Regional
Michaela Wrong is Valerie Bemeriki with an English accent!
One
of the reasons genocide ideology, racism or anti-semitism persist, is because
Western media keeps finding new ways to frame them as insight, freedom of
expression, intellectualism, etc.
When
Rwanda needed the world’s attention, three decades ago, the world’s response
was indifference, at best. They asked the US, the UK to jam the signal of RTLM,
a hate radio that was calling people on hills to kill Tutsi; “We cannot
interfere with freedom of press”, they said.
Just
under three decades later, the country that most predicted would be a failed
state, now leads the continent in areas such as “ease of doing business”,
attracting international conferences and world’s sports; The 2025 world road
cycling championships will be held in Rwanda, a first in Africa.
To
achieve that, only 29 years after a genocide that took the lives of over a
million people, hasn’t been easy as anyone would imagine. Rwandans chose
consensus politics that has seen genocide perpetrators tried in traditional
courts, then pardoned after asking for forgiveness, survivors rehabilitated and
the country reconciled, before embarking on a firm path towards development and
social transformation.
This,
while a remarkable feat by all account, threatens obsolescence to “African
experts”, who first landed in Kigali right after the genocide with ready-made
governance templates in their briefcases and purported to chart our future. We
politely declined. Liberal democracy while effective in the West, had not
worked in our poor, landlocked, densely populated country, with rife ethnic
tensions introduced by Belgian colonialists and entertained by the first and
the second republics.
So
they gave three months to the post-genocide government to collapse, it didn’t.
Then six months, and so on. While no one predicts the future, the fact is that
Rwanda has experienced the longest stability in recent post-colonial history.
However if you read some articles in western media, you would be shocked by the
dystopian depictions they reserve to a country where education, housing and
healthcare are free for the poor, where life expectancy now reaches 70 years,
almost at par with rich nations.
One
of such declinist authors is Michaela Wrong. When her book on Rwanda came out,
I wrote a rejoinder: Here. Almost
nothing in it is factual. She makes claims she can’t substantiate, documents
she can’t produce and refers to witnesses she can’t reveal – all for their
safety of course…
Her
recent article in Foreign Affairs is no exception. She claims that the FDLR, a
militia led by those who fled after committing the genocide against the Tutsi,
is a scapegoat for Kagame to invade and plunder the DRC. But the FDLR did in
fact bomb the Rwandan territory in 2019, killing innocent civilians and
destroying property in the border town of Kinigi, northern Rwanda. The UN,
which she quotes, has consistently reported that the Congolese army FARDC does
collaborate with the FDLR, only that part is left out in her typical deceit.
Second,
she claims that the M23 rebel movement invaded the DRC from Rwanda. Only, it is
geographically impossible to seize the town of Bunagana from Rwanda. Bunagana
is located up north at the border with Uganda, and Ugandan officials have
officially admitted that M23 came from their country, where they had been
encamped for over 25 years, waiting for the DRC government to fulfill its
commitment of repatriating their near 300 thousand refugee community in vain.
It
is remarkable that media reporting is in contradiction with the position the
two regional mediators. Both Angola, and Kenya who sent troops into eastern DRC
do not intend to engage M23 militarily. M23’s demands are well understood in
the region, mainly because Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda and Kenya have all been
sheltering Congolese Tutsi who fled from FDLR genocide perpetrators.
It
is reductive to overlook the plight of the Congolese Rwandophone community that
has been rendered stateless for about three decades, because one has a bone to
pick with Paul Kagame. As I write, the M23 has fulfilled its promises to cede
its conquered territories to regional forces in exchange for a dialogue towards
a peaceful return of their diaspora, as promised. But the DRC president has
flipped again, saying he will never negotiate with the group.
“After
M23 was defeated in November 2013, eastern Congo was relatively quiet For the
next eight years”, Michaela Wrong writes. This is a lie. M23 isn’t even
remotely violent compared to other groups operating in Eastern DRC, nor is it
the source of the country’s instability. This week it was reported that there
are over 250 militias operating in eastern DRC, of which Ugandan jihadists of
ADF-Nalu, Rwanda’s FDLR, Burundi’s RED-Tabara and Congolese regular army – the
FARDC are reported to commit most crimes against Congolese civilians.
Now,
the reason I chose briefly come out of retirement to write this rejoinder is
because Michaela Wrong claims in her recent article, that Tutsi are being
targeted in DRC because of the M23’s resurgence. “Congolese Tutsis, she writes,
are also victims of the M23’s new campaign.” She made the same assertion in her
book, on page 369, that Tutsi brought death upon themselves.
This
claim is dangerously familiar. The person who invented it was Gregoire
Kayibanda, the first Rwandan president. In a speech in 1962, after
exterminating Tutsi of Rukumberi, eastern Rwanda, he warned Tutsis in exile
canvassing to return home, that should they ever attack Rwanda, their relatives
who had been dispossessed of their land and cattle, then deported from their
villages of origin and sent to die in “Tutsistans”: arid, inhospitable regions
replete with Tsétsé flies, would be exterminated in retaliation.
The
same message was relayed by genocide cheerleaders on hate radio RTLM by the
likes of Valerie Bemeriki, in preparation of, and during the genocide against
the Tutsi between 1990 and 1994. “If the RPF doesn’t return to Uganda where
they belong, the message said, Tutsi in Rwanda would be exterminated”.
Such
remarks constitute incitement to genocide and Bemeriki is
serving a life sentence in Rwandan prisons for genocide and crimes against
humanity.
What
of the 300 thousand Congolese Tutsi who have been in exile for the last three
decades; what is their sin? Congolese Tutsi are being targeted, in fact,
because of the likes of Michaela Wrong, who are peddling accusation in mirror.
Following
allegation of massacres of Kishishe, reported differently by many institutions
without setting foot in the village, colleagues and I travelled in the war zone
in Eastern DRC to investigate. Populations in Kishishe told us that no massacre
had occurred in their village. They said there were 21 people in total who were
killed in a battle between a local Mai-Mai militia and M23.
In
our report, here,
we shared filmed testimonies; we shared names and occupation of the victims;
names and contacts of interviewees, we showed the graves where the people had
been buried, we even filmed a focused group discussion by the population of
Kishishe on what had exactly occurred in their village.
The
government had reported 300 victims, while the UN had said 151. In writing our
report, we sent a questionnaire to the DRC government, the Rwandan government
and the UN. Rwanda and the UN responded, the DRC did not.
Our
question to MONUSCO was simple: Do you know the identity of people who
died in Kishishe? Is there a report we can consult?
We
were astonished with their response. They admitted to having no report on the
matter and no knowledge of the victims; all they had was a one pager
declaration to the press. Our findings were later corroborated by Human Rights
Watch’s own investigation. Last week after M23 had vacated Kishishe,
Francophone television wanted to revive the Kishishe lie. They filmed a skull
on some random village path, then recorded a mystery man with altered voice and
blurred face claiming the existence of a mass grave. That is all! They couldn’t
show the said mass grave because none exists in Kishishe!
As
is her habit, Michaela wrong resurrects the old accusations of the late 90s,
that Rwanda invaded the DRC to plunder its minerals and conduct widespread
massacres. Those accusations have been extensively debunked. As explained here by
veteran politician Etienne Tshisekedi, father of the current DRC president
Tshisekedi Jr., Then president Sese Seko Mobutu had refused to disarm genocide
perpetrators and placed them in a camp near the Rwandan border, in violation of
the 1951 Refugee Convention. As a result they frequently crossed into Rwanda
and continued Killing Tutsi, which led the Rwandan Patriotic Army (RPA) to
invade former Zaire.
However,
in ‘La
traversée’ a book by French author, Patrick de Saint-Exupéry,
refutes the pervasive allegations of massacres conducted by the Rwandan army in
Zaire. The war reporter journeyed from Kigali to Kinshasa, in the footsteps of
the RPA and of Rwandan refugees, interviewing villagers and visiting alleged
killing sites on his way, and found no sign of any massacres. De
Saint-Exupery’s findings were recently confirmed by the “Duclert
Report”, by a commission of French historians set-up by President
Emmanuel Macron to examine the role of France in the Genocide Against the
Tutsi.
There
is no single allegation by Michaela Wrong that has not been spectacularly
invalidated. In her book she accused the Rwandan government of strangling a
former spy, one Karegeya in a posh hotel in downtown Johannesburg, South
Africa. In reality, no nexus has ever been established between Karegeya’s
murder and the Rwandan government, in one of the most dangerous cities on
earth. While a lawsuit was filed by his family in South African courts to that
end, a South African judge decided to strike the case from the role, citing
lack of evidence.
When
it comes to Rwanda, researchers in any other fields update their datasets
annually, because the country’s transformation happens live, for everyone to
see. The moniker: “impoverished donor-dependent, authoritarian regime”,
could not be further from reality. Perhaps it is because the likes of Michaela
Wrong have been banned from travelling to Rwanda since a long time that they
revert to repeating outdated mantras.
Last
week it was reported that Rwanda has created over 1000 multi-millionaires in
dollars, with 72 new entrants on the list last year alone. With limited
corruption and little natural resources, this data vindicates Kagame’s
politics. This also means that taxes were adequately collected on this wealth,
and social services will be adequately funded. It also means lasting stability
as people with millions of dollars do not typically wish for war.
There
is a reason Rwanda leads the continent, not as the place with the most
millionaires, but as the country that adds more millionaires annually. 29 years
after the genocide, a landlocked country with little natural resources, adds
7.2% millionaires annually. Rwanda also have a couple of billionaires in
coffee, tea, hotels and banking. Imagine that! That’s the best places to have
billionaires: unlike billionaires in mining and politics, these are labor
intensive sectors, creating good jobs and social security! A good economy!
Perhaps
Wrong’s biggest rejoinder yet, is the reports by the World Bank and the World
Economic Forum that Rwanda leads the continent in attracting and retaining the
best and brightest in the last ten years; mostly Rwandans, but also foreigners.
These people whom for the most part leave western capitals to settle in Rwanda
seem to see no problem with its alleged dictatorship and lack of freedoms.
If
she claims that Paul Kagame is a “darling of the West”, a bizarre attribute for
a politician, usually in the realm of affection, if she claims he longs for
relevance, she should at least acknowledge that he is highly regarded on his
own continent. The man she calls a ruthless dictator, was unanimously elected
by his peers to reform the African Union, whence he pushed for a Continental
Free Trade Area agreement. As I write, Paul Kagame is on a tour of West Africa.
In Guinee-Bissau he was bestowed the “Amilcar Cabral medal”, the highest
distinction of the land and a befitting tribute, from a freedom fighter to
another. In Guinea-Conakry, a highway was named after him. When he went to
inspect the guard of honor, Benin republican guards intoned a Rwanda Defence
Force moral song, as it turns out, they all attend the Rwandan Military
academy…
Source:
www.gateteviews.rw