Editor,Reference is made to your article that appeared in The New Times of Tuesday, this week, titled “Pardoning of Genocide convicts sparks debate.”I have to agree with the survivors on this issue because I don’t think it is right. I do not believe that these prisoners deserve to be released simply because they have become elderly. The majority of them more than likely still hold on to their beliefs (genocide ideology), which is the reason they are in prison. There is a better chance of younger people reforming (rehabilitation) than there is for a person who has held these beliefs for many years. They did not have any sympathy for the elderly when they were committing the 1994 Genocide against Tutsi. I believe in reconciliation and they can pursue that in their communities when they have completed their sentences. I hope the government gives this decision serious consideration with open dialogue with survivors. The survivors are the ones who deserve to be heard, particularly on this case.Marie CollinsEditor,I am worried the elderly convicts might spread genocide ideology among the young Rwandans once they are released. The young generation needs and deserves the opportunity to grow up in a better environment. The government should reconsider the proposal and look at its implications more broadly. Reconciliation is good but people who committed crimes must answer and be held accountable. I don’t think we achieve justice when people who wronged society are freed on the basis of age.Joy KampororoKigaliEditor,With all fairness, no convict should be released from prison because of their advanced age. Much less when they were convicted on serious crimes like genocide. Let them serve their sentences. The government and the Rwandan public have been lenient enough; these people were callous during the Genocide against the Tutsi, they were so cruel they killed even unborn babies, ripping them from their mothers’ wombs. I do not believe in the eye-for-eye principle, but I think these convicts were far treated with leniency; otherwise the magnitude and intensity of their crimes automatically earned them death sentence.Nshuti Karekezi Kimironko
