A negationist justice?
All the versions of this article:
[English]
[Español]
[français]
[Kinyarwanda]
The Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda was foretold many times by political leaders, starting with a 1963 speech by former President Kayibanda. President Juvenal Habyarimana similarly announced on 30 October 1990 that Rwanda’s Tutsi faced genocide. Just before the RPF attack, the president had declared that he would avenge any of his men who fell on the field of battle. On whom did he intend that such vengeance should fall? The innocent, of course. All began with massacres of Tutsi in Byumba, followed by those of the Bagogwe. One then remembers the arrest, on 5 October 1990, of thousands of Tutsi, including school children in their classes. In Nyamirambo, people were rounded up, tortured and crammed in the regional stadium where, eventually, they were reduced to eating grass. Our families had nothing to eat but grass, and it is impossible that I will ever forget the experience. That journey invariably led into Kigali’s notorious “1930” prison, so named because it was built by the Belgians in 1930. How many, you may ask, managed to come out of there? I would like to ask the UN, were you not there? Do you remember the HRW’s visit to the home of Kajerijeri, a former burgomaster from Northern Rwanda, in whose garden they found a mass grave? Has the UN forgotten this? I have not. Those who were in Rwanda at the time will recall the buses used to transport arms, including machetes, to different parts of the country from 1993. We were there; we saw what was happening and raised the alarm, but the UN decided that the seized weapons should be returned to the regime; the one bent on genocide. Today, pseudo Rwanda experts assert that the ICTR has not proven the planning of the genocide against Rwanda’s Tutsi. So, one asks, how should we call what happened: inter-tribal massacres? Was it, as the genocidaires prefer to claim, a case of large-scale massacres for which the RPF should be held responsible; projecting, in this manner, their own crime onto the only ones who fought to stop them? This has, in essence, been the sum of their defense. It flies in the face of a 2 April 1994 report by Belgian intelligence, “Etudes sur les milices Interahamwes”, that these militias had been tasked with identifying all Tutsi families. Who says list, says planning; who says planning, says intent to act. I discern where the UN is heading. It wants to one day be able to deny the Genocide; to be able to claim that there was never a plan for the genocide against the Tutsi. And that, therefore, since there was never a plan, there couldn’t have been genocide. Let the alarm ring out: where there is no justice, vigilantism emerges in its place. The UN’s inability to deliver justice has only fed conflicts around the world. And yet if we, the genocide survivors, tried to give ourselves justice, we would be accused of vengeance. It is already more than 15 years since we have been waiting for justice. Throughout that time, survivors have been killed again and again or have succumbed to such consequences of the genocide as women dying from having been raped and infected with HIV/AIDS. And while these women victims have been dying untended, the UN has been busying itself caring for the rapists.
How many survivors, returning from testifying in Arusha, have been killed by prisoners’ relatives? And how many concerted efforts have we seen to dismiss us as Rwandan government stooges in order to devalue our testimonies, despite the fact that that same government and the Tribunal have been cooperating closely? Today, one of the masterminds of the Genocide, Protais Zigiranyirazo, whose name struck us with so much terror we could only refer to him as “Mister Z”, has now been released, we are told for breach of due process. God knows this would not be for the first time. The ICTR has at almost the same time also acquitted another notorious genocidaire, Father Hormisdas Nsengimana; if this man is innocent, we will probably be told, all other priests similarly suspected of involvement in the Genocide should be too! This is mind-boggling! Where are we headed when the most important architects of the Genocide can remain free in countries which have signed on to the Geneva Convention? As if to distract, we see a coincidental arrest of FDLR leaders, probably with the aim of releasing them only the following day. And as if it were a coup de grâce, Pierre Péan, a French writer, wins an appeal case for defaming the Tutsi in a book in which he claims they are trained to be liars from birth. Genocidaires and genocide deniers are acclaimed from all sides, not least by the UN and France. In view of Pierre Pean’s portrayal of Tutsi children, the world could be forgiven to think that their extermination was justified since they represent a danger for humanity. Oh why? We are exhausted; truly very exhausted. But I solemnly promise, you the mighty leaders of the UN, whether there remains a thousand or even just one survivor, we are not ready to abandon the fight. You may no doubt think that, since we are alone and forsaken by you and the world, biology should resolve the issue; that we will get old and stop being a problem. Let me assure you, however, you would be wrong to believe so; for we are determined to carry on.
I sometimes weep at the extent of the torture the UN is prepared to inflict on Tutsi genocide survivors. The organisation seems to have fast forgotten that for the prosecution of those responsible for the Shoah, it was never considered necessary to have to bring Auschwitz survivors to testify at the Nuremberg trials. I have lost everything I hold dear, including the essence of myself, since the extermination of my children and their being dumped in mass graves like so much filth. Genocide, alternatively called “work” or “cleaning” by the killers, designated my children into dirt in Rwanda. I lost my husband and everything of value in this life; I am not ready to surrender; kill me if you will instead of torturing me. Put our orphans and our widows in jail in Arusha in place of the killers, for we are guilty of having suffered genocide. At least then, we shall be able to eat three times a day. At least we shall have a shelter. At least we genocide survivors will be cared for. Oh, you can’t? They why not kill us and finish the job? How can one explain the fact that a tribunal with a budget of over 100 million dollars each year, with more than 267 dollars for 2008 alone, is incapable of rendering us justice? How can it be that a tribunal created in 1995 has since that time only completed 30 trials for genocide of more than a million victims in three months? The Arusha “justice” is not justice for us the victims, but rather for you of the masters of United Nations. This tribunal was in reality solely created to cleanse your consciences. It is a justice which does not heal; it is one which refuses to accept us, the victims, as legitimate civil complainants in the proceedings but only as simple witnesses. Our interest is represented by a prosecutor whom we had no hand in choosing, while the killers of our loved ones have at their disposal several lawyers of their choice. This is a court that requires us to have to fly to a foreign country to testify as to what has been inflicted on us. But above all, it is a justice which provides no possibility of reparations for the victims. What kind of justice do you truly think you are rendering? Justice that provides no reparation and healing for the victim can be nothing more than additional injustice. Excuse me for such anger, it cannot equal the fury of the genocidaires faced with the innocence of their victims, or the grief of a mother in the face of what her children had to suffer. Our people say no one can put on trial he who has buried him. But they also have a more positive corollary, that no matter how long the night might seem day is sure to come. Brussels, November 18th 2009 Yolande Mukagasana, genocide survivor.