagame and his immediate inner circle and have decided to keep quite.

Kagame’s U-TURN on the issue of ethnic groupings is diversionary; in fact the Kagame camp  intends to use these new developments to divert attention from his long stay in power and may be to rally support from his confidants to sell his new brand of changing the constitution so that he can contest for another term  or may be stay until his death as one way of seeking sanctuary from  the international justice for the crimes he has committed both in Rwanda and outside Rwanda especially in the neighboring country Congo where millions of people  have been killed  especially women and children and many more displaced  and are now wandering in the neighboring countries.

Indeed, I think that Kagame’s new approach simply as quest for cheap popularity amongst some survivors of genocide whom he was addressing but also to deflect from the paradox of a dictator who has been in power for nearly 19 years witnessing many survivors who are still in abject poverty, their land and other properties looted by Kagame and his RPF officials who claim to have saved these survivors.

Therefore Kagame’s utterances are not a surprise to many, the international community knows very well what he has been doing to his own people, neighbors,    how he has suffocated the independent media, killed or incarcerated all the political opponents, but because he remains a sub –contractor  to some western powers as a huge regional security  broker  and as a bridge for unprecedented extractive economic access to regional minerals;  Kagame and his uncle Museveni   have facilitated pro-Western regime change in nearly all their neighbours; and provided the best testing ground and arguments for the Western neo-liberal economic plunder of the continent.

The problem in Rwanda, is that many people are suffering from political paranoia, unable to say what is right for fear of being labeled with the genocide ideology even if   you are a survivor of genocide, this is same fate Deo Mushayid suffered when he questioned the wisdom of changing the names of genocide description, if you are of another ethnic background, then you don’t even dare because you will be ready meat for the scavengers of the Kagme security forces.  Indeed, the RPF leadership and Kagame know that the FDLR no longer posses an existential threat to the regime. However, as a pretext for the “securitisation” of Rwandan public life; a scarecrow to be raised during elections, or throw some grenades markets and public gatherings; an early and lucrative channel for grand corruption; an opportunity to raise cash from US “anti-terrorism” budgets; and an excuse for the wholesale demonisation of politicians from other political parties with different political agenda, the FDLR issue is still useful, and so it is allowed to rumble on. Therefore Rwandans should unite and fight this dictatorship or decide to remain loyal to this one man or their country Rwanda.

 

Jacqueline Umurungi

Brussels.