Genocide deportee heads to jail

Genocide convict, Marie-Claire Mukeshimana, who was deported from the US yesterday morning, was led by police from Remera Police Station to her temporary quarters, Kigali Central Prison. She will later be transferred to Butare Prison in the Southern Province where she will serve the 19 years she was sentenced by a Gacaca court, for her role in the Genocide. According to officials from the prosecution, she has the constitutional right to have her case reheard because she was tried and convicted in absentia in 2005. “Tomorrow [Friday] I will receive her in my office and inform her of her rights as stated by the law since she has a right to appeal having been convicted in absentia,” John Bosco Siboyintore, head of the Genocide Fugitives Tracking Unit (GFTU) said yesterday. Mukeshimana was convicted by the Gacaca court of Mbazi of Genocide crimes committed in her home area of Maraba, in Huye district. She allegedly helped Interahamwe militia kill children at a nun’s convent in the former Butare region, her home area. Jean de Dieu Mucyo, the Executive Secretary of the National Commission to Fight Against Genocide, told The New Times that Mukeshimana hails from his home area. Mukeshimana’s mother, Eliza Mukanyangyezi, reportedly erected a roadblock on the road near their home “She collaborated with her mother who was the leader of the MRND in our sector in Mbazi. People say that there was a gun at that road block and that the gun was kept at their home,” he said. Mukeshimana often appeared on the road block along with her brother [only known name is Bosco] whose whereabouts remain unknown. Mucyo says that he attended the Gacaca court sessions in which Mukeshimana’s mother was tried. She is now serving a life sentence, in Butare Prison. Mukeshimana’s deportation follows that of Jean Marie Vianney Mudahinyuka, alias Zuzu, who was handed over to Rwandan Police in January. According to Siboyintore, Mudahinyuka was also granted the right to apply for revision of his case. Domitila Mukantaganzwa, the Executive Secretary of the National Service of Gacaca Jurisdictions, told The New Times that “he had that ri ght and was duly informed about his full rights but he did not apply for the review. The conviction stayed because he never applied for an appeal”. Unlike Mukeshimana, Mudahinyuka, who is in the first category of Genocide offenders, is now serving his time at Remera prison in Kigali. Ends