Gatsibo Gacaca courts to end work next week

EASTERN PROVINCE GATSIBO—All 14 sectors of Gatsibo district will have finished trying their Gacaca cases by the end of the month and ahead of the 2008 deadline, officials here have said.The last four to finish are Murambi, Kiramuruzi, Kiziguro and Rugarama sectors. Most of the cases to be tried in Murambi were cases from those people who had appealed because they were not comfortable with the way the courts handled their cases. Executive secretary of Murambi, Jackson Muvunyi, said that the delay for the sector to finish trying its cases was because the place had many Genocide cases and almost all the people in the area were implicated. “We have so many people who participated in the 1994 Genocide in this part of Gatsibo district and because of the many cases, we have taken longer than the other sectors with few cases to try,” Muvunyi said. A lot of Genocide activities took place in these areas because they were under the former mayor of Murambi district John Baptist Gatete, one of the masterminds of the 1994 Genocide. One of the residents said that Gatete mobilized so many baturages to participate in killings and supplied many with weapons which led to the place’s being awash with blood during the Genocide. The rest of the 10 sectors in Gatsibo have finished their Gacaca cases and are through with the exercise successfully. Vice-mayor for social affairs Yvette Dusenge said the exercise in Gatsibo district went very well because people “banked so much on truth” and there was likely to be a lot of reconciliation among people in a short term. “The trying of these cases of people who participated in the Genocide has helped because now the culprits have been punished and the victims have seen justice carried out,” Dusenge said. The remaining 3 sectors in Gatsibo district are sure to have completed trying their cases by Tuesday next week with the exception of Kiziguro, which had others cases of people who committed atrocities during the Genocide but are now living in Nyagatare. Ends