Take up responsibility on genocide, church leaders urged

The Executive Secretary of the National Reconciliation Commission (NURC) has called upon church leaders to take up responsibility of what happened in 1994 if they are to fully participate in the reconciliation process. Fatuma Ndangiza made the call during a meeting with a delegation of church leaders from Europe that has been in the country on a reconciliation drive dubbed ‘Rwanda Amateka Mashya,’ literally meaning Rwanda, the new history. “The state embarked on reconciliation because the church failed, if the church had done what it ought to, this commission would be left with little to do because you have access to the population,” said Ndangiza. She added that if reconciliation is to be achieved, everybody has to acknowledge their responsibility in the divisions that culminated into the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi. According to Joseph Nyamutera, a programme coordinator, the visiting delegation of European church leaders was in the country to take part in the reconciliation conference to seek forgiveness over the role their respective countries played in dividing African communities in general and Rwanda in particular. The representatives came from Belgium, France, Germany, Netherlands, United Kingdom and USA. “We thought that their coming for this conference would help in reconciliation because it has been widely said that it was the whites who planted the seeds of hatred and divisionism. They should come and say sorry,” Nyamutera said. Speaking to The New Times, the head of the delegation, Lynn Nwagbara said that they had come to seek forgiveness on behalf of their respective countries. Nwagbara pledged that the group were going back to lobby their home governments to accept their respective roles in the divisions that tore up Rwanda. During the reconciliation conference that took place in the Southern Province last week, each cleric mentioned their country’s role in the Genocide and asked for forgiveness. Ends