The 15th commemoration of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi: Part Seven

Rwanda at the dawn of the 21st Century “Building peace has been an illusive goal of civilizations throughout history. In their most recent efforts towards this end, the nation-states of the world community looked toward cooperation through the United Nations (UN) to spread peace. As conflicts throughout the world continue to erupt, the UN has created and continues to develop various instruments for building peace,” said former United Nations Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali. The 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda has been a scourge on the conscience of the nation for quite some time. All government efforts are geared towards the aftermath of the genocide to provide long-term solutions to the problems that flared up. The overall aim is to help the country to return from the brink, by mainly reconciling the society. Rwandan leaders have therefore been imbued with the values to promote national unity and cohesion. Those not able are often called of the boat- it is a win- win situation, adapt or die. It has however not been a smooth road- it is not easy to do away with challenges that dogged us from 1950s, or even far before that period. But what should be the way forward amidst such background? Unfortunately, Rwanda as a country on the African continent is not privileged to get live experiences of countries that underwent similar experience and later on came up with peace. On the contrary, live examples in some African countries are pathetic. The Somalia, Guinea Bissau, Madagascar, and even neighbouring countries do not offer the ‘best’ examples of peace to build on. However, the repercussions the countries in question suffer offer very good lessons for a post genocide society like Rwanda. So as Rwanda prepares to go for the 2010 presidential elections, we should be ready to desist from charged politics, propaganda that may be part off greedy politicians. There is no room for political irresponsibility in content and manifestos. “Reconstructing a country after conflict is a bit like building a jigsaw puzzle with pieces missing, too many corner pieces and a lot of blue sky. And then someone shows you the partly completed picture from the last attempt and somehow that should help you build yours,” Rebecca Lineham, New Zealand international review. How can we do this? There are many steps towards achieving such levels of maturity in politics, but we need to move an extra mile. This can be done for instance by raising literacy levels and fighting poverty. Low levels of literacy, poverty, unemployment and other social ills leave people naked. In other words, they are not well equipped with enough knowledge to differentiate between the law, their rights and vested interests of desperate politicians. That is how to a greater extent Rwanda turned to genocide. It further partly explains why peasants in Rwanda were embroiled in the massacres during the genocide. Even the killers by then acted like machines and no human being would have done what they did- non-rational human beings act like animals. Someone acting irrationally could, only do the torture the Interahamwe for example, conducted over their preys. This is the prize of illiteracy and consequent ignorance! It is during the period of genocide that the people of Rwanda, fell prey to the tall and destructive tales woven time again by misleading politicians. Many fake political parties emerged only to compound the already existing political quagmire during the Habyarimana regime. This cannot be tolerated at the dawn of the 21st Century in Rwanda. The people of Rwanda have to start making informed democratic choices. Rwandans inevitably need to embrace the culture of peace, respect for one another’s rights and dignified pursuit of freedom. The no-nonsense leadership in Rwanda spearheaded by President Paul Kagame has managed to end the state of hopelessness in Rwanda in just 14 years. This leadership in essence makes the Rwandan situation unique- a people living together in relative promising peace after years of animosity between the so-called ethnic groups. There is nowhere in the world where genocide happened and the victims and perpetrators live together peacefully. This is courtesy of leadership that deserves credit. mugitoni@yahoo.com