Open Letter to President Paul Kagame

Dear Mr. President, I was in Amahoro Stadium on the night of April 7, and watched twelve thousand candles being lit, depicting a huge flame, the figure 15 and the words “Icyizere, Hope, Espoir”. The design was covering the whole surface of the stadium, a shimmering ephemeral work of art. The word that came to my mind was “Stupendous”. When you got up, with the First Lady, to walk across the pitch to light a candle, a hush came over the huge crowd. This was the fifteenth anniversary of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsis and Rwanda was letting the World know that it was intent on going forward regardless of the challenges still facing the country. These being, the genocide ideology even now prevailing within the country and a White World whose condescending indifferent attitude has contributed to the perpetration of this ideology over the past fifteen years. Suddenly, the air was rent by an agonizing scream, then another and then again another as all around the stadium, genocide survivors were over taken by overwhelming grief and horror. The screaming persisted as friends and relatives carried the traumatized victims outside, but their strident, raucous screams continued in the distance as people around them tried to comfort and calm their tortured spirits. The intensity of the moment had awakened the memory of their own personal Calvary during those fateful one hundred days, between April 6 and July 12, 1994, when over a million Tutsis were exterminated in the most cruel, abominable, and vicious of ways. I wondered what you must be thinking, hearing these terrible screams and, especially, what you must be feeling. I had seen you on television delivering your speech. I was profoundly touched by the force of your anger at the injustice displayed by the International community as regards the Genocide engineers who are still at large. When you said, “They say to me, We don’t like your Justice, I say to them, Well OK then, why don’t you arrest these criminals under your own Justice System and bring them to trial for the crime of masterminding and executing a horrendous Genocide in my country in 1994”. I think that this is the shattering point, the fact that these criminals are still walking free in Europe, America and elsewhere, enjoying even the best hospitality. I heard when I was in Belgium, that one of them is a University professor. Well, as a parent I can tell you that I would not want a Genocide engineer, a major killer, rapist and torturer to be lecturing my son or daughter, thank you very much. And then, what about the French hoax, they really top the bill with their arrogance, “l’Accusation Bidon”, as I call it. “Bidon”, is a really good word to describe it. In the dictionary it is translated as, ”phony, baloney” and I’d add an Irish one for good measure, “Balderdash”. But the pity of it is, it gives false credit to the criminals who orchestrated this ignominy. It is so utterly devious that one can somehow feel sorry for the weight of shame which will overshadow the future generations of France. When the truth comes out, which it always does, not only will the French have to own up to active participation in the preparation of the genocide, but also of supplying arms to Habyarimana’s regime and setting up the Turquoise sham in July, to enable these genocide engineers to escape. Then to further harbor and support these criminals over all this time is only exacerbating an already highly volatile situation inside the population. The message is ambiguous, They are telling the people that it was all right to commit genocide, that they can get off scot free, which means that you are implying that it can be OK to do it again. They are guilty of perpetrating genocide ideology. Mr. President, I thoroughly empathize with the weight you carry and personally pledge myself to be of whatever assistance I can, as a writer, as a poet and as musician in this country’s endeavor to promote reconciliation among the people, regardless of the drawbacks. My very best wishes to your Excellency, Yours sincerely, Mukandoli Una Balfe