Human Rights Watch a propaganda tool for genocide ideologues

For those following activities of the New-York based Human Rights Watch (HRW), its recent report, “Rwanda: Crackdown on Opposition, Media Intensifies,” published on October 19, did not come as surprise. The report is in line with the hostile posture against the Rwandan government HRW adopted since the defeat of the genocidaire government in July 1994.

HRW always sides with those who want to harm the country and its people or those who perpetrated the genocide against the Tutsi in 1994. The HRW report was issued in the aftermath of the arrest by the Rwanda Investigation Bureau (RIB) of six people, including Theoneste Nsengimana suspected for involvement in subversive activities. RIB had earlier issued a warning to people using social media to avoid acts aimed at harming national security. Many of those individuals are based abroad, but a few are in Rwanda. Those arrested were spreading rumours, and divisive content aimed at arousing anti-government sentiments in the population.

Perplexing is the way HRW rushed to issue a pre-emptive report before those arrested were brought taken to court. The so called rights group alleged that they were “linked to an opposition party”, and appeared connected to “Ingabire Day,” organized by the unregistered party Dalfa-Umurinzi, that had been scheduled for October 14, 2021, to discuss among other things political repression in Rwanda.

From this statement, it is clear that HRW had been coordinating with the self-styled opposition politician, Victoire Ingabire, leader of what HRW calls “unregistered opposition party.” If the party is unregistered, any activities Ingabire and her supporters do on Rwandan soil are illegal.

HRW forgets the dark period Rwandans lived in the lead up to the genocide in 1994 with the proliferation of hate media in Rwanda. The ravages caused by the same unbridled liberty allowed hate radio RTLM and Hutu extremist publications like Kangura to spew anti-Tutsi venom with the consequences we all know. Given our experience, the new government in Rwanda put in place guardrails to help prevent the country from falling back in the same ethnic troubles of the past. HRW should know that in today’s Rwanda, no one is above the law. Being a journalist or a member of a registered or unregistered political party does not give anyone a carte blanche to commit crimes.

In the report, HRW calls the provision against the spread of hateful propaganda, genocide denial and revisionism, an infringement of “the right to freedom of expression and media freedom under international law.” We now understand why at the height of the 1994 genocide, the US government refused to jam the hate radio RTLM though it was inciting the extermination of the Tutsi.

In Rwanda today, such cavalier and irresponsible attitude has no place. We experienced its consequences with over million deaths. We learnt our lesson, and it will not happen again. What is also bewildering is the way HRW sanctifies the so-called opposition party, DALFA Umurinzi, completely ignoring its roots and who its leader, Ingabire, truly is. She is a relic of the former genocidaire regime. After its defeat, its senior army officers and high-ranking officials who took part in the genocide created the Rally for Democracy in Rwanda (RDR) of which Ingabire became president from 2003 to 2006, before morphing into FDU – Inkingi.

The RDR masqueraded as an organisation fighting for the return of refugees but in reality, its real raison d’être was to perpetuate the genocide ideology of Hutu Power which resulted in the extermination of more than one million innocent lives in 1994.

It is no surprise that FDU–Inkingi is a group whose leadership comprises well-known genocidaires including Ndereyehe Ntahontuye, the ringleader of the massacres of the Tutsi at ISAR Rubona in southern Rwanda, and Marcel Sebatware who coordinated the killings of the Tutsi at CIMERWA in the former Cyangugu province.

In 2010, Rwandan courts sentenced Ingabire to 15 years in prison for, among other crimes, genocide ideology and incitement of divisions. On September 14, 2018, President Paul Kagame exercised his prerogative of mercy and granted her early release.

Ingabire’s connections with the terrorist organisation, RUD-Urunana, which on October 19, 2019, launched a deadly attack on Kinigi Village in Northern Province and killed a dozen people, is no secret.  After the attack, Ingabire again quickly laundered her FDU “party” – which is part of the P5 – into what she called “DALFA Umurinzi”.

The P5 group is an alliance of several political forces, some linked to armed militias like the Rwanda National Congress (RNC) which operates in eastern DRC.

We should have no illusions.  HRW wants to sanitise a woman who has never denounced the Hutu Power ideology and is now trying to spread it again using various social media channels including Umubavu TV. People should also take the noise about missing FDU/DALFA members, or any other persons HRW said were disappeared, with a pinch of salt. In the past, they were later found to have joined anti-Rwanda forces in neighbouring countries.

The HRW game plan is to work closely with those hell-bent on sabotaging the Rwandan government, like Ingabire, to damage its reputation and that of its leadership. But the Rwandan government will not give in to smear and fabrications from a corrupt organisation like Human Rights Watch.

The freedom of speech much trumpeted by HRW has limits too, according to Amnesty International which states that: “You might not expect us to say this, but in certain circumstances free speech and freedom of expression can be restricted.”

“Governments have an obligation to prohibit hate speech and incitement. And restrictions can also be justified if they protect specific public interest or the rights and reputations of others.”

In the case of Rwanda, and much to the chagrin of HRW and Rwanda’s detractors, RIB will not tolerate anyone trying to rekindle ethnic hatred, spread rumours, or trivialise the genocide against the Tutsi as did Yvonne Idamange, and Aimable Karasira in the name of freedom of speech. Violators of Rwanda’s peace and security must know that RIB will act regardless of the noise made by the liked of HRW.