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Ms Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza has been asked the following question related to his alleged connection to the rebels organisation FDLR. Here follows the question and the answer she gave:
Question:
There is this allegation that FDU-Inkingi is connected to FDLR which has been labelled a terrorist organisation by the US, tell us this is true?

Answer:
These are fabrications aimed at tarnishing my image and delaying the registration of my party. Of late, government lobbies have been going around, brandishing a UN experts report as evidence. This UN report which by the way was heavily criticised by Tanzania and Burundi, is so biased that it went to the extent of saying that the commander in chief of FDLR is my brother! This is rubbish.

The report further alleges that I am connected with FDLR because I attended a meeting with FDLR members in Barcelona. The so called Barcelona meeting took place under the auspices of a Spanish NGO and was attended by Rwandan of all ethnic groups, including RPF well known individuals from Rwanda. This can be cross-checked from the minutes of the meeting. The agenda of the meeting was to see ways and means of organising an inter Rwanda dialogue. How came these RPF members who attended the meeting are not labelled FDLR supporters?

The truth of the story is that the government does not want a true dialogue and want to demonise any dialogue initiative that is not under it iron fist. Had the Barcelona meeting been a conspiracy meeting, the organisers would have not invited delegates from Rwanda including staunch supporters of the ruling party.

From interview by Eleneus Akanga – ellyakanga.wordpress.com.

So what exactly entails revisionism? And how is it quantifiable when a lot of facts on Rwanda happen to be hearsay.

I am a Rwandan and refuse to be fed by a fabricated truth–no matter how internationally acclaimed it is.

I explain why:

1. The RPF did not start the war to stop genocide. There is no evidence to support this view. Rwanda was relatively a peaceful country albeit a Hutu dictatorship.

2. Kagame did not end the genocide. He won the war. But the killings continued, in Rwanda and beyond. Evidence of RPF’s killings in Kibeho for instance, suggest that Kagame’s interest was always to replace Hutu power by Tutsi power.

3. The war in eastern Congo has largely targeted Hutu refugees and the Hutu Diaspora. Tutsi 1994 heroes like Laurent Nkunda and Bosco Ntaganda have turned out to be the Hitters of Africa.

4. The RPF is extremely PR savvy. It uses psychological tactics and always playing the victim card. For instance, the killings of millions of Congolese are blamed on the unwillingness of the then Zaire to hand over the alleged genocidaires.

5. It is very inaccurate that 1,000,000 Tutsi were killed during the Rwanda genocide. If the Tutsi comprised 10% of the population, it is not difficult to see how suspecting the data is.

6. President Paul Kagame might be a Tutsi liberator (this is arguable) yet, he is seen by many Hutu and Congolese as a mass murder. There is evidence to support these claims.

7. Like any conflict in Africa, there are western interests fueling the conflict. This has been obscured. Rather than blaming the colonialist, let’s focus on the French who funded the Ex-FAR and the Americans/Britons who supported the RPF.

8. The world did not abandon Rwanda. Neither did it fail to intervene. Foreign powers intervened the wrong way, resulting in unexpected calamity.

The people of Rwanda deserve the chance to define their own destiny. They deserve democracy and the world needs to STOP its support of an unpopular dictatorship.

by Mutesi – http://www.theglobeandmail.com/community/?userid=60566512&plckUserId=60566512.

by Geoffrey York – Globe and Mail (theglobeandmail.com)

Victoire Ingabire dared to speak of Hutus victims of genocide

Kigali � The symbolism was incendiary. In front of the mass graves where 250,000 genocide victims are buried, a Rwandan politician dared to speak of the Hutus who were killed in those same terrible months in 1994.

Perhaps more astonishingly, Victoire Ingabire was not imprisoned for her taboo comments � not so far, at least, although the police have interrogated her three times and accused her of the crime of spreading �divisionism.�

Her challenge is posing an uncomfortable dilemma for the minority Tutsi-led government that dominates Rwanda. Sixteen years after the genocide of an estimated 800,000 Tutsis by Hutu extremists, can the authorities tolerate a political candidate who appeals openly to the Hutus who still comprise 85 per cent of Rwanda’s population?

How long can the government use the genocide as a justification for strict controls on the political system? And who decides the official history of the genocide?

The woman at the centre of the storm is an unlikely politician: a cheerful 41-year-old emigrant who has worked as an accountant at a U.S. company in the Netherlands for the past decade.

She wears a frilly-strapped dress and giggles merrily when she is asked about the barrage of wild attacks on her in Rwanda’s state-controlled media.

But she is backed by many of the Hutus who fled to Europe and North America during the Rwandan wars of the 1990s. She clearly has money and resources. She rents a large house in one of Kigali’s most exclusive neighbourhoods, where she has a Land Cruiser parked in the driveway.

Ms. Ingabire’s decision to return to Kigali this year has sent shock waves through Rwandan politics. In a country where ethnic divisions are officially never discussed, she has dared to raise Hutu grievances � especially the killing of thousands of Hutus in 1994 and 1995, which she describes as a �crime against humanity.�

It’s a potent appeal. Many Hutus feel excluded from power, excluded from the best jobs and schools, and afraid to speak out. It was to them that Ms. Ingabire was deliberately appealing when she returned to Rwanda in January � after 16 years in exile � and made her controversial comments at the genocide memorial.

Ms. Ingabire has carefully couched her appeal in diplomatic language. She condemns the genocide, calling for reconciliation and dialogue. She denounces �extremists� on all sides. She urges the authorities to bring all criminals to justice, regardless of ethnicity. She pledges to work for a peaceful country, united in mutual respect.

Yet merely by talking of Hutu victims, she has triggered a firestorm of reaction. She and her assistant were assaulted by a gang of young men in a government office. Her assistant, who was badly beaten, has been jailed for �genocide� crimes. She is facing a police investigation for her alleged �genocide ideology.� And even the country’s powerful President, Paul Kagame, has warned that �the law will catch up with her� � a clear threat that she will be arrested.

At the heart of the battle between Ms. Ingabire and Mr. Kagame is a stark disagreement about Rwanda’s identity. The President argues that any talk of ethnicity must be suppressed because Rwanda is still in a fragile post-genocide period, where hatred and violence could rise again. His opponent sees this as an excuse for repression, leading only to resentment and bitterness among those who cannot speak out.

It is unclear whether the government will permit Ms. Ingabire to challenge Mr. Kagame in the presidential election in August. The President won the last election with an official margin of 95 per cent, and he has brooked no real opposition since 1994, when he led the Tutsi rebels who defeated the genocidal Hutu regime.

So far, Ms. Ingabire has been denied permission to gather the 200 signatures that she needs to register her political party. She is routinely subjected to fierce attacks in the pages of Rwanda’s only daily newspaper, the state-connected New Times, which refuses to publish her responses to the attacks.

�I don’t know why the government is so afraid of me,� she says. �They watch me and follow me all the time. I know anything can happen to me � they can arrest me, they can kill me.�

The managing director of the New Times, Joseph Bideri, confirmed that the newspaper refuses to give any �space� to Ms. Ingabire’s responses. He wrote a personal letter to her on Jan. 22, vowing she would never get a �platform� in the newspaper because she is a �genocide denier.�

In an interview, however, Mr. Bideri was unable to provide any evidence that Ms. Ingabire denies the genocide. In fact, in her public speeches and in a lengthy interview with The Globe and Mail, she repeatedly acknowledged and condemned the 1994 genocide. She draws a distinction between the slaughter of the Tutsis � which she calls a genocide � and the killings of many Hutus, which she describes as a �crime against humanity.�

Although she emigrated to the Netherlands shortly before the genocide began, Ms. Ingabire’s own family suffered in the genocide. Her brother was killed in 1994 because he was mistaken for a Tutsi.

�When people talk about the pain they feel, they need to understand that everybody feels pain,� she says. �We have to understand the pain of others. When I condemn the genocide, I’m also thinking of my brother. Not all Hutus are killers, and not all Tutsis are victims.�

International human-rights groups, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, have criticized the Rwandan government for attacking and harassing opposition leaders such as Ms. Ingabire. Amnesty says the Rwandan law on �genocide ideology� is so vague and ambiguous that the authorities can use it to suppress dissent.

There is strong evidence to support Ms. Ingabire’s allegations of war crimes against Hutus. For example, a United Nations investigator in 1994 estimated that 25,000 to 45,000 civilians, primarily Hutus, were killed by the Rwandan Patriotic Front � the army of Mr. Kagame, now the governing party. Many other civilians, including thousands of Hutu refugees, were killed in further attacks in later years. Only a small handful of RPF members have been prosecuted for the Hutu deaths, which remain a taboo subject in Rwanda.

Ms. Ingabire says she doesn’t know how many Tutsis died in 1994, how many Hutus died, or even whether the number of Tutsi victims was larger than the number of Hutu victims. Some observers say she is leaving the impression of an equivalency between the two sides, despite historical evidence that the Tutsi victims were far more numerous and were the only ones subjected to a deliberate campaign of attempted extermination.

But even the Rwandan government has struggled with how to write the history of the genocide. At the memorial where 250,000 victims are buried, a guide says it commemorates only the Tutsi victims of the genocide. Yet he distributes an audio guide that calls it a memorial to the �Tutsi and moderate Hutu peoples� who were killed.

Didas Gasana, editor of a weekly newspaper whose staff is often harassed and threatened by the authorities for its independent views, says the government needs to provide justice and truth to the Hutu victims. �There needs to be debate and justice and openness,� he says. �It’s a part of history that can’t be denied.�

Mr. Gasana is himself a Tutsi. And despite the official view that ethnicity has disappeared, he says he is often told privately by government officials that he should not write such critical articles � because he is a Tutsi.

Geoffrey York – http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/rwandas-blood-soaked-history-becomes-a-tool-for-repression/article1487568/.

CHRI Press Release-6 March 2010.
CHRI (Commonwealth Human Rights Initiatives) is deeply concerned at the continued restrictions and threats to opposition parties in the run up to Rwanda�s Presidential elections on 9 August 2010 and urges the Rwandan Government to take immediate steps to ensure respect for the basic, universal rights to freedom of expression, freedom of association and peaceful assembly of opposition parties. The absence of these rights is tantamount to breaches of the Commonwealth’s fundamental political principles that insist on free and fair elections (Harare Declaration 1991).

On Commonwealth day, 8 March 2010, CHRI once again brings to the notice of the Commonwealth Secretary General the growing number of concerns surrounding political freedoms in Rwanda. Despite grave representations by CHRI and others about the appropriateness of Rwanda�s readiness for membership, given its record on human rights and its questionable role in the conflict in the Congo, Rwanda was unconditionally admitted to the Commonwealth as its newest member at the Heads of Government Meeting in Trinidad and Tobago last November.

Rwanda�s membership requires that it honours and complies with the Commonwealth�s fundamental political principles which include respect for civil society and human rights. The Chair of a new opposition party, United Democratic Forces (UDF) has written to the Secretary General of the Commonwealth alleging state orchestrated harassment, describing violence against herself and colleagues as well as outlining the restrictive environment facing opposition parties in their electoral challenge to the ruling Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF).

Under Article 13 of the Rwandan constitution it is an offence to engage in �revisionism� or �negationism� (denial of the genocide). These are so broadly defined to include anyone who disagrees with the ruling RPF�s account of the Genocide. On the 25th of February the Ministry for Security in Rwanda issued a statement saying that any politician who �slanders the country� or is �against public unity� would be punished. In addition the Minister for Local Government has reportedly threatened to crackdown on unregistered political parties who are members of the Permanent Consultative Council of Opposition Parties. Further opposition parties have alleged that the government is making it hard to register by continually changing registration rules; the National Electoral Commission which regulates these matters is controlled by the members of the RPF. A number of opposition parties have also complained that they face repeated harassment from government officials and the members of the RPF.

It is imperative that the Government of Rwanda thoroughly investigates, in a manner satisfactory to opposition parties, the many incidents of intimidation and bring those responsible to justice. It should also ensure that its electoral processes are consistent with UN and Commonwealth standards for free and fair elections.

CHRI urges the Commonwealth Secretary General to insist that the Rwandan government makes every effort to create genuine democratic political atmosphere in the country prior August 2010 elections. We call upon the Commonwealth Secretary General Kamalesh Sharma, in his meetings this week with President Kagame, to urge him to ensure that in these first Rwanda elections as a Commonwealth member, the standards are patently free and fair and in compliance with Commonwealth values.
Maja Daruwala
Director, CHRI
Website: http://www.humanrightsinitiative.org/

Stephen Kinzer

In his article titled ‘The limits of free speech in Rwanda’, Stephen Kinzer, former New York Times, goes to great lengths to justify the limitations of Freedom of Speech in the post-genocide Rwanda led by Paul Kagame’s RPF ruling party. After all, why should Paul Kagame allow open debates on genocide and social problems in Rwanda? Stephen Kinzer argues that even in a country of free speech as the Us, it is not allowed to shout ‘fire’ in a crowded theatre.

Here is what he writes in the London Guardian (guardian.co.uk), on March 2, 2010:

The country’s president claims that laws against disseminating ‘genocide ideology’ are necessary to stop a return to violence

Sixteen years after genocide, Rwanda is facing a new test. President Paul Kagame, who is seeking re-election, is widely admired abroad. Among his fans are some of the world’s most famous do-gooders, from Bill Clinton and Tony Blair to Rev Rick Warren and Dr Paul Farmer. His enemies hope to use this election campaign to tarnish his image and show these admirers that he is no democrat.

Rwanda is more stable and prosperous than many would have predicted following the 1994 genocide. The reconciliation process has been at least partly successful. Yet beneath the surface, Rwandan society remains volatile. Hatreds are unexpressed, but no one believes they are gone.

Kagame’s government has passed laws against disseminating “genocide ideology”, meaning views that could inflame communal hatreds. People are supposed to describe themselves only as Rwandan, never as Hutu or Tutsi. Kagame claims these laws are necessary to keep Rwanda back from the abyss of violence. If he enforces them during the political campaign, though, critics will accuse him of suppressing free speech.

Last month, a Rwandan-born businesswoman who has spent more than a decade in the Netherlands, Victoire Ingabire, arrived in Rwanda and announced that she was a candidate for president. Her party is based abroad and not recognised in Rwanda. According to a UN report (in French), she is supported by leaders of the principal Hutu insurgent group, which is among factions terrorising the eastern Congo.

Ingabire’s first statements after landing in Rwanda were thinly veiled appeals for Hutu solidarity. “There is no shame in saying I am Hutu or am Tutsi; there’s nothing wrong with that,” she told one interviewer.

Appealing to ethic identity this way is illegal. The official press launched a sharp campaign against Ingabire, and her campaign group has been attacked at least once. She has been interrogated by police and warned that she will be arrested if she continues preaching “genocide ideology”. Amnesty International responded by accusing the government of “intimidation and harassment”.

Nonsense, replies President Kagame. He believes western human rights activists underestimate the prospects for a new outbreak of ethnic violence in Rwanda, as well as the danger of allowing ethnically charged speech. “We’ve lived this life,” he said angrily at a news conference. “We’ve lived the consequences. So we understand it better than anyone from anywhere else.”

Kagame won the last presidential election, in 2003, with a reported 95% of the vote. Critics complained that the campaign was unfair, but Kagame emerged relatively unscathed because few outsiders were paying attention.

Seven years later, Rwanda is in the midst of a promising transformation and Kagame is a darling of the global development community. His enemies know they cannot defeat him in this election; he is the strongman and will do whatever is necessary to win. Their strategy is to bait him into taking actions � like arresting a rival candidate � that would make him look bad abroad and thereby weaken his regime.

Many people in developed countries look suspiciously, as they should, on leaders who impose restrictions on free speech. Even in the US, though, it is illegal to cry “fire!” in a crowded theatre. That is what Rwandan leaders accuse the foreign-based opposition of doing � fanning hatreds that could explode into another genocide. The opposition, in reply, insists it is merely speaking truths Kagame does not wish to hear.

Kagame, who was called the “Napoleon of Africa” during his march to power in the early 1990s, is acknowledged to have great military skills. His political skills are less tested. Between now and the election on 9 August, he must navigate a delicate course that will assure him three things: re-election, national stability and minimum damage to his reputation. This is to be his last campaign, since the Rwandan constitution limits presidents to two seven-year terms. How he conducts it will shape both his legacy and Rwanda’s future.

Source: Christopher Vourlias – March 4, 2010.

I returned to Kigali this week with the hopes of enjoying some downtime before heading to eastern Congo. Sadly, this was not to be the case. As I recently reported, things in everyone�s favorite central African autocracy have taken a turn for the dysfunctional of late, even by this region�s strange standards. Grenade attacks, coup rumors, renegade generals on the run. If it weren�t for the fact that there�s not a beach in sight, I would�ve sworn I was back in Bujumbura.

Happier times for Presidents Museveni and Kagame, seen here in 2008, before renegade, coup-plotting generals fled into Uganda and threatened to strain relations between the two countries

Front and center has been the bizarre case of Lieutenant-General Kayumba Nyamwasa, a former army chief of staff who � after rumored sightings in Uganda � has apparently resurfaced in South Africa after fleeing the country last week. Kayumba, who was until recently serving as Rwanda�s ambassador to India, has had a strained relationship with the RPF leadership, after he was allegedly linked to a failed coup attempt in 2003. The diplomatic posting seems to reflect the conventional wisdom in Kigali, which is to keep your friends close, your enemies closer, and your failed-coup leaders in India. Uganda�s Sunday Vision reported on Kayumba�s contentious relationship with the government, citing local reports linking him to the troubled Green Party, as well as rumors that �no government official or even fellow soldiers attended the funeral of [Kayumba's] mother recently,� which is a dark tiding indeed for a Rwandan political figure.

Yesterday, a clearly peeved PK gave a press conference here in Kigali, at which he dispelled any rumors that the fleeing general � as well as another former army officer, Patrick Karegeya � had been plotting a coup against him, according to South Africa�s Independent.

�Nobody, absolutely nobody, not even Kayumba, can carry out a coup here. Think about it and you�ll come to the conclusion no one can carry out a coup� in Rwanda, the president said.

�People can only dream about it, wish for it; I believe what I�m telling you,� Kagame said.

Kagame went on to add: �Never ever ever ever ever. Never. Ever.�

Kagame, who at a recent press conference ‘double-dog dared’ opponents to overthrow him

The press conference comes on the heels of an announcement by the Prosecutor General Martin Ngoga, who told reporters with a straight face on Tuesday that the Kigali grenade attacks of last month have now been linked to none other than Lt. Gen. Kayumba Nyamwasa and Patrick Karegyeya. This comes after officials stated just hours after the attacks that two suspects had been apprehended, and that, in the definitive words of police spokesman Eric Kayiranga, �they belong to the Interahamwe militia.�

The Rwanda News Agency comments on the sudden about-face.

When three grenades exploded in Kigali two weeks ago and another in Huye district a week before, Police Spokesman Superintendent Eric Kayiranga quickly said investigations showed that Rwandan FDLR rebels were behind them.

The link has not been raised again. On Tuesday, the National Prosecuting Authority suddenly claimed that Gen. Kayumba Nyamwasa and Col. Patrick Karegeya were behind the grenade attacks. On Wednesday, President Kagame said the link between these two scenarios might be possible.

Why would former RPF stalwarts now be canoodling with the Interahamwe? Exactly how many FDLR Hutus do you think are on Lt. Gen. Faustin Kayumba�s Christmas-card list?

Undeterred by the hilarity of their accusations, the RPF today released photographic evidence that Messrs. Kayumba and Karegeya are, indeed, plotting with Interahamwe militia. �We finally have our smoking gun,� said Kagame.

Interahamwe militia and rogue RPF elements plotting at a sidewalk cafe in eastern Congo, according to an investigative report by Rwanda’s New Times

The Kayumba saga comes against a backdrop of increasing intimidation and harassment of opposition politicians, as I�ve reported before. These have included threats most foul against at least three prominent opposition figures � Victoire Ingabire, of the FDU-Inkingi Party; Bernard Ntaganda, of the Parti Social-IMBERAKURI; and Frank Habineza, of the Democratic Green Party � and have (predictably) drawn outraged cries from the international community.

President Kagame, of course, has repeatedly defended his actions, citing the ever-present threat of Hutu rebels to the east and fifth columnists within. In an op-ed for The Guardian, Stephen Kinzer sums up the Kagame position.

He believes western human rights activists underestimate the prospects for a new outbreak of ethnic violence in Rwanda, as well as the danger of allowing ethnically charged speech. �We�ve lived this life,� he said angrily at a news conference. �We�ve lived the consequences. So we understand it better than anyone from anywhere else.�

The levels of intrigue here are�intriguing. Kagame is a master manipulator, who has repeatedly used the genocide as a pretext for bullying the international community and cracking down on internal dissent. The refrain of �we understand it better than anyone from anywhere else� has, in some form or other, become the de facto position of the Kagame administration. It is part of its us-against-the-world mentality, which has always included, as a lingering subtext, a reminder of how the West failed Rwanda during its darkest hour.

On a scale of one to 10, this man is not to be fucked with.

The president is a grand strategist, as PR-savvy as any American exec, and observers in this country are always forced to consider how a given event � whether it be grenade attacks in Kigali, or the return of a rabble-rousing exile � is being manipulated by the man upstairs. However damaging or threatening the latest news might seem, you know it is being redacted in His Excellency PK�s enigmatic noggin, before being regurgitated in a way that, ultimately, casts the Kagame regime in an ever more righteous light. Ingabire, for example, has been given a relatively free hand (by Rwandan standards) to state her case to the foreign press. But is Kagame simply holding back because the international spotlight is on her? Or is he playing a more patient hand, perhaps giving Ingabire enough rope to (metaphorically, of course) hang herself?

(The same laissez-faire attitude, unfortunately, has not been extended toward her erstwhile assistant, Joseph Ntawangundi, who just three days after being attacked alongside Ingabire, was promptly arrested and locked up on an outstanding warrant for crimes committed during the genocide.)

I�m not entirely sure what to make of these opposition leaders. Frank Habineza, President of the Democratic Green Party of Rwanda, for example, clumsily played the genocide card while appealing to the West to put pressure on Kagame for his repressive political tactics.

�We do not want the international community to wait, like it waited in 1994,� said Habineza, drawing a parallel that was unlikely to win him many fans. (You can hear more from Habineza here.)

Ingabire has not exactly shied away from the limelight.

And then there�s Ingabire. I�ve already written a bit about her political aspirations, after spending nearly 16 years in exile in Europe. The would-be president quickly stirred controversy by making some politically charged comments about Hutu victims at the genocide memorial. This more or less occurred while she still had crumbs from the in-flight meal on her chin.

Given such blatantly ethnic posturing � as well as some of the questionable figures looming in her background � it is hard to accept her intentions at face value. Likewise, the clumsy, stage-managed episode involving her supposed asylum request at the UK High Commission makes you wonder whether Ingabire isn�t as much a cool calculator as the man she hopes to dethrone. And you have to ask why someone so deeply concerned with the future of her country waited this long to return, anyway.

Recently Ingabire claimed that if the election were to be held tomorrow, the people would surely vote FDU into power, �because they know who we are.�

I don�t want to take anything away from the average man-on-the-collines here in Rwanda. I would like to give Rwandans � particularly the rural poor, who make up the bulk of this country�s population � the benefit of the doubt, and assume that, come August, they can and will calmly file to the polls with a selfless democratic spirit and full of only the highest of high-minded aspirations.

Unfortunately, that goes against everything I know about electoral politics in this region. Given the amount of time she has had to �campaign� in the country, I suspect most voters don�t know all that much about who Ingabire is. They simply know that she is a Hutu, and in a country where that group still holds a roughly 85 percent majority, she could very well be banking on the fact that that�s all they need to know. You can hardly blame the president, then, for being a bit concerned at the rumblings from below. And you have to wonder just what steps he might take in the next few months to suppress them.

Kigali – In an article published today under the title “NGO exposed after infighting”, The New Times, mouthpiece of Paul Kagame’s ruling party RPF, labels the Rwandan Human Rights Organization ADL as a “‘negationnists’ network“. For anybody who knows Rwanda, this is an accusation which has to be taken seriously.
ADL stands for Association Rwandaise pour la d�fense des Droits de la personne et des Libert�s publiques.
These accusations reveal how fragile the ADL is now. It is pointed out that the ADL is not properly registered and that its temporary authorization to operate expires in September this year. What does that mean?
Here is what The New Times writes about ADL.

An imminent �negationists� network� operating in Rwanda suspected of coordinating Genocide convicts with fugitives abroad and posturing as a local Human Rights organization, has been exposed by its members after a fall out.

Rwandan Association for the Defence of People�s Rights and Public Liberties (ADL) was formed in 1991 and receives funding from some groups in France.

Its activities involve conducting �shaddy� surveys on Genocide convicts to come up with reports that strongly criticize and abuse government policies.

Recently, members of ADL fell out over management of funds which led to some of them ganging up against the association�s chairperson, Cassien Kasire, and deposing him because he questioned how money was spent.

�It is an extremely negative association operating with outside negative groups against the government and posing as a human rights organization,� Kasire said in an interview with The Sunday Times.

Kasire has been heading the association for the last three years.

�Before I joined this association, people tried to close it and actually there were plans to plot for its closure, but I refused. My aim was to join it and change the radicals in the association,� said the embattled Kasire.

�Things turned out to be different when I got there. I realized that I was working with a team of extremists that could not easily be changed.�

Malicious reports

The association recently released a report on Local Government Performance Contracts and strongly criticized the whole practice.

The report, a copy of which The Sunday Times has obtained, brands the contracts as a �slavery� (uburetwa)
According to Kasire; �When I received a copy of the report I realized that the team that had compiled it had termed the whole exercise as slavery. I immediately called for an executive committee meeting and asked them to change the wording.�

�During the meeting, my deputy, Leonard Ngerageze, stood up in protest and accused me of having a double mission in the association claiming that I am taking the association to the RPF (party).�

�I told him (Ngerageze) that the aim of the association is not to destroy the country but to help in its construction through promoting human rights,� he added.

He said that the meeting of the Executive Committee ended without a consensus.

The association had received Rwf 5 million from the Great Lakes Human Rights body (LDGL) to conduct the survey.

Another organisation, Forum d�Aide Juridique (FAJ) according to Kasire, recently gave the association Rwf 28 million to conduct a survey on the situation of prisons in the country.

He said that members of the association were divided into different groups to conduct the survey.
�I learnt that Leopold Hakizimana who was working on Kibungo prison was actually doing something different from what we had agreed on;�

�He was gathering information from prisoners, manipulating it and sending reports to France through a friend called Andr� Barth�lemy who heads an association called AGIR Ensemble that is a strong critic of Gacaca,� said Kasire.

AGIR Ensemble released radical reports after the Nyamirambo Gacaca court sentenced a human rights activist, Francois Xavier Byuma, to 19 years in jail for his role in the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi.

Barth�lemy is said to be Hakizimana�s brother-in-law-to. Kasire claims that Hakizimana used to send information from prisons to his sister who would pass on the information to the husband.

�I had to stop Hakizimana by removing him from the surveying team. He was working with Beata Uwimpambere who strongly protested on behalf of her colleague. This was a clear indication that there was something fishy going on,� said Kasire.

He added that later, on February 20, Kasire called for a General Assembly to review an audit report on how funds meant for the prison survey were used.

�During the meeting, members of the committee admitted that they had misused the funds and I ordered them to refund the money.

My deputy, Ngerageze acknowledged that he embezzled about Rwf 210,000 but after this meeting, I was surprised to receive a text message from Ngerageze calling for an extra-ordinary meeting,� said Kasire.

He added that he never attended the meeting since it was not important for him and this is the same meeting that resolved to suspend him.

�The committee is organizing a general assembly to lobby for my eviction and I insist the intentions of these people are not promoting and defending human rights. Authorities should investigate this association,� said Kasire.

The Sunday Times learnt that ADL is currently not registered and still uses documents they acquired in 1991.
Recently, it acquired a temporary document from Nyarugenge District which will expire in September this year.

When contacted, Ngerageze refuted the allegations and instead blamed Kasire for being a dictator and �the reason why the association was failing�.

�I am surprised he is the one making those claims. He endorsed the performance contract report himself,� Ngerageze said.

�We sent him the report and asked him to make changes which he did not do,� Ngerageze charged.
He also refuted claims that he embezzled and diverted funds of the association.

�I have proof that all the funds were properly used. He should produce evidence against me because the audit report clearly shows how we effectively used the money,� he said.

�I personally don�t find any problem with talking to prisoners. We sought permission and got it. This man has a problem that we could not tolerate.�

Ngerageze however could not clearly state the differences between him, the committee and Kasire.
He instead claimed that Kasire is a dictator and that he was not going to tolerate him.

Rwandan Criminals Wanted

The now fugitive Rwandan General Kayumba Nyamwasa dismissed the indictment issued by the French Judge Jean-Louis Bruguiere saying:
- The indictment document is “rubbish”.
- �How can it happen? It is not an international court. He (Brugiere) is not an international judge.�
- Bruguiere is an “obscure juge”.
- “Those times are gone when they can indict and deport sovereign nationals.”
This was reported by V. Sudarshan of Outlook India. The indicted criminal Nyamwasa was then Rwandan Ambassador to India.
Here is the full article from Outlook India:

When he turned on the radio last Thursday, some unlikely news greeted the Rwandan Ambassador to India, Lt. Gen. Kayumba Nyamwasa. A French court had indicted him for war crimes. The court, presided over by France�s top anti-terrorist judge, Jean-Louis Brugiere, named Amb. Nyamwasa as having a direct role in the assassination that killed Rwandan president Juvenal Habyarimana in April �94 and triggered the Rwandan genocide.

Judge Brugiere, nicknamed the �Sheriff� for his erstwhile penchant to carry a Magnum pistol, is famous for rounding up a number of terrorist suspects. He played a crucial role in bringing to book Carlos the Jackal and Libyan officials convicted of blowing up planes in the �80s. This time he wants Rwandan President Paul Kagame and his military aides, including (then) Col. Nyamwasa, brought before a UN court to be tried for war crimes and genocide. He is convinced that President Kagame instructed his Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) to destroy the plane in which President Habyarimana and the President of Burundi were travelling.

�The investigations undertaken have clearly shown that, for the RPF, the physical elimination of President Juvenal Habyarimana was the necessary precondition for seizing power by force, and was inscribed in a vast plan worked out to this end,� reads the indictment. �The final order�was given by Paul Kagame himself in a meeting held in Mulindi on March 31, 1994.�

�It is like a judge in Haryana indicting (President) Chirac to appear in court somewhere in Haryana for an alleged crime without proof,�

Amb. Nyamwasa told Outlook India, in response.

�How can it happen? It is not an international court. He (Brugiere) is not an international judge.�

Brugiere is trying the case because the family members of the French-national pilot and crew members approached the French court in 1998 to ask for an investigation to determine who was responsible for the attack.

According to a report by international agency Human Rights Watch (HRW), President Habyarimana died on April 6, 1994, when the plane bringing him home from Dar-es-Salaam was shot down. He had been attending a meeting of heads of state where he had consented to put in place a broad-based transitional government. The president of Burundi, Cyprien Ntaryamira, who also attended the meeting, decided to fly home in President Habyarimana�s plane rather than in his own. He too died in the attack as did General Deogratias Nsabimana, Chief of Staff of the Rwandan army, along with several others. The plane was shot twice as it was coming in for a landing by surface to air missiles fired from a location on top of a hill near the Kigali airport. The Rwandan army later stated it recovered two missile launchers. The registration numbers on the launchers identified them as SAM-16s, sophisticated weapons that require some training to use.

Judge Brugiere�s indictment, released last week, plunged already strained relations between Paris and Kigali into a diplomatic impasse. Rwanda has since shut down its diplomatic mission in Paris and ordered all French diplomats out of the country. When contacted, the French embassy in India declined to be drawn into the issue, merely stating that the judiciary in France was independent.

How the arrest warrants will be implemented remains to be seen. Rwanda�s Ministry of Justice has already called upon Interpol member states not to give weight to the warrants. At the time of writing, it wasn�t clear what views the mea had on the subject. When asked if he thought the Indian government would act on the warrant, Amb. Nyamwasa said,

�India is a democracy with a functioning government and an independent Parliament and judiciary. It won�t take orders from an obscure French judge. Colonialism is over. Those times are gone when they can indict and deport sovereign nationals. We are independent nations.�

In fact, claims Amb. Nyamwasa, �those named did not commit this crime at all. They weren�t part of the army guarding him (the late president). On the contrary, he (President Habyarimana) was being guarded by French troops. The judge should be indicting them instead.�
…
Amb. Nyamwasa is still reportedly reading through the document (in French)�which a friend sent him. He�s yet to read all of it, but prima facie he finds it rubbish. �This judge has even got my name wrong,� he says. �I�m identified as Faustin Nyamwasa-Kayumba. I�m not Faustin. Were the Interpol to come inquiring, I�d have to tell them I�m not Faustin.�

As for the actual charges, the ambassador claims,

�The day it happened, I was about 100 km away, in Mulindi, Byumba. This judge alleges that one time I attended a meeting when we planned to kill the president. The source of this information is about fifth-hand. He has not asked us to substantiate it. Not one of his witnesses is first-hand. How do you rely on this sort of information as a basis of indictment? There was no such meeting. There was no such plan anyway.�

Amb. Nyamwasa claims the French government is behind all this. �It�s what they wanted him (the judge) to do,� he says.

�Rwanda is an African republic where the French have repeatedly carried out coup d�etats year in and year out. If they had wanted it, they could have sent whatever evidence they had to Arusha (where a separate inquiry into the genocide is under way). France is causing problems in Cote d�Ivoire. Can Cote d�Ivoire now indict President Chirac?�

Ambassador Nyamwasa, who became a colonel in the Rwandan Patriotic Army in 1993, was Deputy Chief of Staff of the National Gendarmerie in 1994 and has been accredited with the Indian government since April of last year. Ironically, he has been to France�Normandy to be precise�for military exercises as part of a joint training team. This was back in 2001, even as the investigation was under way. But he�s not going back there in any hurry, at least not in the near future.

Source: http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?233375

Victoire Ingabire

On 24th February, Mr Andrew Mwenda (independent.co.ug) published an article titled �Will Ingabire be Rwanda�s saviour?�.
I do not share the view of Mr Andrew Mwenda on Mrs Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza. Mrs Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza is a very responsible politician, keen to take the bull i.e. Rwandan tragic past, by its horns in order to forge a better future.

The line of argument developed by Andrew M Mwenda that Mrs Ingabire political stand is irresponsible, rests on questionable assumptions and wrong historical comparison, a false interpretation of the statements made by Victoire on her arrival in Rwanda and a limited understanding of the terms of the debate that Victoire presents as opposed to the political discourse imposed by the incumbent regime.

Questionable assumptions and comparisons.

The statement that it is irresponsible for Victoire to �say that those who ended genocide should stand with those who orchestrated it� and �that victims of genocide should be tried alongside its architects� is based on a misinterpretation of her statement and underlying denial of justice to all Rwandans irrespective of ethnic affiliation. As far as I heard and read Victoire stated that those who committed genocide against Tutsi should be brought to book according to the law and added that for genuine reconciliation to take place once each Rwandan�s pain need to be acknowledged and those who committed war crimes and crimes against humanity against Hutus be tried. I find this to be a normal demand to end impunity which is the root cause of the instability in the Great Lakes region. Denying justice to thousands of people who lost their loved ones is divisive, discriminatory and undermines reconciliation. Crime of genocide, however horrendous, should not give a blank cheque to commit other crimes with impunity especially when the crimes were committed in a coordinated, systematic and premeditated manner. It beats my imagination to equate the call for justice to thousands of Hutus to denying genocide against Tutsi.
What Victoire is saying is no different from what the public is asking, the international community and well wishers for stability in Rwanda have been advancing.
The UN Commission of Experts concluded in its preliminary and final reports (S/1994/1125 and S/1994/1405) on which the Security Council Resolution 955 that set up the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) point out that �during the war that followed the assassination of President Habyarimana

“Individuals from both sides to the armed conflict in Rwanda during the period from 6 April 1994 to 15 July 1994 perpetrated serious breaches of international humanitarian law, in particular of obligations set forth in Article 3 common to the four Geneva Conventions and relating to the protection of victims of non-international armed conflicts of 8 June 1977 and that Individuals from both sides to the armed conflict perpetrated crimes against humanity;�.

A report by UNHCR Team headed by Robert Gersony estimated that from April to August 1994, the Rwandan Patriotic Front systematically killed between 25,000 and 45,000 Hutus as it made its way toward Kigali.
According to Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International:

“The crimes committed by RPF soldiers were so systematic and widespread and took place over so long a period of time that commanding officers must have been aware of them.”
…
“RPF soldiers massacred unarmed civilians, many of them women and children, who had assembled for a meeting on their orders”

(Human Rights Watch: http://www.hrw.org/reports/1999/rwanda/Geno1-3-03.htm#P86_35545).

These killings are not just spontaneous anger because in doing so one would excuse the killings carried out by the presidential guard after learning that their President was killed by a Tutsi led rebel movement.

The RPF army is accused of having killed at least four thousand unarmed civilians in Kibeho camp for the internally displaced. See Witness to Genocide — A Personal Account of the 1995 Kibeho Massacre.

In addition, during its invasion of what was then called Zaire, it is estimated that the Rwandan soldiers killed more than 200,000 Hutu refugees. A report by a chillean Roberto Garreton who led investigation was diluted on orders of some powerful members of the Security Council, and forced to remove any suggestion that what happened was genocide, for fear that it would bring trouble to the RPF regime.

In a letter written to the Security Council on the 6th of June 2006, FILDH (F�d�ration Internationale des Ligues des Droits de l�Homme), Human Rights Watch, Lawyers Committee for Human Rights and Rencontre Africaine pour la D�fense des Droits de l�Homme, drew the attention of the Security Council to the fact that in 1994, the RPA killed thousands of civilians, in the process committing war crimes and crimes against humanity, crimes well documented, including by a U.N. Commission of Experts which concluded that the RPA had

�perpetrated serious breaches of international humanitarian law and crimes against humanity.� They warned that �only if the ICTR dispenses justice fully, impartially, and to all parties will it fulfil the purpose for which the Security Council established it, contributing to peace and reconciliation in the region�.

Calling statement made by Victoire Ingabire

Calling for the prosecution of elements of the RPF who committed crimes against humanity should not be construed as asking that �victims of genocide should be tried alongside its architects�. Victims of the genocide are different from criminals who killed Hutu in their thousands. RPF is a political military organisation with a political programme and those who committed crimes should answer them individually. Besides, though it was dominated by Tutsi elite it is not synonymous with Tutsi ethnic group, in the same way that the Hutu led government or the Hutu who killed Tutsi are not synonymous with Hutu ethnic group. Criminals are criminals independent of their ethnic affiliation and should face the law. The International Tribunal for former Yugoslavia has tried criminals from all sides. There is no reason why RPF should be an exception. Double standards based on ethnicity is unacceptable not whistle-blowing to end injustice.

The RPF does not deserve the moral high ground of having stopped genocide.

The UN report that set up ICTR pointed out that the shooting down of the plane that had on board the Presidents of Rwanda and Burundi and their suite triggered the genocide. Though nothing can justify the heinous crime of genocide, the person or persons who carried out that terrorist act are partly responsible for the genocide for they would have known the grave consequences of such a heinous act.

The former U.S. Ambassador to Rwanda, Robert Flatten, testified in June 2005 at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda that he personally warned Gen. Kagame and Pres. Habyarimana that if either resumed war by breaking the Arusha Accords cease fire, they would be responsible for thousands of civilian casualties from retaliatory killings that U.S. State Department documents predicted should the war resume…similar to killings that swept Burundi/Rwanda in 1988.

There is a strong suggestion that the RPF is responsible for it and therefore shared responsibility in the genocide. A French anti terrorist judge Jean-Louis Brugui�re has confirmed this and issued international arrest warrants against the culprits. A Spanish judge, Fernando Andreu, has come to the same conclusion.

Even when the catastrophe struck, the RPF deliberately blocked all attempts to intervene to stop the genocide.

The RPF rejected the invitation made by the military crisis committee, set up on the 7th April 94, for a meeting on the 8th April 1994 with committee, through the UN troops Commander General Dallaire, to discuss how to handle the new crisis. RPF responded by starting a full-scale war on all the fronts, 4 hours before the planned meeting.

The former Deputy UN troops commander in Rwanda Col. Marshall made it clear when testifying before the Criminal International Tribunal for Rwanda on 2/12/2006 that the RPF main preoccupation was military victory at any cost and not to save Tutsi in Rwanda:

�From my experience, my conclusion is that the RPF (Rwandan Patriotic Front) had one goal, seizing power by force and keeping it to themselves�,
�For me, it is the Rwandan Patriotic Front which has perpetrated the attack (shooting the presidential aircraft). Not once, never have I sensed the desire to make concessions, to smooth rough edges, to reach a consensus�.

On the 8th April 19994, the RPF asked all foreign troops to quit within 48 hours declaring they would be considered as enemy combatant if they stayed longer. The Security Council under the pressure of the US, the UK and Belgium, decided to reduce dramatically the UN troops.

On the 12th of April 1994 the RPF rejected a truce offered by the governmental forces in order to fight those who were carrying out massacres of civilian population. Army communiqu� calling on RPA dialogue was signed by Ntiwiragabo, Muberuka, Kanyamanza, Murasampongo, Rwabalinda, Hakizimana, Rwamanywa, Kanyandekwe and Gatsinzi Marcel, now Minister of Defence in Rwanda.
On the contrary the RPF dispatched Dusaidi and Muligande to New York to prevent any foreign intervention.

On the 15th April, a meeting organised by Jacques Bobooh, UN representative, failed to broker a ceasefire because the RPF was deliberately putting forward impossible preconditions, one of which was to ask the army to denounce the interim government and to immediately prosecute those who had committed massacres.

According to Human Rights Watch, on the 30th of April the RPF made a statement opposing UN initiatives for a deployment of international forces in order to help curb the massacres of civilians. Human Rights Watch reveals

�When the Security Council discussed sending a larger peacekeeping force to Rwanda with a broader mandate to protect civilians, the RPF feared that the force might interfere with its goal of military victory. Its leaders may have been particularly concerned that the French might use the force to protect the interim government. Instead of welcoming the move and urging speedy implementation, the RPF spokesman in Brussels opposed it and asserted that there were no more Tutsi to be saved�.

But as HRW testifies thousands of Tutsi were still hiding or in churches calling for help (1999 annual report).

On May 5, 1994, The Washington Times wrote:

“The rebel Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF) commander said yesterday a U.N. force cannot bring peace to his blood-soaked country and only a guerrilla victory will end the massacres”.

It took another two months for the RPF to take over the country.
Gen. Dallaire, commander of the UN forces in Rwandan (UNAMIR), testified under oath before the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, that Gen. Paul Kagame told him that those civilian killings are “collateral damage” for his war plan.

On 12 November 2005 the RPF spokesman Mr Severian Sebasoni told BBC Great Lakes radio that RPF objectives was not to be like Red Cross saving people but to take the power.

The issue of ethnicity in Rwanda

Andrew M. Mwenda points out that �given the emotive power of ethnicity especially in Rwanda, it is easy to rally a political following by making ethnic claims, something that is �also extremely dangerous�. If a claim to justice for all is �extremely dangerous� in a society, then there must be something fundamentally wrong that must be addressed for such society to survive.

My view is that the Rwandan society must take the bull by its horns by accepting its past looking at it critically and accept each one�s responsibility. Throwing the bucket at each other for what went wrong in Rwanda does not help nor does the story line of the good and bad guys portraying Hutus as �Hutus extremist killers, while the Tutsis of the RPF are portrayed as avenging angels, who swooped in from their bases in Uganda to stop the genocide�

I believe that ethnicity is not a problem in itself; the problem is lack of the rule of law, democracy and equal opportunity. Once the three conditions are present, the importance of ethnicity will disappear.

It is an open secret that the RPF has used the slogan on national unity to prevent any criticism of its policies and to stifle dissenting voices. This cannot augur well for the future of the country. It can only push dissenting voices underground.

Dr Susan thomson

For most ordinary Rwandans, life since the genocide has not been as pleasant as the country’s authorities would pretend.

That is what clearly appears in the article “False Reconciliation” published by Susan Thomson (SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellow, School of Political Studies, University of Ottawa). Here is what she writes:

As Rwanda gears up for Presidential elections in August, it is a good time to reflect on the progress the country has made since the genocide in 1994, both in image and in reality.

By most popular accounts, Rwanda is a nation rehabilitated. Diplomats and journalists talk of President Paul Kagame�s phenomenal success in rebuilding the once-shattered country.

The capital, Kigali, boasts a modern airport, several international hotels, a modern ICT infrastructure, and countless new residential and commercial properties. Numerous caf�s and nightclubs have opened, catering to the city�s growing middle class of bureaucrats and businesspeople. Kigali�s crime rate is low and its streets are clean.

In the Rwandan Parliament, women hold 56 per cent of seats, the highest proportion of female representation in the world. Tony Blair is a presidential advisor and international dignitaries, including Bill Clinton, Bill Gates, and Howard Schultz of Starbucks, frequent the country.

Kagame is praised as a benevolent and thoughtful leader who cares deeply about his people. His policies have reconciled the Hutu perpetrators of the genocide with Tutsi survivors. Community-based gacaca courts have processed more than 100,000 Hutu accused of acts of genocide with most successfully reintegrated into society.

But most foreign visitors do not see the deep poverty and daily hardships that confront ordinary Rwandans. For most of them, Hutu and Tutsi alike, life since the genocide is not as bright and shiny as the authorities in Kigali would pretend.

Some 90 per cent of Rwandans are peasants who rely on subsistence agriculture. Few of them have benefited from the country’s rapid reconstruction. The gap between the wealthy urbanites and the poor rural dwellers is on the increase. Government policies favour the urban elite, many of whom are Tutsi who returned to the country after the genocide.

The vast majority of Rwandan women and men who survived the genocide remain extremely poor, politically marginal, and, in many cases, traumatised by what they lived through. Almost 95 per cent of Rwandans in the country during the genocide have post-traumatic stress disorder. Few receive government-sponsored counselling or support.

With rare exceptions, Rwandan peasants are thin, their eyes lacklustre from continued hunger, with weathered hands and faces, giving them the appearance of being older than their actual age. Some have orange hair, a telltale sign of malnutrition. Many go barefoot and dressed in ragged clothes � often the extent of their wardrobe.

Most of the Rwandans I spoke to lamented the constant struggles of everyday life since the genocide. For them, there is a lack of food, clean water, and affordable and proximate health services.

Increasing levels of authoritarianism by the ruling Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) stifle any attempts to address these inequalities.

Public space for free and open political expression is limited. The media and civil society operate at the behest of the RPF. Any individual or group that challenges the official government version of Rwanda as a rehabilitated nation, peaceful and secure, is harshly dealt with.

Opposition politicians, journalists, and ordinary folk alike who criticize the government are all subject to harassment, intimidation, disappearance, and, in extreme cases, death. Just ask Joseph Sebarenzi, the former Speaker of the House. Kagame forced him into exile in 2001 for his efforts to constitutionally limit the powers of the president. He writes about his experience in his recent book “God Sleeps in Rwanda“.

Instead of allowing for frank and open discussion of the genocide, the RPF has forced reconciliation upon the people. They make Hutu tell the truth about what they did during the genocide, and make Tutsi forgive them. Reconciliation is not a sincere affair of the heart; it is an administrative matter.

The ordinary Rwandans I talked with are more than just skeptical about the government�s commitment to reconciliation; they also recognise it as a form of social control.

As Olive, a Hutu widow whose Tutsi husband died during the genocide told me, �All these confessions are a program of the government. Hutu confess to get free. But we know what happened! We were there in 1994. Not all who killed get justice � the government pardons them for reconciliation. Not all who didn�t kill go free � the government puts them in prison for reconciliation. What kind of peace is this? It is not from the heart.�

Local officials harass and intimidate those who fail to embrace this reconciliation; anyone who questions the sincerity of it can be imprisoned.

This is not a process grounded in an enlightened vision of peace and security. Instead, it forces Rwandans to remain silent and to not question the RPF version of peace and security. Rwandans are only simulating reconciliation as a means of coping with the demands of their government. As Jeanne, a Tutsi widow, said, �There can be no peace in the heart if there is no peace in the stomach.�

For many ordinary Rwandans, this has been an alienating, oppressive and sometimes humiliating experience � something that could, paradoxically, crystallize and create stronger dissent in the future, perhaps erupting into violence as early as August 2010 when Rwandans go to the polls again.