UGANDA - Uganda’s Minister of State for Regional Cooperation, Isaac Musumba, has strongly condemned the 1994 Rwandan Genocide against the Tutsi, casting blame on the previous regime for championing the killing of innocent civilians whom they were charged to protect.

Musumba, made the remarks on Wednesday as he joined the Rwandan community in Uganda to commemorate the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, an event that took place at Kasensero, in Rakai district.

Kasensero, a village that lies on the shores of Lake Victoria, has a memorial site with remains of over 1,000 Genocide victims who landed on the shores after being dumped in Rivers Akagera and Nyabarongo. 

"What was done against the Tutsis during the Genocide is a crime against humanity that needs to be fought in Africa and make sure it does not happen again,” Musumba said in an interview with The New Times. 

The minister commended the Rwandan government for the incredible effort in rebuilding the country, which he said, has not only had an internal but also international impact.

"I immensely commend Rwanda for the work done to retrieve and reconstruct the country from the miserable state it went through in 1994”.

At the same occasion, area Member of Parliament, Mathias Kasamba, hailed the Rwandan government for improving the three permanent memorial sites in Uganda.

"They have done a great job to upgrade the sites and their surrounding areas,” the lawmaker said.

"These sites have become the living testimony to us and our children for what happened caused by undemocratic leaders in Rwanda, which calls for having in place leadership institutions to sensitize our younger generation on how leadership is supposed to be and avoid any form of Genocide in Africa.”

Mohamood N.Thobani, one of the people who played a major role in retrieving the floating bodies from the lake, highlighted the necessity to turn these sites into some sort of a tourist attraction because of the history surrounding them. 

He said that by so doing, foreigners will have access to them and have a chance of what exactly happened in Rwanda during that tragic period.

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