Most, if not all, of Rwandans would not wish to look back into the mirror of our past, a past that was a fate we found ourselves in not because of our failures, mistakes, or any other reason that could remotely justify that state, but one that dehumanised us so much so that anyone who would want a people to go back to the same deserves a punishment that is as brutal as the same past or even worse. I personally have no kind words and I will not play politics here (I am not good at that anyway) nor diplomacy, for doing so would discount the enormity of  critical national issues at stake and trivialise an otherwise heinous past, and an uncertain future ahead of us.

Renegades turned political opportunist

When you look at the behavior of the likes of Kayumba Nyamwasa, Gerald Gahima and his brother Dr Theogene Rudasingwa, and most of bizarre of them, David Himbara (Dr), one finds a common strand, among others, why they had to leave the country: extreme accountability failures. Period.

Of course, there are other specific reasons that made these renegades turn into the so-called ‘oppositionists’ or rather opportunists  as if failure to account is a basic qualification to become an ‘opposionists’ and some people even believe them without doing simple checks why they are what they are today. These are the same people that in the yesteryears praised the very system that they now admonish with venom akin to diabolic hatred that is only told in biblical literature of fallen ‘angels’. Now, these are characters who are consulted by people with ‘hidden’ agenda to define Rwanda. It’s like asking a priest or pastor to consult a fallen angel, and what they would expect from such consultations. Or perhaps consulting ISIS generals whether Iraqis or Syrians what they think of President Obama or Prime Minister Cameron; you can only guess what would come out of these consultations. Yet these equally renegade characters are consulted even by such reputable media organisations as BBC and VOA on what Rwanda was in the past, or is today! What would a reasonable mortal expect of them? 

Of course some so-called experts in outer world will not bother to do a background check on these renegades for their sentiments are aligned to their own malicious schemes that will only remain in their conscious. The train left the station – its one way traffic – and will certainly reach the destination no matter the valleys and hills ahead, or storms to weather, etc. Looking at Rwanda’s past, the future can only get better.  Rwanda will move on, it is greater than all of us as individuals or a group of misguided individuals no matter their faith coated wishes that will never be realised.

Rwanda is perhaps the only country where failure of accountability turns an individual into a bizarre ‘opposionists’/critic, and most media out there will consult them for comments on issues they failed to account for or even deliver on to the extent that an individual who was a total failure in a system becomes an expert in the same or assumed area he failed to deliver on.

The case of Himbara

Take the example of Himbara who claims everything he has never been and is always on air on international media making all sorts (especially BBC and VOA Kinyarwanda versions) of comments on Rwanda, which he least understood at least from the point of view of those who worked with him and thus knew him as a total failure that only passed on his failure tag to others to mask his incapacities.

His arrogance to senior government officials is well known, and was displayed for all to see in high level government meetings, including several retreats where he had the audacity to pass judgment on issues he was not qualified to do (as will be pointed out in the next article). In fact, he has deserted his job twice, all for financial reasons. The recent one was even more appalling for he engineered a consultancy contract from an international organisation in Rwanda that was to pay him US$15,000 per month (ten times the salary of a Rwandan Cabinet Minister) for capacity building as he put it. When this scam was busted and stopped, Mr Himbara took the next flight to self imposed exile, where he now questions everything he used to praise while in public service. If this is not the epitome of accountability failure, which those giving him the credence he does not deserve ignore and yet this is one of the virtues held with high esteem in the west, I don’t know what is.   And so the reasons he now advances are lame excuses to cover up his love for financial gains at the expense of taxpayers.

Now this is the latest expert on everything Rwanda, and all international media refer to him to know what is happening in Rwanda which he is most least placed to do. This is no witch-hunt but facts on the substance of Mr Himbara who has taken it upon himself to wrongly pass judgment on people and institutions he is least qualified to.

The writer is a former cabinet minister and currently an economist and financial expert based in Kigali.

nshutim@gmail.com.