The phrase canary in the coal mine originates from using canaries, small bright yellow birds, in coal mines as early gas detectors. These sensitive birds would show signs of distress or die when exposed to harmful gases, even before humans were affected. Miners would hurriedly evacuate if the birds showed any distress, warning of dangerous gas levels. It is my strong belief that the events of Kinigi were one such moment, an easily observed series of events that hopefully warned us of larger societal problems that needed quick and long-lasting preventive action. On Sunday, I joined a few hundred other guests and cadres of the ruling party, the RPF, at their headquarters in Rusororo to discuss Rwanda's unity and the threats against it. The meeting, which included speeches from the Secretary General and the Vice Chairperson, an expert panel, as well as statements from the audience, left me with a few things to ponder. The first thing that left me pondering was, 'what role could diversity play in the creation of a unitary state'? I know that what I've written may seem like a word salad, but bear with me. Today, all we hear about is diversity this and diversity that, and that is all well and good; but the question I then ask is, how can we create a society that is pulling in the same direction if diversity is paramount? Even in probably the most diverse country in the world, the United States, the unitary concept of the 'melting pot' bonds all those who call it home. Precolonial Rwanda, despite being a nation that had quite a bit of diversity (in terms of clan structures, regional dialects, and economic statuses), was a nation of one people, with an agreed national leadership and a collective culture. What the colonial project did in Rwanda was exacerbate our 'diversity' and throw away what unified us (the kingship and our religion). The effect of this? The refugee crisis of 1959, the abolishment of the 1,500-year Nyiginya dynasty, the systematic discrimination of the MRND and the MDR-Parmehutu governments, and the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi. What the RPF government has been attempting to do since its victory in 1994 is to do away with the artificial, colonial divisions that created the conditions that led to over a million deaths. What the enthronement of the chief of the Abakono clan showed me was that RPF's attempt to remove the divisions that have bedeviled our country is still a work in progress. The peace and development that we've enjoyed over the last 29 years have perhaps given us a false sense of security. A word that came up, over and over again, in the Rusororo meeting was 'umurengwe'. Although I might be wrong, I believe that umurengwe can be loosely translated as 'self-aggrandization' (promoting oneself as being powerful or important). The economic and political stability that we enjoy seems to have created a false sense of 'arrivism.' We think that we have 'arrived' at the Promised Land. We have nice houses, huge SUVs, and drink expensive champagnes. But while we enjoy those nice things, we need to remember that the majority of our people are still poor (earning barely over $1,000 per year on average). And as long as this majority still exists, we haven't arrived anywhere at all. The temptation to fall into comfortable patterns is the easiest thing in the world, especially when you think that the threat is gone. Unfortunately, due to our past, our 'comfortable place' seems to be divisionism, ethnicism, and clientelism, so we need to put a lot of pressure on ourselves not to fall into these bad patterns. We owe constant vigilance to ourselves and future generations. We are somewhere already, but we are not where we want to be. The Kinigi incident is proof of just how susceptible we are to our own worst demons. It was a canary in our Rwandan coal mine. It's up to us whether we flee that coal mine or keep digging. The writer is a socio-political commentator.
