Regional
Of HRW’s insidious agenda against Rwanda
For the last 27 years, the New-York-based so-called rights group, Human Rights Watch (HRW), has never hidden its poisonous agenda against Rwanda - publishing fabricated reports aimed at smearing the reputation of Rwandan government and its institutions.
Lately,
on March 16, HRW published another report, “Rwanda: wave of free speech
Prosecutions.” In this report, it alleges that opposition leaders and
commentators in Rwanda are being persecuted by the authorities for their speech
and opinion.
It’s a rehash of similar critique it levelled
against the Rwandan government in its 2021 report: “Rwanda: “Crackdown on
opposition, Media intensifies.” Such alarmist reports, often based on mere
fabrications, should be treated with the contempt they deserve.
In
response to the new report, Yolande Makolo, Rwandan government spokesperson,
said: “The judicial system in Rwanda operates fairy and transparently with
Rwanda’s laws, as well as our regional and international obligations. Everyone
is equal to the law, and no one is persecuted for having political opinions.”
She
stressed that “the sustained harassment of Rwanda” by HRW does nothing more
than entrench negative stereotypes about justice and human rights in Africa.
The
HRW’s fury against Rwanda was better exposed by Richard Johnson, a retired US
diplomat, in his paper: “The Travesty of Human Rights on Rwanda,” published in
March 2013.
He
wrote: “What Human Rights Watch (HRW) does about Rwanda is not human rights
advocacy. It is political advocacy which
has become profoundly unscrupulous in both its means and its ends. HRW’s Board of Directors should hold
Executive Director Kenneth Roth and the HRW personnel who cover Rwandan issues
accountable for this travesty, which has dangerous implications for Western
policy toward Rwanda and for the overall credibility of Western human rights
advocacy.
“Donors
to HRW should think seriously about what causes their money might serve. Western governments should be careful about
following HRW advice, and courageous enough to challenge them publicly when
need be.”
Johnson
explained that HRW’s discourse on Rwanda over the years has been viscerally
hostile to the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) which defeated the genocidal Hutu
Power regime in 1994, and systematically biased in favour of letting
unrepentant Hutu Power political forces back into Rwandan political life.
What
HRW calls free speech of Youtubers who have fallen foul of the law is, on the
contrary, ill-intentioned criminal minds that engage in genocide denial or propagate
the extremist Hutu ideology.
Such
crimes are punished by law according to Rwanda’s Constitution, much to the
chagrin of HRW and supporters of those fugitives blamed for the 1994 genocide
against the Tutsi which claimed the lives of more than one million innocent
Rwandans.
This
genocide ideology and the genocidaires who instigated it were defeated in 1994.
But as noted by Johnson, HRW wants them rehabilitated and infected into Rwandan
governance structures by the back door.
He
wrote: “HRW’s discourse has been an important part of their life-support
system, particularly over the past twelve years. This discourse -- what is said and left
unsaid, what is highlighted and what is downplayed, what is averred and what is
implied -- can best be understood as four commands addressed to the
post-genocide Rwandan government: let the genocidal parties back in, do not
outlaw their ideology, don’t hold more than a few perpetrators accountable, and
forget about their foreign accomplices.
Admit that you are no better than they.”
As
for alleged disappearances, in 2012 HRW declared that Alexis Bakunzibake, Vice
President of the non-registered PS Imberakuri party had been kidnapped by
Rwandan recurity organs. Few days later he was presented to FDLR members as a
new ally by its president Brig Gen Gaston Iyamuremye. The FDLR is a DRC-based
terrorist group formed by remnants of the masterminds of the genocide against
the Tutsi in Rwanda.
The
list of people who were declared missing or disappeared and ended up later
having crossed to DRC, Burundi or Uganda is endless. Those include David
Ngendahimana who was declared missing in 2021 and later, it was established,
was in Uganda operating a private online TV.
Theobald
Mutarambirwa was decaled missing in 2010, and in 2019, he was arrested by the
FARDC (Congolese Armed Forces) where he had joined the MRCD/FLN militia group
of terror kingpin Paul Rusesabagina.
In
July 2017, just before presidential elections, HRW published a report with a
list of persons alleged to have been ‘summarily’ executed by Rwandan security
forces for petty crimes, such stealing goats. The seven people cited by HRW
were: Tharcisse Nsanzabera, Alphonse Majyambere, Daphrose Nyirabavakure, Elias
Habyarimana, Donati and Emmanuel Hanyurwabake. They were later produced in a
press conference, much to the embarrassment of HRW.
The
HRW is a very corrupt organisation. According to The Intercept of March 2,
2020, HRW took money from a Saudi businessman after documenting his coercive
labour practices. The money was given to its director Ken Roth.
HRW’s
agenda against Rwanda is clear. This time around, issuing such a venomous
report ahead of CHOGM 2022 in Kigali has no other purpose but to try paint
Rwanda in a very bad light and therefore spoil the party.
This
is futile because the summit will take place. This is HRW’s modus operandi. But
forces of evil shall not prevail where Rwanda is concerned.