Mr Bertrand Bisimwa, the political head andsupposed Commander-in-Chief of the M23 Movement, has declared the end of the armed rebellion.

In a statement he issued in Kampala on Tuesday, November 5, 2013, he said M23 would pursue its objectives through political means. “…therefore, the General Chief of Staff, as well as all Congolese Revolutionary Army (M23 armed wing) unit commanders, are ‘requested’ to prepare the troops for the process of disarmament…”
Our attention was drawn to the word ‘request’.

As Commander-in-Chief, he was supposed to ‘order’, not to ‘request’. But this is the Democratic Republic of Congo; we are expected to put up with some peculiarities.

Enter President Yoweri Museveni. In what was clearly a stab on President Joseph Kabila, Museveni blamed the prolonged conflict in the DRC on what he called indifference of the country’s leadership.

At a Special Summit on the DRC in South Africa, President Museveni said the Banyamulenge, an ethnic Tutsi group whose forefathers migrated from Rwanda, were denied Congolese citizenship. “… it is this group that forms the bulk of the M23 rebels who have been fighting the government in DRC since April 2012”.
For President Museveni’s information, the rank and file of M23 Movement and its armed wing is dominated by Banyejomba, Abashi and Banyabwishi. There are no Banyamulenge in the top leadership of M23.

I have a feeling that President Museveni knows these things. If he doesn’t, then he is being given wrong intelligence. However, may be he deliberately mentioned Banyamulenge to rationalise the existence of M23.

The Rwandans are doing better; at least they no longer claim that the relay-format armed rebellions in Eastern Congo are led by Banyamulenge. They now generalise rebels as Rwandaphone (to rope in all Kinyarwanda-speaking Congolese).

Saying that Banyamulenge are behind the rebellion in Eastern DRC, only seeks to link these new rebellions to the widely populae rebellion that ousted president Mobutu. But it gets worse when experts take it as part of their analysis to explain the persistent conflicts in Eastern DRC.

The rebellion that led to the ouster of Marshal Mobutu was sparked off by the supposed dissatisfaction of the Banyamulenge. And until they realised that they were merely being used by the regional powers, the Banyamulenge played.

Until about the year 2000 when they snapped and ‘rebelled’ against regional powers who were playing games in DR Congo. This rebellion was led by a one Masunzu.
In fact the last Banyamulenge names associated with the leadership of rebellions in Eastern DRC were Azarius Ruberwa, Deo Bugera (a Mugogwe, not Munyamulenge), Moise Nyarugabo, Charles Bisengimana, etc.

This was a long time ago; and one may want to know that some of these Banyamulenge leaders are now in Kinshasa as bona fide citizens of the Democratic Republic of Congo. One of them, Gen. Charles Bisengimana, is actually the Chief of Police.
Needless to say, the Banaymulenge are despised by the military and intelligence leadership in Kigali as being lazy and failures (and wink wink: for working with Kabila).

It should be noted that Barthelemy Bisengimana (I am not sure whether he is the father of the current chief of police), was the powerful Principal Private Secretary of President Mobutu between 1969 and 1977. Where and when did the Banyamulenge’s DRC citizenship arise?

About M23
When it was ‘decided’ that Bosco Ntaganda should be carted to The Hague, he fought back. However, this brought out the ethnic dynamics in a small ‘Rwandaphone’ region hitherto generalised as homogeneous. The Banyamaisis (supporting Ntaganda) fought the Banyejomba (associated with Gen. Laurent Nkunda).

The Banyejomba group won and chose Mr. Bertrand Bisimwa as the new M23 political leader. He is a Hutu Mushi (plural Abashi) and related to Laurent Nkunda through marriage.

Gen Sultan Makenga, the M23 military leader, is a Tutsi Munyejomba while his deputy, Col Jean Marie Vianney Kazaramo, is a Hutu Munyejomba.

Asuman Bisiika is the Executive Editor of East Africa Flagpost.