At the height of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, one of the most daring acts one would do was hiding or helping a Tutsi to run for dear life.

But some people took the risk anyway.

Félicité Niyitegeka was one of them.

Then a member of Auxiliaries of the Apostolate, better known as ‘Abakobwa ba Musenyeri’ in the Roman Catholic Church, could have looked the other way just like many priests and faithful.

But she did not.

Auxiliaries of the Apostolate is an order of lay women who choose to live a celibate life in service to the Church and dedicate their lives to spreading the gospel.

Unlike nuns, members of the Auxiliaries of the Apostolate do not live in convents but among communities and can do ordinary jobs.

During the Genocide, Niyitegeka was the head of Centre Saint Pierre, a charitable home under Nyundo Catholic Diocese in Gisenyi (Rubavu District).

She was aware of the risks of standing up to the marauding killers – backed by the government of the time – including death.

According to close friends and those whom she saved, Niyitegeka believed that if she was able to save even a single life, then it was her duty to do so.

The ultimate price

Born in 1934, Félicité Niyitegeka was the daughter of Simon Sekabwa and Angelina Nyirampabuka.

In Gisenyi, where she worked at the charitable home, she lived in town just a few metres from the Grande Barriere Border Post between Rwanda and Democratic Republic of Congo.

According testimonies, Niyitegeka used her ‘limited power’ to offer shelter to fleeing Tutsi and helping others escape to the then Zaїre (present-day Democratic Republic of Congo. 

She paid the ultimate price.

The late Niyitegeka, a national heroine under the Imena category, was killed on April 21, 1994 while trying to save Tutsi who sought asylum at the centre.

"She saved my life along with 15 others,” recollected Adria Umurangamirwa, one of those she saved.

Niyitegeka, she recalled, "bribed a soldier with an amount of money I did not get to know so he could let us cross into the Congo; that is how I survived.”

Early April 1994, Niyitegeka was hosting a retreat at Centre Saint Pierre for members of Auxiliaries of the Apostolate.

Some of the participants were Tutsi. Many did not return to their homes as killings started shortly after.

They remained at the centre where they were joined by many other Tutsi from neighbouring areas desperate for refuge.

Before long, Niyitegeka would begin planning their escape into the Congo.

‘If God saves us, as we hope,

we shall see each other tomorrow’

All the while she was defending the refugees at her charitable home – even confronting the Interahamwe militia.

Initially, the militia were scared to raid Centre Saint Pierre because Niyitegeka had a brother who was a senior officer in the army (FAR).

But her feared brother, Col. Alphonse Nzungize, came to learn of this and sent his escorts to his sister to warn her against trying to resist Interahamwe attacks on the centre.

He warned her she would soon be killed if she kept sheltering and defending the Tutsi. He even encouraged her to abandon them and flee.

But she remained steadfast, sending the emissaries back with a message to tell her brother that he should not be worried for her.

They went back with a note back to her brother, Col. Nzungize, that reads:

"Dearest brother,

Thank you for wanting to help me. I would rather die than abandoning the forty-three persons for whom I am responsible. Pray for us, that we may come to God. Say ‘goodbye’ to our old mother and our brother. When I come to God, I shall pray for you. Keep well. Thank you for thinking of me. If God saves us, as we hope, we shall see each other tomorrow.

           Your sister,

           Felicitas Niyitegeka.”

Her note would later be reproduced in a book, Christianity and the African Imagination’, by Aylward Shorter, a member of the Missionaries of Africa.

No sooner had her brother’s escorts left, the Interahamwe invaded the charitable home but Niyitegeka was adamant, confronting the killers instead. She made it clear she would rather die than see them kill the dozens of innocent people she was with.

The militia told her that while her life would be spared they would kill all the Tutsi with her. But Niyitegeka stood her ground.

That was on April 21, 1994, survivors say.

Commune Rouge slaughter  

Interahamwe forced their way into the home, bundled everyone, including Niyitegeka herself, onto waiting buses and drove them to Commune Rouge from where almost all of them were killed. Commune Rouge is an infamous killing ground in the heart of Gisenyi.

Immaculee Tuyisenge, a member of the Auxiliaries of the Apostolate, attended the retreat at the centre just before the killings began.

"I was among those who attended the retreat. However, when news broke that the President (Juvenal Habyarimana) had died (in a plane crash on April 6, 1994) and killings had broken out, we all decided to stay at the centre praying,” she told The New Times this week.

She said that they were all scared they would be killed "but Niyitegeka would comfort us urging us to be courageous enough and offer themselves as sacrifices of peace for the betterment of the country.”

"It was around 4p.m on April 21 when the Interahamwe broke into the compound, baying for blood,” she recalled.

Niyitegeka hurried to meet the militia at the gate.

"They immediately started shouting insults at her and demanding that she hands over the ‘Inyenzi’,” she said. ‘Inyenzi is a Kinyarwanda word for ‘cockroaches’, a derogatory term used at the time to describe soldiers of the Rwanda Patriotic Army (that would later liberate the country) and the Tutsi in general, as a way of dehumanising them and setting the stage for genocide).

Niyitegeka, she said, insisted that there were no ‘Inyenzi’ at the premises.

On hearing this, Tuyisenge quickly looked for a place to hide.

She ended up under a bed. That’s how she survived.

The rest, she said, were taken away along with their protector, Niyitegeka.

Almost all of them were never seen again – including Niyitegeka.

Niyitegeka had helped several other people to cross over to the Congo.

Marie Claire Mukarugero, a businesswoman who deals in ornaments in Gisenyi town, was one of them and vividly remembers what happened as though it’s only yesterday.

On the way to Commune Rouge, she recollected, Niyitegeka kept praying and begging the militia to spare the lives of "her people”.

"She kept urging them to not spill the blood of innocent people, even once we had arrived at Commune Rouge…to no avail.”

Mukarugero said: "When we arrived at Commune Rouge they started killing people with all sorts of weapons, I was thrown into a mass grave by someone who probably thought that I was already dead.”

Miraculously, Mukarugero would later manage to pull herself from under piles of corpses. "The killers had left and I saw her body (Niyitegeka’s). She had apparently been shot.”

The girl ‘everyone liked’

Athanasie Nyirabagesera, 86, lived with Niyitegeka for about three decades, both serving as Auxiliaries of the Apostolate in Nyundo Diocese.

Nyirabagesera, now retired, lives in Nyundo Sector in Rubavu District.

She said Niyitegeka was a hero even before the Genocide against the Tutsi.

"We used to call her a heroine as far back as 1980s,” she said. "She was that type of girl that everyone liked, she was selfless and had a generous heart especially toward the neediest.”

She added: "Besides her Church responsibilities, she was patriotic, she would always encourage us to love the country and all its children as we did for ourselves.”

Speaking to Saturday Times, Marie-Goretti Vumiliya, another member of Auxiliaries of the Apostolate, said of her departed colleague: "She’s in a better place, she was a special person.”

"We are grateful to the country for having proclaimed her a national heroine,” she said.

Niyitegeka is one of the heroes that Rwandans will be celebrating on the occasion of the 26th Heroes Day on February 1.