Indigenous knowledge, a cultural heritage from Rwandan ancestors to solve problems, helped Rwanda deliver on the Gacaca court system which, in 10 years, tried more than 1.9 million crimes related to the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, researchers said during an international conference in Kigali on May 3.

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Alice Karekezi, a Rwandan academic who is a member of the Scientific Committee of the Council for the Development of Social Sciences Research in Africa, showcased the Gacaca justice system at the international sciences conference in Kigali. The conference was organised by the International Network for Governmental Science Advice (INGSA), a global network for anyone interested in how knowledge informs the forces that shape people’s lives.

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Karekezi was speaking in a side event, organized by the Organisation of Southern Cooperation (OSC), under the theme: Bridging Worlds of Knowledge – Promoting Endogenous Knowledge Development. Endogenous knowledge is an integration of indigenous knowledge and exogenous knowledge (knowledge constructed from one's current environment) while OSC is an organization established in 2020 by Latin American, Caribbean, African, Asian and Middle Eastern countries to contribute to the equitable, just, and prosperous social transformation of societies.

The panel discussions, in which Rwanda’s Gacaca courts system was showcased by Karekezi, explored the integration of endogenous knowledge systems into scientific research, policy development, decision-making, and societal transformation. The researchers shared best practices, challenges, and opportunities in building bridges between academic and non-academic knowledge domains.

After the 1994 Genocide against Tutsi when over one million people were killed, Rwanda initiated the Gacaca courts to handle genocide crimes. Gacaca is a home-grown community-based justice system.

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Through Gacaca courts, Rwandans proved the capacity to solve their own problems, to mend the social fabric, and reveal the truth about the Genocide which had been prepared for a long-time. Gacaca courts were used as one of the ways to get rid of impunity and a lesson to respect human rights, especially the right to life and equality of all Rwandans before the law.

The Gacaca justice system officially closed in 2012, after trying more than 1.9 million Genocide crimes in 10 years.

"Thirty years ago, the question of endogenous knowledge was on the table in Rwanda. Not as a rhetorical question but as a question of survival. This country has been in issues and we have experienced how, first of all, mobilising endogenous knowledge and bridging it has worked for Rwanda,” Karekezi said.

She explained that the elderly could sit and elect people of integrity to handle Gacaca cases.

"There have been results. If we speak about endogenous knowledge, I want to speak about justice and reconciliation regarding the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi. Gacaca has been utilized as practice of conflict management. Gacaca was a communal way to deal with conflict in the community. It has been used as a system of justice after genocide combining retributive and restorative aspect where communities adjudicated on genocide crimes. It had been used during pre-colonial times,” she said.

Gacaca archives have been proposed for UNESCO’s heritage list.

She insisted that cultural heritage to deal with problems can be adapted to present day issues to solve problems in the Global South.

"Countries can solve problems in their context. It is an ideological war and it should not be neglected,” she added.

Rwanda’s indigenous knowledge in health treatment

Marie-Christine Gasingirwa, a Rwandan biomedical and pharmaceutical scientist, said that indigenous knowledge in Rwanda in medicinal plants should secure increased investment and finance to boost health research in treating different diseases in Rwanda and the world.

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"Indigenous knowledge is useful in the health sector. Indigenous knowledge such as the Gacaca system helped solve our problems. When Covid-19 came some people used indigenous knowledge in treating themselves. We need enough money to have our people engaged in research using their indigenous knowledge to achieve more in the pharmaceutical industry without relying on people from the North who dictate what they want in their research. Africa spends less than one per cent of GDP for research,” she noted.

Manssour Bin Mussallam, the OSC Secretary-General, said there is a need to effectively apply endogenous knowledge from the Global South.

The Global South refers to the nations of the world which are regarded as having a relatively low level of economic and industrial development. According to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the Global South broadly comprises Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, Asia (excluding Israel, Japan, and South Korea), and Oceania (excluding Australia and New Zealand).