France rejects Kabuga daughter's citizenship application: How about other genocide suspects?

Kabuga Felicien, the Father of Felicite Mukademali

France has rejected the citizenship application of one of genocide suspect Felicien Kabuga’s daughters. Felicite Mukademali, according to French media, has been living in France for 27 years before French authorities recently informed her that her application for citizenship was rejected.

Her father, Kabuga, 87, largely considered as the main financier of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi, was the most wanted genocide suspects who had been on the run for more than 27 years. He was arrested in mid May last year in Asnieres-Sur-Seine, Paris, where he had been living under false names. He is now at The Hague waiting for trial for genocide and other crimes against humanity.

Mukademali is married to well-known genocide suspect, Augustin Ngirabatware, a former minister of planning in the government that perpetrated the genocide against the Tutsi in 1994. He was arrested in Frankfurt, Germany on September 17, 2007, put on trial and found guilty by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in Arusha-Tanzania, for direct incitement to commit genocide. He was subsequently sentenced to 35 years in prison on December 20, 2012. The sentence was   reduced to 30 years upon appeal, on December 18, 2014.

One wonders how French immigration laws work. It appears to me that there is a category of asylum seekers in France who enjoy different treatment. The entire world witnessed the dismantling, in October 2016, of the Calais Jungle (Camp de la Lande) refugees camp which housed thousands of refugees from Africa, Syria, and Afghanistan. Paradoxically, Rwandan fugitives who are mainly genocide suspects were allowed to over-stay.

It is also hypocritical when France grants citizenship and asylum to prominent genocide suspects and denies the small fish.  For example, Agathe Kanziga, the wife of President Juvenal Habyarimana, was given a red carpet welcome. She is accused of being a mastermind of the 1994 genocide and especially having committed genocide and crimes against humanity.

Catholic priest Wenceslas Munyeshyaka, a former parish priest of Kigali’s St. Famille church and Laurent Bucyibaruta, the Prefet (Governor) of Gikongoro during the Genocide, were arrested in France under a warrant from the UN Genocide tribunal.

Since his arrival in France, Munyeshyaka has been allowed to live and work as a parish priest despite the fact that immigration authorities in France are aware of the accusations against him. The former vicar at Kigali’s St. Famille Cathedral, who was seen wielding a gun and donning military fatigue during the genocide is blamed for the killing of more than 200 refugees at the church during the Genocide. He is also accused of rape. Munyeshyaka was in 2006 sentenced in absentia by a Kigali court to life in prison. He is charged with, among other crimes, genocide and incitement to commit genocide, extermination, murder and rape.

On the other hand, Bucyibaruta is among the key people who participated in the killing of more than 50,000 Tutsi who took refuge in Murambi, 27 years ago but he roams freely in France.

Col Laurent Serubuga, a former deputy chief of staff of the Genocidal army is another top genocide suspect living freely in France. He was arrested near the northern French city of Cambrai in July 2013 following an international arrest warrant issued by Rwanda. In September 2013, a lower court in Douai rejected Rwanda’s request for his extradition and ordered his release. Serubuga was a very important figure during the Genocide, as part of a group of officers called “The Juvenal Habyarimana comrades of July 5, 1973,” who helped overthrow former President Grégoire Kayibanda.

In 2014, a French court declined to extradite him to Rwanda on grounds that genocide had not been legally defined as a crime in 1994! What a lame and shameful excuse to delay and deny justice to the victims of the genocide! Other prominent genocide fugitives in France include;  Innocent Musabyimana,  Ignace Bagilishema, Claude Muhayimana, Hyacinthe Rafiki Nsengiyumva,  Dr Sosthene Munyemana,  Innocent Bagabo,  Dr Charles Twagira, just to mention a few. 

Recently, one of the main pepetrators of   the genocide, Colonel Aloys Ntiwiragaba, was also found to have lived in France for many years. The former senior officer of Genocidal army was the president of the Rally for Democracy in Rwanda (RDR), formed in the wake of the genocide. Why are all these genocide suspects allowed to stay?

French authorities should borrow a leaf from the US. The recent extradition from the US of Beatrice Munyenyezi, nicknamed “the monster next door”, shows how to deal with persons suspected of the worst crimes. Refusing them citizenship or asylum papers and yet allowing them to stay leaves Rwandans puzzled.

If France truly wants to turn a page and leave the past behind, genocide suspects on its soil should be extradited to Rwanda as has been requested for years by the Rwandan government. 

Justice delayed is justice denied.