Ntarama: dark and full of history

Ntarama Township is located approximately 30km south of Kigali City in Bugesera district. Just about 500 meters from this place stands the former Ntarama Catholic Church, which has now been turned into a Genocide memorial centre. Over 5,000 Tutsi’s were massacred as they sought refuge here. On entering this building, one would expect the smell of death or decomposing human bodies. However, the scent here is the kind one finds in a stuffed room – a blend of lime and wet earth. But the sight of human skulls and bones obviously leaves one with an apocalyptic feel. The only noise one can hear is that of a cricket crying in the vicinity. Light rays screen their way into the room through holes and cracks created by grenade blasts on the walls. Blood-stained clothes of victims of the Genocide hang from the struts while things like combs, pots, identity cards, sleeping mats, glasses and books lay in piles in front of the church. A number of coffins are piled up near the alter. The remains of Genocide victims are still kept here, their bones still strewn where they fell 19 years ago. In the compound is a kitchen that was burnt down, destroying hundreds of lives of especially women and children who had sought shelter here. Adjacent to the kitchen is a small rectangular red-brick building that once served as a Sunday school class for hundreds of young lives who suffered brutal deaths in 1994. Most of them were killed by hitting their heads on walls and seats. Prior to 1994, whenever attacks on the Tutsi began, churches and cathedrals were always considered safe havens, so most of them took refuge there. It was believed that no one would ever muster the confidence to commit murder in God’s house. However, during the 1994 Genocide, murderers seemed to have lost the fear of God. They went on rampage, slaughtering anyone who hid in a church. “Majority of the people who had camped here were Tutsis and a few kids from Hutu families who were only there out of confusion that comes with stampedes. So, when the Hutu militias arrived, they asked their own to stand aside and then murdered the rest,” narrates Stanley Mugabarigira, a guide at the memorial site. Back in the 1940s, Bugesera was uninhabited. The area was a forest infested with houseflies. Then, in 1959, with the Belgian government backing Hutu political parties, the Hutus began “relocating” the Tutsis from towns to concentration camps in Bugesera. The relocation of Tutsis continued throughout the 60s and 70s as the Hutu government became more and more anti-Tutsi. In fact, Bugesera became a Tutsi district. During the 1994 Genocide, however, with Bugesera’s remoteness, it was one of the last districts to be hit. The road to Bugesera was impenetrable. “There was general panic when we first heard that the Interahamwe militias were heading towards Ntarama. Some people ran to the town hall, hoping for some shelter from the local authorities. But one of them came out and told them, ‘If you go back home, you shall be killed. If you escape into the bush, you shall be killed. If you stay here, you shall be killed. Nevertheless, you must leave this place, because I do not want any blood in front of my town hall’,” reveals, Alphonse Rwimira, a resident of Ntarama who survived the Genocide by hiding in a swamp for two months. He goes on: “Churches, schools and nearby swamps, became our only option for refuge and by the time they (militias) arrived we had at least managed to organise ourselves in groups, armed with spears, machetes, bows and arrows. For three days, at least, we managed to fight them off. However, on the fourth day, they came back with rocket launchers, machine guns and grenades. That’s how they managed to finish off most Tutsis.” Gasper Kadomo, also a resident of Ntarama, points out that many women in Bugesera are infected with HIV/AIDS because they were raped during the Genocide. Hutu men who were known to be infected with HIV, he says, were employed by the extremist government and instructed to infect Tutsi women with the deadly virus by raping them. “This was another strategy by the Hutu extremist government to exterminate the Tutsis,” he says.