There is something laughable about Western columnists who act as if President Kagame owed them something. Ian Birrell’s latest article where he laments that the Rwandan President “fooled” him illustrates this sense of entitlement that is observable in Western media circles. The recurring story generally starts with a white man fantasizing about a mythical character that corresponds to a submissive foreign leader, then comes the time when the white man opposes the real person to his fantasies. Same script, different cast, with predictable ending: crocodile tears of the white man claiming he was fooled by someone who never knew they had that kind of relationship, to begin with. Reading Birrell’s article one can’t help but think of a situation involving a predatory stalker of an unsuspecting victim. Birrell thinks he had some kind of intimate relationship with the President of Rwanda. How else would one explain his bizarre claim that Kagame fooled him? The fact is, President Kagame made promises to Rwandans. He, for instance, promised that, under his careful watch, Rwanda would never experience again the kind of disaster that befell it 26 years ago and assured safety for her people, and it is indeed one of the safest countries in the world. On the measure of safety, for example, Rwandans cannot say that Kagame fooled them. He promised to defend the dignity of Rwandans and promised them that no Rwandan was meant to remain poor despite the daunting task. “What we have set out to do is not for the half-hearted, let alone the heartless,” Kagame told Rwandans while inviting them to dream big and to work with one another in pursuit of unity. 21 years later down the road, more Rwandans are getting out of poverty while there are working tirelessly to build an inclusive society. Kagame is keeping his promises. But most importantly, it is worth reminding that President Kagame warned anyone with ideas of “bringing war to Rwanda” that “they should also be aware of the danger they face”. Unfortunately, neither Birrell nor his friend Paul Rusesabagina listened to this warning. Otherwise, they would have noticed this much: President Kagame is a man of his word. Rwandans know this, which is why they are eager whenever the President tours the country during his regular outreach calendar; they talk to the President knowing well that once he promises to address their grievances, no effort is spared in that endeavor. Thus, it is rather strange to hear Birrell - like Roger Boyes before him -, a British citizen, claiming that he was fooled by a president he didn’t vote into office, a leader who never promised him anything. As argued before, “If aid, [in this case British tax payers’ money], was for improving the lives of recipients, then it has done what it ought to do. However, by denigrating Rwanda’s political choices and its need to guarantee security for its citizens, [Birrell] clumsily attempts to turn aid into a tool for political control”. Imagine Birrell thinking that he controls Kagame’s choices! Logically, nobody fooled Birrell or donors “as no promises are made beyond the targets for which aid is sought and given.” Whatever illusions they develop beyond that is no one else’s responsibility but their burden to carry. The only explanation for Birrell’s ridiculous claim is obvious: He had unreasonable expectations built around his own fantasies. And like a man whose fantasy world is crumbling, Birrell is shocked to learn that “democracy is not defined by the West”. His resentment, similar to that experienced by abusive men whose pathological desire to exert control on their targets is met with resistance, is such that the perpetrator resorts to rumor-mongering and smearing with the aim of attracting hostility towards his victim. Indeed, reading Birrell’s arguments, one wonders whether the resentment has also obliterated his cognitive abilities. For instance, Birrell describes the adoption of English as a medium of instruction in Rwanda as an attempt to evade “rising criticism in the Francophone world of his [Kagame] rule and the RPF’s role in the 1994 bloodshed”. One wonders, how a country like France, whose officials were deeply involved with the perpetrators of the Genocide against the Tutsi, and in whose embassy in Kigali the genocidal government was sworn-in, could get the audacity to criticize anything about Rwanda or to shift the world’s attention to the RPF’s “role”. Clearly, if Birrell’s world wasn’t upside down, he wouldn’t use the hostility of, and the desperate attempts by, some French officials to evade their responsibility as a tool for his smear campaign. Birrell tantrums are never-ending. He further argues that the decision to hold the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Kigali stems from “the legacy of guilt over the world’s failure to prevent the sickening genocide.” But, if such guilt existed, the UK government would have prosecuted – or extradited to a third-party state where prosecution was possible - the five genocide fugitives that are still roaming free on its soil given its refusal to hand them over to Rwanda; the UK would not be shielding perpetrators of the crime to which it has guilt. Indeed, if such guilt existed, the Western world wouldn’t have become a safe haven for genocide fugitives and the hotbed of the promoters of the Hutu Power ideology, which underpinned the genocide against the Tutsi. These fugitives and genocide deniers form the same circles that Paul Rusesabagina had called upon to support his “presidential bid” that led him to a Rwandan prison. Evidently, if Birrell’s cognitive abilities were not impaired by his hatred for the man who shattered his fantasies, he would read Joshua Hammer’s article in the New York Times about his hero’s slide to terrorism that was incubated in those genocidal circles, and maybe he (Birrell) would progressively reconnect with reality. But alas! If Birrell were to concede to the legitimate grounds of the Rwandan government to bring Rusesabagina before justice, the question would still remain as to whether he (Birrell) will one day come to terms with the idea that President Kagame has an exclusive and intimate relationship with Rwandans, not with some British unhinged maniac with an inflated sense of entitlement. No one is fooling Barrell and it is time that he stopped fooling himself and end the stalking, name-calling and constant harassment informed by the illusion of a non-existent relationship.
