Why we shouldn't be surprised that FDLR are just playing games

Editor, Refer to Joseph Rwagatare’s article, “Why FDLR continues to play games” (The New Times, September 16). Support to the FDLR from so-called human rights organisations is inexplicable only if you believe their mission is primarily about human rights rather than self-aggrandizement. Many of these organisations have never forgotten how the Rwandan Government put them in their place and showed them the way to the airport even when the country was still in the deepest of ditches. To compound that crime of lèse-majesté, Rwandan forces would eventually dismantle the massive camps just across the border in the then Zaire, eliminating at the same time the huge fund-raising tool that was helping to fill their coffers, raise their profiles and their power. As for the FDLRs continued ability to contemptuously thumb their nose at the UN— or if you want to use that convenient tag that means nothing in reality, “the international community”— the Rwandan adage that, Uherekejwe ningwe aravoma (loosely translated: he who is guarded with leopard is untouchable), says it all. We dont even need to wrack our brains trying to guess who has been ensuring that the UN forces, originally brought into the DR Congo specifically to neutralise the genocidal FDLR forces and thus eliminate Rwandas justification for being there, does nothing of the sort. It is exactly the same people who facilitated their flight into that benighted country. It is also the very same people who control UN decision-making on peacekeeping, the decisions in this area and how they are implemented. In view of all this, why would we be surprised that the FDLR can continue to thumb their noses at the same toothless organisation? They know the “leopard guards them, and so they can continue to visit the watering hole without fear”. Mwene Kalinda

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Why we shouldn't be surprised that FDLR are just playing games