Passing of UK-Rwanda asylum seekers bill shames anti-Rwanda crusaders

Author: Annet Nabakooza

• 2024-05-03 05:30:00

For almost two years, lawmakers in the United Kingdom have played Parliamentary ping-pong regarding the “UK-Rwanda Bill”. The bone of contention has been on the single issue of whether Rwanda is a safe country for the asylum seekers.

The passing of the bill clearly demonstrated that the UK legislators, despite the long debates held about the safety of Rwanda, were finally convinced that Rwanda is a safe country for the asylum seekers.

As the UK parliament approved the UK-Rwanda bill, two things worth noting happened. The first was the robbery of a bank in Sawbridgeworth, UK, where a heavy caterpillar truck was used to demolish a bank and took away an ATM machine full of money. One could not believe that the video footage shown in media, with people easily demolishing a bank with no security presence was taking place in UK. I wondered whether such a thing can take place in Rwanda. Then I put everything on a scale to weigh which country is safer than the other.

Secondly, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) reported that at least 16 people died and 28 others went missing after a boat carrying 77 migrants capsized off the coast of Djibouti. Yvonne Ndege, the IOM spokeswoman, told the media that the 16 deaths included children and an infant.

If the UK parliament had acted much earlier to approve the UK-Rwanda asylum seekers bill, hopefully, these risk journeys of migrants that cost countless lives could have come to an end or at least reduced. However, for two years “Parliamentary Ping-Pong” on the UK-Rwanda bill, was played. One thing was clear; the political differences between the two houses of the UK parliament used the bill as an opportunity to play internal politics rather than focus on the safety and humanitarian side of the asylum seekers.

It was a political showdown between the Tories and Labour Party. 

Worse still, the individuals who claimed that Rwanda is unsafe did not do so from an objectively informed point of view. The anti-Rwanda narrative created by corrupt Western media and NGOs is what they relied on for information.

The media played a very big role in misinformation about Rwanda by selectively interviewing people who had negative views about the government and leadership of Rwanda.

The partnership between Rwanda and UK to stop the small boats and give decent living conditions for the asylum seekers is beyond money and politics.

Weak and corrupt minds cannot understand that saving lives is a humanitarian act above all other interests and that is what compels  Rwanda to make a difference, in a situation where the critics do not even provide any better alternative.

The passing of the UK-Rwanda bill left the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) with egg on the face and exposed its hypocrisy as the UN agency had joined anti-Rwanda crusaders, yet the same UN agency works with Rwanda on projects to accommodate asylum seekers and refugees in Rwanda.

In March, Rwanda in partnership with UNHCR received 91 asylum seekers from Libya in accordance with a 2019 MoU signed between UNHCR, AU, and Rwanda, for the latter to provide a transit mechanism for refugees and asylum seekers evacuated from Libya.

Again, Rwanda, in partnership with UNHCR, has given sanctuary to more than 130,000 refugees, asylum seekers, and other displaced populations mainly from the Democratic republic of Congo (DRC), Burundi, Libya, Eritrea, Afghanistan, Sudan, and others.

There is only one Rwanda, which is very safe, and it has successfully struggled for the last 30 years to shake off countless challenges after the devastating the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi. Rwanda will never be defined by haters as well as genocide suspects and genocide deniers who are relied upon by Western media as credible sources on the safety of Rwanda.

When former UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson was in Rwanda in 2022, for the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM), he said that Rwanda needs to be seen and believed.  His remarks were in reference to comments by individuals who opposed the UK-Rwanda asylum seekers deal on allegations that Rwanda was unsafe. "You didn’t come on the Rwanda trip. You should’ve done, because lots of people did, the scales fell from their eyes," he said.

"They saw a country that is really going places; they had a totally different view of what it could mean. And if you talk to Paul Kagame [the president] and the government, they are rather shocked by some of the coverage in the UK. They see this as an opportunity for us to make progress together on a very difficult issue,” Johnson added.

Just like the former UK Prime Minister, I would encourage the people in UK and elsewhere who are involved in the “unsafe Rwanda campaign” to go to Rwanda along with the first flight of asylum seekers to have a first-hand impression on the safety of Rwanda.