ICTR Chief Prosecutor Hassan Bubacar Jallow (L) and Prosecutor-General Richard Muhumuza pay tribute to Genocide victims at Kigali Genocide Memorial Centre, Gisozi, yesterday. (John Mbanda)
Kigali 23/04/2015: As Rwandans await the final verdict in the longest ever trial by ICTR that has spanned 14 years, the reparation of Genocide survivors still hangs in balance.
If no decision is taken about the reparation of survivors before the tribunal winds up by December, efforts to hold the international community to account for its failures in Rwanda may be farfetched.
However, The New Times understands that both Rwanda and ICTR officials have been devising ways of establishing a reparation mechanism.
“Unfortunately, at the time when the tribunal was established, the issue of compensation of victims was not part of that process. But the system of international justice has evolved to the point where the question of compensation to victims is paramount,” said the Tribunal’s Chief Prosecutor Hassan Bubacar Jallow.
Jallow was speaking at Kigali Genocide Memorial Centre, Gisozi, after paying tribute to victims of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi where he was accompanied by Prosecutor-General Richard Muhumuza.
“I think it’s still not too late for the international community, even outside the context of the ICTR, to look into the issue of reparations to ensure that victims are compensated for the suffering that they underwent,” said Jallow.
The deal with IOM
In December, last year, while addressing the UN Security Council, ICTR president Van Joensen said the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) had completed and submitted a draft assessment study to the Government of Rwanda on reparations for victims of the Genocide.
“The assessment study identifies options for reparations for victims and survivors and describes in concrete and operational terms how these options can be developed and implemented in Rwanda as well as how these programmes may be funded. The final report of the study should be issued in the coming months, and transmitted to relevant stakeholders so that follow-up activities can be planned,” said Judge Joensen.
Although the content of the study has been kept confidential, both government and Genocide survivors are optimistic that the move may reap positive results.
“It should be noted that Judge Joensen’s initiative to have a study on reparation is in good spirit. We got a copy of the draft report and also submitted our inputs; we are now waiting for the final report to move forward,” said Dr Jean-Pierre Dusingizemungu, the president of Ibuka, the umbrella of associations advocating for the interests of survivors of the Genocide.
Dusingizemungu shares the same view with Justice minister Johnston Busingye, who said that although the move had taken long, there was need to establish a proper framework for reparations.
“If this succeeds, it would be the first step, then we will have to move forward with mechanisms of implementation with all the stakeholders on board. There is every reason and every justification to hope for the best,” Busingye said.
No date has been set for the release of IOM’s final report.
In May, last year, the Ministry of Justice signed a deal with IOM to conduct a study on how reparations would be carried out.
The comprehensive report is expected to assess and identify in detail options that could be developed, established and implemented in the Rwandan context.
The report will also include how the reparation will be funded, while suggesting strategies to operationalise the proposed compensation option.
The government annually commits 5 per cent of state revenues toward the Fund for the Support of Genocide Survivors (FARG) although the priority for FARG is education, healthcare, shelter and socio-economic welfare for survivors.
Reparation is one of the long-sought-after justice issues in the aftermath of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, mainly because most of those who were convicted either do not genuinely have capacity to pay, or have lied about their ability to pay.Others are fugitives who have never been brought to book.
First appeared in the New Times edited here by Albert GASAKEK
Ahagana mu ma saa kumi z’igitondo cyo ku wa 13 Mata 2015, mu Karere ka Rusizi mu Murenge wa Bugarama mu Kagari ka Pera mu Mudugudu wa Kinamba, umugore warokotse Jenoside yakorewe abatutsi mu w’1994 witwa Solina Mukantagozera yasohotse ajyanye umwana we kwiherera afatwa n’abantu babiri nyuma yo kumubaza urutonde rw’abandi bacitse ku icumu baramuzirika amaguru n’amaboko, bamukubita mu mutwe bashaka no kumufata kungufu avuga ko arwaye SIDA.
Foto ya Mukantagozera, ubu urwariye mu kigo nderabuzima cya Bugarama
Ubwo Kigali Today yamusangaga ku kigo nderabuzima cya Bugarama aho arwariye, Mukantagozera yavuze ko abo bantu bamufashe umwe yari yipfutse mu maso undi yisize amafu mu maso ku buryo bwo kwiyoberanya.
Ngo babanje kumubaza niba yabamenye nawe ababwira ko atabazi, nyuma y’aho batangira kumubaza amazina y’abarokotse Jenoside batuye muri uwo murenge bari bafite ku gapapuro we akababwira ko atabazi, mu gihe yakomezaga guhakana avuga ko atabazi bahise bamubwira ko bagiye kumwica bahita bamukubita urukweto bari bafite banamubwira ko bagiye kumufata ku ngufu.
Abonye bagiye kumwangiza yahise ababwira ko n’ubwo bagiye kumuhohotera ngo abana n’ubwandu bamubaza n’iba ajya afata imiti nawe ababwira ko amaze iminsi myinshi, ku bw’Imana baratinya ntibamufata ku ngufu.
Bahise bagira uburakari bukabije bavuga ko bagiye kumukubita icyuma cya ferabeto (fair à Beton) bari bafite niba atababwiye ko azi abo barokotse Jenoside, ababwira ko abazi atangira kubabwira amazina amwe n’amwe yabo.
Umwe muri abo bagizi ba nabi yahise abwira uyu mugore ko bari bamaze iminsi bamutegereje ngo asohoke kandi ko ngo bari baramwandikiye urwandiko rubimumenyesha ariko akaba yarabasuzuguye. Uyu mugore ngo yahise ababwira ko atigeze abona urwo rwandiko.
Nyuma yo gusiga bamuziritse bamubujije guhuruza bageze hirya gato ahita avuza induru ari nabwo abaturanyi bamutabaraga bagasanga aziritse amaboko n’amaguru. Abaturanyi bamuzituye basanze mu maguru ye harimo udupapuro twanditseho ngo “Hu”, akandi kanditseho “Tutsi”.
Gusa uyu mugore ngo yari amaze iminsi acyurirwa n’umugabo witwa Habimana ndetse akaba yarabitanzeho amakuru ku buyobozi. Mu minsi ishize uyu mugore ngo yasabwe amafaranga yo gufasha abarokotse Jenoside kandi nawe abarimo binagaragara kandi ko atishoboye.
Umunyamabanga nshingwabikorwa w’agateganyo w’Umurenge wa Bugarama, Nyiragaju Janvière avuga ko imyifatire bari kugaragaza muri ibi bihe byo kwibuka ku nshuro ya 21 Jenoside yakorewe Abatutsi uteye isoni, ariko bitagomba kugarukira aho.
Urugendo rwo kwamagana ihohoterwa ry’abacitse ku icumu
Yasabye abaturage kwikuraho isura mbi bakomeje kwambikwa na bagenzi babo kandi yasabye bakihutira gutanga amakuru abakora ibyo bintu bagafatwa.
Yakomeje avuga ko ejo ku wa kabiri tariki ya 14 Mata 2015 hateganyijwe urugendo rwo kwamagana ibyo bikorwa bibi.
Abaturage bo bavuga ko ibi bintu bibabaje mu bihe nk’ibi bakavuga ko hakwiye kujya habaho irondo rifasha mu gucungira abarokotse Jenoside umutekano cyane cyane mu bihe byo kwibuka Jenoside kuko baba bamerewe nabi muri uyu murenge.
Kugeza ubu abakoze ayo mahano ntibarafatwa, icyakora umwe uri mu bakekwa uzwi ku izina rya Kazungu niwe uri mu maboko ya Polisi.
Inzu Mukantagozera atuyemo
Umuvugizi wa Polisi mu Ntara y’Iburengerazuba, Superintendent Hitayezu Emmanuel yavuze ko abahohoteye uyu mugore bari gushakishwa.
kuva igikorwa cyo kwibuka Jenoside cyatangira mu Murenge wa Bugarama hamaze guhohoterwa Abarokotse Jenoside batatu barimo uyu Mukantagozera, uwatwikiwe ikiraro n’undi wakubiswe.
Hari kandi undi mugabo ubu uri mu maboko y’ubugenzacyaha wavuze ko “Jenoside yakorewe Abatutsi yatewe n’ihanurwa ry’indege ya Habyarimana wari Perezida w’u Rwanda”. End
The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) must in theory close its doors on December 31. On November 8, it celebrated twenty years of existence. While the Tribunal’s contribution to fighting impunity is clear, observers point to remaining grey areas of its legacy. These include the failure to prosecute alleged crimes by one of the parties to the 1994 conflict in Rwanda; lack of any mechanism for victim reparations; acquitted persons with nowhere to go; and nine top suspects still on the run.
The ICTR was set up under UN Security Council Resolution 955, which gave it a mandate to hunt down and bring to justice those most responsible for “genocide and other serious violations of international humanitarian law committed in the territory of Rwanda, and Rwandan citizens responsible for genocide and other such violations committed in the territory of neighbouring States, between 1 January 1994 and 31 December 1994.”
Twenty years on, observers agree on one point: most, if not all the individuals tried by the ICTR would still be free if the international community had not created this Tribunal, based in Arusha, northern Tanzania.
Since its first trial started in 1997, the ICTR has convicted 60 people (of whom seven are still on appeal) and acquitted 14 others accused of having played a leading role in the anti-Tutsi genocide. One witness and one investigator have also been tried and sentenced for contempt of court. Those convicted include former Prime Minister Jean-Kambanda and other members of his government, army generals, businessmen, clergy and members of the media.
But some analysts, like French sociologist André Guichaoua who has testified as an expert in several ICTR trials, think the Tribunal has not fully implemented its mandate. “Choosing to focus on prosecuting and trying the authors of the genocide was justified in the conditions that were those of the ICTR when it was set up, as well as a duty towards the victims and survivors,” he said in a recent interview with Hirondelle News. “But the fact that successive Prosecutors subsequently bowed – with the blessing of the UN Security Council – to the refusal of the military men in power (in Kigali) to have the whole of the Court’s mandate carried out has weakened its credibility and the scope of its judgments, truth telling and most certainly the appeasing of passions and controversies between parties to the conflict,” he said. “So the task given to the ICTR has not been completed,” added Guichaoua, in reference to crimes allegedly perpetrated by members of the RPA, former armed wing of the ex-rebel Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) now in power in Kigali.
Current ICTR Prosecutor Hassan Bubacar Jallow refutes this allegation. At a press conference on November 5 at the Tribunal headquarters, the Gambian lawyer said his team had “never been prevented from investigating” allegations against the RPF. Jallow thus rejected claims that some Western powers, notably the United States, have blocked the “special investigations” started by Swiss former Prosecutor Carla del Ponte, who was Jallow’s predecessor. “We have conducted investigations and concluded that there was a case, the case concerning the killing of (Catholic) bishops” in June 1994 in Kabgayi, central Rwanda, Jallow said.
“Mandate not fulfilled”
Among the 13 clergy killed – almost all Hutus – were three bishops. The case was entrusted to Rwanda by the ICTR Prosecutor. In October 2008, following a trial, a Rwandan court acquitted General Wilson Gumisiriza and Major Wilson Ukwishaka and sentenced the two other co-accused, both of lesser rank, to five years in prison.
But Human Rights Watch (HRW), which says it helped Jallow’s team in this investigation, does not think justice has been done. “The case was not vigorously prosecuted and did not pursue the evidence suggesting a planned military operation ordered by more senior level commanders,” HRW Executive Director Kenneth Roth said in a letter to Jallow on August 14, 2009. “The prosecutor did not pursue more senior commanders who had been involved in the military operation and against whom evidence exists.”
“We continue to believe that your mandate as Chief Prosecutor at the ICTR will not be fulfilled until you pursue all senior commanders responsible for atrocities committed in Rwanda in 1994,” Roth also said in the letter to Jallow.
For genocide survivors, their main criticism of the Tribunal is the absence in its governing texts of any mechanism to provide reparations for victims. This is a criticism not so much of the ICTR itself but of the UN Security Council which set it up. “The ICTR still lacks this important component of reconciliation because it doesn’t have a fund to compensate victims,” said Naphtal Ahishakiye, Secretary General of the main survivors’ organization Ibuka (meaning “Remember” in the Rwandan language), on November 8.
Ibuka President Jean-Pierre Dusingizemungu launched the same appeal on April 10 this year as he was attending a genocide remembrance ceremony at the ICTR’s headquarters. “As we commemorate the 20th anniversary of the genocide, reparations are at the heart of what Ibuka is asking for,” he said. “And we think this is the moment for the (Rwandan) government and the international community to redouble their efforts to put in place a reparation mechanism for victims.”
Whereas the ICTR Statutes do not provide for any reparation or participation mechanism for victims, those of the International Criminal Court (ICC) do. At the ICC, victims have a right to present their observations and question witnesses through their representatives. At the end of a trial, they can ask for reparations for harm suffered. The Rome Statute which founded the ICC also set up a Trust Fund for Victims, which is independent of the Court. “Our recommendation now is that an international Fund be set up for victims,” the Ibuka president concluded.
Three “big fish” still on the run
The Collective of survivors’ associations is also calling for the international community to continue hunting for the nine ICTR accused still on the run so that “the closure of the ICTR does not signal the end of justice”. Six of those still at large have had their cases transferred to Rwanda, which now has the first responsibility to track them down. The three others, including rich businessman Félicien Kabuga said to be the financier of the genocide, will be tried if they are caught by the residual Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals (MICT). In a press statement on November 8, as the ICTR was celebrating its 20th anniversary, the Security Council called on all member states to “cooperate with the ICTR, the Residual Mechanism, and the Government of Rwanda in the arrests and prosecutions of the remaining nine indicted fugitives”. ICTR Prosecutor Jallow made the same call from Arusha. “The nine fugitives who remain at large (…) need to be arrested and brought to justice,” he said. “This can be done only through the active collaboration of all states to secure the arrest and transfer of these fugitives for trial.”
Billionnaire Félicien Kabuga, accused notably of having ordered the machetes used to kill Tutsis, is believed by the ICTR to be hiding in Kenya, only six hours by road from the seat of the Tribunal in Arusha. The second “big fish”, former Defence Minister Augustin Bizimana, is said to be in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The third is former presidential guard commander Protais Mpiranya. He was in charge of the élite protection unit of ex-president Juvénal Habyarimana, which was active in the massacres. Mpiranya, who was a commanding member of the FDLR Rwandan Hutu rebels in the eastern DRC, is being protected, according to the ICTR, by senior Zimbabwean officials. However, some Rwandan sources say Bizimana and Mpiranya have died of natural causes. ICTR Prosecutor Jallow contests this.
On another issue, the ICTR recognizes it has had enormous difficulty finding host countries for the people it has acquitted, and for convicted persons who have served their sentences. Of the 14 acquitted so far, only six have found host countries while the others are still in an ICTR “safe house” in Arusha, along with three people who have served their sentences. “I humbly call on all governments present to see how they can assume this international responsibility and agree to host persons acquitted or freed by the ICTR after serving their sentence,” said ICTR Tanzanian Deputy President Mohammed Gharib Bilal at the November 8 ceremony. According to the agreement between Tanzania and the UN, people who have been definitively tried by the ICTR must leave Tanzanian territory.
The fact that acquitted persons cannot leave Tanzania represents a “failure” for the ICTR and a “big human rights challenge”, according to ICTR Registrar Bongani Majola.
Mukaroza Laurence wo mu Murenge wa Kigina, Akarere ka Kirehe, warokotse Jenoside yakorewe Abatusi yishwe urw’agashinyaguro mu gicuku cyo kuwa 15 Ukwakira 2010.
Nyina na murumuna we bishwe n’abo mu muryango yashatsemo, ndetse ngo umugabo we Kanyangoga ni we wamusohoye aho yari yihishe muri Mata 1994.
Mukaroza yari umutangabuhamya mu Nkiko Gacaca mu rubanza rw’abishe nyina na murumuna we, atotezwa kenshi n’abo mu muryango yashatsemo, ndetse ngo n’umugabo we yamutegetse kudashinja bene wabo, bitaba ibyo agapfa
Mukaroza yaje gusangwa ku gasi, yambaye ubusa iruhande rw’ahataburuwe imibiri ya nyina n’uwa murumuna we, basanze ahirita
Kuwa 30 Werurwe 2010, Urukiko Rukuru, Urugereko rwa Rwamagana rwanzuye ko umusore witwa Bikorimana Simon ari we wishe Mukaroza. Abandi bakekwagaho uruhare bahanaguweho icyaha, Ubushinjacyaha bujuririra Urukiko rw’Ikirenga.
Urukiko rw’Ikirenga rwaburanishije mu bujurire, kuri uyu wa Mbere, urubanza ruregwamo Bikorimana Simon, Hakizimana Sylvatus, Ngomije Elysee (muramu wa nyakwigendera) na Kanyangoga Edouard wari umugabo wa Mukaroza.
Ubwo urubanza rwatangiraga kuburanishwa mu mizi, Bikorimana wunganirwa na Me Musafiri Jerome, yamenyeshejwe ibyaha bibiri ashinjwa, ari byo gusambanya ku gahato n’ubwicanyi. Hakizimana, Ngomije na Kanyangoga bo bashinjwa gucura umugambi wo kwica Mukaroza, n’ubufatanyacyaha mu ishyirwa mu bikorwa ryawo.
Ubushinjacyaha bwahise bujuririra icyo cyemezo, ariko na Bikorimana ahita akijuririra. Ubushinjacyaha bwavuze ko bwajuriye bitewe n’uko Urukiko Rukuru rwavuze ko Bikorimana yemeye icyaha rukamugabanyiriza igihano, kandi nyamara ingingo ikuraho igihano cy’urupfu yaragisimbuje icya burundu y’umwihariko ku cyaha cy’ubugome nk’icyakorewe Mukaroza.
Impamvu ya kabiri y’Ubujurire bw’Ubushinjacyaha ni ukuba Bikorimana yaremeye ibyaha mu mabazwa ye ya mbere, yagera mu rukiko agahindura imvugo, akavuga ko yari yarabyemeye kubera kuzahazwa n’inkoni yakubiswe n’Abapolisi.
Uwari uhagarariye Ubushinjacyaha yasoje asaba ko Urukiko rwakwemera hakumvwa umutangabuhamya witwa IP Niyomugabo Emmanuel, Umupolisi wageze aho icyaha cyabereye, akaba atari yarumviswe mu Rukiko Rukuru, ibi akaba abyemererwa n’ingingo ya 62 y’itegeko ry’Ibimenyetso (Law of Evidence).
Ubwo yasabwaga gusobanura impamvu y’ubujurire bwe, Bikorimana yasubije ko yarenganyijwe, gusa byari bigoye gufata nk’ukuri ibyo yavugaga, kuko yari afite ubwoba bwinshi bwatumaga icyo avuze ahita akivuguruza ako kanya.
Nyuma yo kuyoborwa n’Inteko iburanisha, yasubije ibibazo yabajijwe, aho yagaragaje ko Mukaroza yishwe na Berinyuma Pierre wabanje kumusambanya, nyuma Bikorimana amuhereza igiti cy’umwumbati ikimujombagura mu gitsina, bamusiga aho ari intere.
Nubwo adasobanura neza uwabatumye ngo umuryango wa Mukaroza uve mu gihirahiro, Bikorimana yavuze ko ibyo Berinyuma yakoze atari yabyibwirije.
Me Musafiri umwunganira, yahise asaba Urukiko ko hashingirwa ku myanzuro yashyikirije urukiko igahuzwa n’ibyavuzwe n’abatangabuhamya, kuko ibyo Umukiliya we avugiye mu rukiko birimo guhuzagurika no kuvuguruzanya.
Haba hari isano hagati y’Urupfu rwa Mukaroza n’ubuhamya yatanze kuri muramu we muri Gacaca?
Ubushinjacyaha bwagaragaje ko Mukaroza yaba yarishwe nyuma y’igihe kitari gito atotezwa n’abo mu muryango yashatsemo ndetse n’umugabo we bwite, bamubuzaga gutanga amakuru ku rupfu rwa nyina na murumuna we.
Ibi binashimangirwa n’umwe mu bo mu muryango we wabwiye IGIHE ko muramu we witwa Bugingo washinjwe uruhare mu rupfu rwa nyina na murumuna we yigeze gufungurwa, aza kumubwira (Mukaroza) ko agiye kuzamwica nk’uko yishe nyina.
Mbere yo gushiramo umwuka, Mukaroza hari amazina yasize avuze
Ubushinjacyaha bwagaragaje ko mbere yo gupfa, Mukaroza yavugaga ko azize umugabo we Kanyangoga na muramu we Ngomije, ariko biza gushidikanywaho ndetse bigibwaho impaka ubwo umutangabuhamya IP Niyomugabo yavugaga ko ahagera yasanze nyakwigendera avuga amazina y’abantu batatu, aho yavugaga ngo “Nzize Berinyuma, Ngomije na Kanyangoga.”
Nyuma yo kumva umutangabuhamya, no kwibutsa Bikorimana ko mu mabazwa ye mu Bugenzacyaha no mu Bushinjacyaha yari yavuze ko Mukaroza yambuwe imyenda na Berinyuma afatanyije na Hakizimana Sylvatus, hahise hahabwa umwanya buri wese uregwa kugira icyo avuga, bose bahakana ibyo baregwa.
Abunganira abaregwa bashimangiraga ko nta bimenyetso bifatika Ubushinjacyaha bugaragaza uretse amagambo yavuzwe na nyakwigendera mbere y’uko apfa, ariko basaba urukiko kudaha agaciro ayo magambo, ngo kuko uwayavugaga yari yamaze guta ubwenge.
Ubushinjacyaha bwahise busaba kutitiranya inyandiko za muganga, aho yasobanuye ko “Traumatisme” (ihungabana) ivugwa muri raporo ya muganga ari uburyo ibikomere yari afite byari bimeze, ikaba yari “Traumatisme physique” (ibikomere by’umubiri byari mu gitsina) byaganishaga kuri “Traumatisme Psychique”(ihungabana ryo mu mutwe).
Nyuma yo kumva impande zose zivugwa muri uru rubanza, urukiko rwasubitse iburanisha, rwanzura ko rizasubukurwa kuwa 23 Mutarama 2015 saa yine za mu gitondo (10:00 am) hasomwa imyanzuro ya rwo mu Bujurire.
Icyo gihe ni ho Umuryango wa Mukaroza Laurence avukamo n’abana be, bategereje kuzamenya ukuri ku rupfu rw’uwo mubyeyi, ahanini bakaba bashaka kumenya uwatumye Bikorimana na Berinyuma, kuko ari bo bagaragaza uruhare rudashidikanywaho mu rupfu rwe, ariko akaba nta kindi cyabahuzaga, kuko aba basore bombi bari abapagasi bakomoka mu Burundi.
Minister Kaboneka responds to queries from senators at Parliament yesterday. (Timothy Kisambira)
Two decades later, genocide orphans are still facing several difficulties to recover the assets left by their parents killed in the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi. The only survivor of his family, Karekezi learned that his parents owned land in Nyabitare Cell, Nyarubuye Sector in Eastern Province’s Kirehe District as he grew up.
He said what disheartens him most about the occupation of the land is that some of its occupants are people he believed perpetrated the Genocide.
“What I need is my land back because it’s a shame for people who killed my people to live off our family land,” he said.
Karekezi said he wrote a letter to the Ministry of Local Government to protest the illegal occupation of his land after officials allegedly told him to give up on his parents’ land.
Jean Damascène Nsanzumuhire, legal advisor and helpline coordinator at AERG, the association of students who are Genocide survivors, said orphans often have less means to seek justice in comparison to their oppressors [who are mostly well-off economically].
He told The New Times that there is need for a framework under which the government could assist orphans in courts.
“Some of them are losing the cases because they don’t have the same level of means as those who took their property,” Nsanzumuhire said.
Asked whether he believed the number of Genocide orphans who claim property left by their parents is about to end, the legal advisor said the challenge is far from over.
“Issues are still there and they will probably never be completely solved,” he said.
Lack of information still hinders recovery of property for more than 300 orphans of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, whose assets were illegally taken over by ‘dishonest persons’ after the slaughter.
Local Government and Social Affairs minister Francis Kaboneka revealed the challenge to the Senate yesterday while presenting the progress on what government had done to help hundreds of Genocide survivors regain their assets.
Cases handled
Kaboneka said only 331 cases remain unresolved out of 1,283 disputes over grabbed properties that were documented countrywide by a taskforce established last year by the Prime Minister’s office.
For the cases that remain unresolved, the major challenge is lack of information as some orphans have no tangible evidence to prove that their parents owned the property they claim.
Some of the orphans have also failed to prove that their parents owned money in banks and savings in the Rwanda Social Security Board (RSSB) before they passed away.
However, the most challenging issue, Kaboneka said, has been about finding land for the orphans when theirs has been taken over by their foster parents who raised them but did not put the assets in the names of the orphans, or other persons who occupied vacant portions of land after the Genocide.
As for the orphans who presented credible information about their properties, officials have held negotiations with them to find them new plots of land in case their offenders cannot leave or pay for the properties, he said.
The government has also been working with banks and the RSSB to seek information about investments and savings made by the orphans’ parents before they were killed in the Genocide.
“The orphans keep getting new information and start over their cases. We will keep listening to them and analysing their cases to find solutions for them,” Kaboneka told the senators.
For cases that are not in courts and are being handled by local officials at different levels of negotiations, the minister said the issues could be solved in the next two months.
“A lot has been done but the remaining cases should also be solved soon. The coordination between institutions is needed in the process,” he said.
Among the more than 300 Genocide orphans whose properties remain occupied is 28-year-old Jean Karekezi, a third-year student at Kigali Institute of Management.
For the last 15 years, Karekezi has been trying to get back his land of 3 hectares from families who occupied it when his parents died in the Genocide.
“I haven’t gotten an answer up to now. I got completely discouraged after trying many times to get my land back in vain. I now live in fear because people who occupy the land don’t like it when I ask for it,” he told The New Times.
At the session, senators once again urged government to move fast to help Genocide orphans recover their assets.
“Genocide survivors feel traumatised twice when they don’t get their rights,” said Senator Gerturde Kazarwa.
zimwe mu nzu zubakiwe abacitse ku icumu Nyamugari zikabasenyukiraho hadateye kabiri
Abadepite bagize komisiyo ishinzwe gukurikirana ikoreshwa ry’imari n’umutungo bya Leta PAC bavuga ko FARG itita uko bikwiye ku iyubakwa ry’inzu zigenewe abarokotse Jenoside yakorewe Abatutsi batishoboye nk’uko bigaragazwa na Raporo y’Umugenzuzi Mukuru w’Imari n’Umutungo bya Leta. Leta yari yasohoye amafaranga yo kubaka inzu 3000 nyamara hubatswe inzu 350 nazo zubakwa nabi inyinshi zihita zisenyuka mu mezi abiri gusa.
Ubwo yabasomeraga amwe mu makosa, Visi perezida wa PAC, Karenzi Theoneste, yavuze ko hari inzu zubatswe mu Karere ka Huye na ba Rwiyemezamirimo zituzuye.
Hon. Karenzi yasobanuye ko bitewe n’uko abagenerwabikorwa bari bayakeneye bapfuye kuzakira uko zimeze, izindi nazo zikaba zisenyuka zitaramara n’amezi abiri zubatswe. “Nk’amazu 30 yubatswe afite agaciro ka miliyoni 126 hanyuma 25 muri yo agira ibibazo.”
Depite Nkusi ukuriye PAC we yagaragaje ko FARG ifite ikibazo cy’igenamigambi no kutamenya icyo ishaka n’icyo igomba gukora kuko hari nk’amazu yabaga ateganijwe kubakwa ntiyubakwe. Ati “Sinumva ukuntu haba hateganijwe kubakwa amazu ibihumbi bitatu hakubakwa 350 abantu bakanayasiga atuzuye”.
Uyu mudepite yavuze ko iki kibazo cyibazwa na benshi kuko ngo na Perezida wa Repubulika y’u Rwanda yigeze kubyibaza mu nama y’umushyikirano.
Depite Nkusi yagize ati “Ariko kubakira abarokotse bizarangira ryari, nyuma y’imyaka 20! Ko atari ikibazo cy’amafaranga yabuze, n’ayubakwa akubakwa nabi nyuma y’amezi abiri ugasanga inzu yasenyutse!”
Undi mu bagize PAC nawe ati “Inzu igahirima twaravuze tuti nyabuna mutange ibikoresho inzego z’ibanze zibyinjiremo ibindi binakorwe mu rwego rw’umuganda ku buryo ibibazo birangira. Nyuma y’imyaka 20 murumva abo bantu babayeho bate koko!”
Usibye izi nzu zavuzwe, hari n’ibindi bibazo nk’ibi byagiye bigaragara hirya no hino mu gihugu mu turere dutandukanye. Na none kandi hari nk’imishinga yari igamije gutanga matungo itarakozwe kandi yari yarashyizwe muri gahunda ndetse ahandi ho ugasanga abarokotse Jenoside yakorewe Abatutsi. bahawe amatungo atameze neza nyuma y’iminsi mike agapfa.
Mu kwisobanura, Nabahire Anastase Visi Perezida w’Inama y’Ubutegetsi ya FARG yasobanuye ko ibyo bibazo byatewe n’amateka y’abayoboye iki kigo mbere ariko ko ubu bari kugenda bayakosora.
Nabahire yakomeje asobanura ko hari igihe FARG yari gifite abakozi ku rwego rw’uturere bigezeho bakurwaho hasigara abo mu nzego z’ibanze bityo kubera ubwinshi bw’ibikenewe gukorwa haba ibibazo byo kugenzura no gukurikirana ibikorwa byabo.
Nabahire ariko yemeje ko aho ibyo bibazo bigaragarijwe abakozi bo kuturere bagiye gusubizwaho kugira ngo bajye bakurikirana uko bikwiye ibikorwa by’abagenerwabikorwa ba FARG.
PAC ntiyanyuzwe n’ibi bisobanuro kuko ngo kuba ku turere nta bakozi bari bahari ataribyo byatumye ibintu bipfa.
Umuyobozi wa FARG, Theophile Ruberangeyo, we yavuze ko koko bafite inshingano zo gukurikirana ibikorwa ariko ko bipfira mu turere tutabagezagaho raporo ariko ko kuri ubu hari abasigaye bazitanga.
Yijeje ko mu gukemura ikibazo cy’imyubakire y’amazu ubu bari gukorana n’inkeragutabara kuko arizo zubaka neza bityongo ibyo bibazo by’amazu asenyuka n’atabwa ntibizongera kubaho.
Ruberangeyo yakomeje avuga ko ubu bari gukosora amakosa yagaragaye kandi ko hari intambwe bateye bayakosora nk’ayagaragajwe na Raporo y’Umugenzuzi w’Imari umwaka wabanje.
The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) will hand down its appeals judgment on September 29 in the case of two former Rwandan political party leaders, Hirondelle learned hirindelle on on monday
Matthieu Ngirumpatse was president of the MRND party, while Edouard Karemera was its vice-president. The MRND was the party of former head of state Juvénal Habyarimana, whose assassination on April 4, 1994 sparked the genocide.
The two men were sentenced to life imprisonment by the lower court in December 2011 after it found them guilty of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.
According to the first-instance judgment, they neither tried to prevent nor to condemn the crimes committed in 1994 by the youth wing of their party, the notorious Interahamwe of the MRND.
Addressing the court during appeals hearings in February, Ngirumpatse’s defence lawyer Frédéric Weyl argued that the former MRND president had “no authority” over party members or government ministers in office during the genocide.
“Matthieu Ngirumpatse had no judicial, police or military power (…),” said Weyl. “He did not have the power to expel or sanction anyone (…) A political party is different from a government or military structure.” Weyl called for the court to acquit his client.
Félix Sow, one of Karemera’s two Senegalese lawyers, argued along similar lines. He also called on the appeals court to “overturn all the convictions”.
Ugandan prosecutor George Mugwanya told the court that the two men had a common agenda to kill Tutsis. He said that they had abused their positions within the MRND as part of a joint criminal enterprise.
The trial started in November 2003 but was subject to many delays, owing mainly to Ngirumpatse’s health problems.
The two MRND leaders initially went on trial with the party’s former secretary general
Joseph Nzirorera and former Education Minister André Rwamakuba, who was a member of an opposition party to President Habyarimana.
But Rwamakuba’s case was finally separated and he was acquitted on September 20, 2006. Nzirorera died of illness on June 1, 2010, when his trial was near the end of the defence stage.
In a country with no tradition of institutional care for the elderly, Rwanda’s widows and survivors of the 1994 mass killings seek dignity at the end of their lives.
SAVE, Rwanda — In the remote hillside village of Save in eucalyptus-covered southern Rwanda, Emmaculate Niwemfite sits on a straw mat near the entry to her two-room apartment. Her door stands ajar, halving the room with a beam of light. She sits in the shadows.
Niwemfite lives by herself, surrounded by stark walls taped with photos of Christian iconography. It’s been 20 years since her husband, children and entire family were killed in the genocide. Afterwards, unable to live in proximity to their killers, she moved into this village. “I’m just alone,” she now laments.
Niwemfite is 65, suffers from asthma, and is unable to walk much due to problems with her legs sustained in a bad beating during the war. She says she spends two weeks a month in a hospital. She has no family left, so the daughters of her friends come to help with household chores and she earns an income from renting another home she owns. But she fears solitude as she ages.
“Imagine I die in my bed,” she says. “No one will know.”
In a culture with no tradition of institutional elder care, Rwanda’s large families have watched over their aging parents since time immemorial. But during the genocide, at least 800,000 Rwandans were killed—300,000 of them children. As many as one-sixth of the genocide survivors were widowed. Today a Rwandan woman can expect to live until 65, but many of these women, who’ve spent years displaying unimaginable self-sufficiency, have been left without children to care for them as they grow old.
Nina Strochlic/The Daily Beast
Niwemfite is a member of a widows collective called Duhozanye, a group that assembled after the genocide to reconstruct a decimated society. They began by building themselves houses and planting seeds in their fields. Two decades later, the organization’s leaders have focused their efforts on constructing a senior care center to assist women like Niwemfite, aging genocide survivors whose families were wiped out in the genocide, leaving no children, or just one, to care for them in old age.
The effort is led by Daphrose Mukarutamu, a statuesque figure in a red embroidered dress and short, sweeping hairdo. Mukarutamu is the founder and president of Duhozanye—which means, “Let us console one another”—and as she moves through the villages where Duhozanye’s members are spread, her formidable presence draws a trail of chattery women.
Mukarutamu clutches both hands to her heart when asked about those early days during and after the killing. She had left on a 2.5-hour trip for the capital of Kigali the night before war broke out. It was the last time she’d see her family. When she returned, a neighbor told her that her husband and eight of her 11 children had been killed.
“Imagine I die in my bed. No one will know.”
“At that time we thought that even death doesn’t like us,” Mukarutamu says of the survivors.
Barely five months later, Mukarutamu gathered fellow widows to start Duhozanye.
Some 330 of them attended that first meeting and became the group’s founders. For the first two gatherings they wept together. At the third, they stopped crying and started rebuilding. They broke off into groups of a dozen and got to work collecting bricks and salvageable materials from the rubble. From donated seeds, they slowly built back the agriculture they once lived off, and later incorporated sewing and craft cooperatives. “We were living schools,” she remembers.
Today, Duhozanye has 3,000 members scattered over the southern district of Gisagara, organized into small local chapters of two or three dozen women and a central body of leaders from the various villages.
But now, at 67, Mukarutamu worries about herself and her fellow widows. After two decades of hardship and self-sufficiency, another factor beyond their control is creeping up on Duhozanye’s leadership: old age. The organization’s founding members range from late 50s to early 90s. “We’re getting old and will be beneficiaries instead of partners,” she says.
Nina Strochlic/The Daily Beast
Outside the organization’s headquarters, a couple dozen young adults are lounging on the lawn. These are orphans that were taken in by the organization 20 years ago. The majority are now in school elsewhere but return each year during commemoration. After the genocide, more than a hundred orphans were collected and cared for by the women, many of whom had lost most, if not all, of their own children.
Mukarutamu quotes a Rwandan adage about an old, slow rabbit being fed by its children, and then posites the question: “But what if it has none?”
Down the street, Langwida Kanyange sits on the floor of her friend Emmaculate Niwemfite’s small home. She’s younger than the others at 48, but her skin hugs a face so gaunt she looks much older. Kanyange has AIDS, a byproduct of a gang rape she suffered during the genocide. After the bloodshed in Rwanda, an estimated 70 percent of the 200,000 women raped were infected with HIV. Her son was also a result of the attack; he’s now a 20-year-old student finishing secondary school.
She too spends the days at home alone, weakened by the medication she takes. It’s freely provided by the government, but she has trouble getting special food that doesn’t make her ill. “When I don’t have enough to eat it reminds me of the genocide,” she says.
If the members of Duhozanye realize their goal to build a senior center, Kanyange, and Niwemfite would be the first to reap its rewards.
“I will immediately agree because I will be with others—I’d agree the same day, then the group looking after me would be free to do whatever they want,” Niwemfite says.
The center Mukarutamu imagines will provide a safe environment for the elderly, and offer hospice care for those at the end of their days or survivors from the hard-to-reach areas in need of constant medical attention. She foresees a project manager, nurses, social workers, and guards, along with an on-call doctor and legal advisor. Another widows cooperative, Avega, is also currently attempting to open a retirement home for widows of the genocide.
“It’s a moral obligation to take care of elderly people in our society, but now these elderly people are expecting to be taken care of by children, and their children are no longer there because they were killed in genocide,” says Claire Umubyeyi, a Rwandan survivor and 17-year veteran employee of the United Nations. “You’re denied this security of aging in dignity because you don’t have family to take care of you.”
After a generation wiped out by genocide, an age gap has left the country’s elderly population overly reliant on its small labor force. In Rwanda, an unbalanced ratio leaves 83 of every 100 citizens dependent on the leftover 17 for survival.
In Save, the single road running through town is quieter than usual, as most of the residents have gathered at an outdoor genocide remembrance meeting, held in every Rwandan village for a few hours per day during the national week of mourning in April. During these gatherings, survivors and perpetrators alike share their stories—many horrendous—to preserve the national memory and educate future generations.
Even though it was only two decades ago, most of Rwanda’s citizens don’t remember the time of war—61 percent of the population is under the age of 24. But memories of the killing don’t come to light only in yearly national ceremonies. On the drive into the single-road village, a mass grave is said to hold the remains of 3,000 people. Just before commemoration week, the province had uncovered another body and was preparing it for burial.
It will also offer a program for survivors to relay their memories into shards of history as part of a belated healing process many were never offered. “When those people die its like a library is gone,” Umubyeyi says. She was particularly upset when an 84-year-old woman named Mary whom she had grown fond of passed away last year in her rural home with no one there. “We could have benefited off her wisdom.” This center, Umubyeyi says, will “make sure these survivors who have suffered so much get some sort of care and die in peace.”
Duhozanye has the land and the need, but lacks the $300,000 it will cost to build and sustain. In the hopes of raising the money, the organization is writing up grant proposals to send across the world. In January, Umubyeyi and Mukarutamu hope to bring a group of volunteers and potential investors to see Duhozanye’s headquarters and meet its members.
In a dim backroom of a mud hut in Save, 82-year-old Teresa Nyirabutunda sits propped upright in bed by her daughter, Francine. Francine says caring for her mother, who can’t process solid food or move by herself, is similar to having a baby. She was the only survivor of the genocide among her siblings and now worries about caring for both her mother and herself because she, too, is aging. “I live by miracles you can’t believe,” she says.
But even for children struggling to care for elderly parents on their own want to abide by tradition. Francine is adamant that her frail mother stays in her house—“She is my mom. Even if she’s very sick I will look after her until she dies. I wouldn’t let them take her,” she says of having her mother live in the center. She admits, though, that she could desperately use the health care services.
In a country where an almost paradisical landscape somehow hosted the fastest genocide of the 20th century, hurdling such seemingly unconquerable challenges is now woven into the national identity, and Duhozanye’s leaders are confident that battle-worn women like Teresa will have their hardships alleviated before the end.
“Rwanda is country of thousand hills, a thousand problems, and a thousand solutions,” Umubyeyi says
“I don’t have to forgive people who never showed any love or respect for the lives of my loved ones, nor any sign of repentance. But I have to live with them, because I don’t have a choice.” Marie G., a survivor of the Rwandan genocide, is known as a woman who speaks her mind.
While Rwanda’s political, administrative and religious authorities are calling for reconciliation, they are not forcing any victims to offer forgiveness.
Marie G. was born in Mwulire, a village in the Rwamagana district of eastern Rwanda, the oldest of eight children. She was 19 at the time of the 1994 genocide, during which she lost her parents, five brothers and sisters, and both sets of grandparents.
To escape the massacres, she spent more than a month hiding in the bushes with her little brother who was not yet six years old. “He cried a lot,” she says. “The rain quenched our thirst but also made us shiver in the bushes. When night fell, I would come out of hiding and go into the fields to pull sweet potatoes, which we ate raw.” During the day, the killers came killing and she remained frozen, with her brother, in their hiding place. “One day, a group of killers passed within an arm’s length of us. They were boasting about what they had done. They mentioned the members of my family that they had just killed. I had to stifle a cry and I ordered my brother not to make a sound. I cannot forget, and no-one can force me to forgive,” she says, then falls silent for several minutes.
For the National Unity and Reconciliation Commission, Marie G.’s feelings are understandable. “If there is no specific request for forgiveness and her property has not been restored to her, then her attitude is understandable,” says Jean- Baptiste Habyarimana, Executive Secretary of the Commission. “Are the people who destroyed her family and looted its property indigent and unable to give it back? Are they people who still think what they did was legitimate?” he asks. Otherwise, he says, “wherever there has been a request for forgiveness and restitution of looted property, there has been a move towards reconciliation”.
Marie G., now divorced with two children, lives in a small house built by the FARG (National Assistance Fund for Needy Survivors of Genocide) in her native village Mwulire.
Her hard life has aged her more than her 39 years. “You would think I was in my fifties,” she says. “That is all because of what they did.”
But she is still a fighter. “I must make a living for them,” she says pointing to her children, one boy and one girl. “After all it is not their fault.”
Her day begins at 5AM. After getting a frugal breakfast for her children, she goes to work in a rice mill where she sweeps the floor. In the evening there are the traditional chores of fetching water and cooking.
She often has to walk the 10 kilometres to work when she runs out of money for public transport.
Attempting a joke, she points to the old pair of trainers she is wearing and recalls a little rhyme from her school days: “Six kilometres on foot, six kilometres on foot, it does your shoes no good!”
By SRE-ER/JC , First appeared in Hirondelle News Agency
As the world commemorates the 20th anniversary of the genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda, renewed efforts supporting survivors to realize their right to reparation are gaining traction. Following a call from victim organisations in Rwanda for increased attention to the lack of a comprehensive reparation effort for victims of the genocide, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in Decem-ber 2013 mandated the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) to conduct a study on the state of reparation for victims in post-genocide Rwanda.
In light of similar studies the IOM has carried out in, for instance, Sierra Leone, Colombia, and the former Yugoslavia, the IOM is expected to provide technical input to stakeholders on the tangible ways forward for reparation for genocide victims, including the identification of feasible and suitable mechanisms for implementing and funding a comprehensive effort. To this end, the IOM will carry out broad consultations throughout the country with survivors and survivor organizations, as well as government representatives and relevant international and regional actors.
In late February 2014, IOM carried out its first consultation visit in Rwanda, resulting in a collaboration with the government of Rwanda, as well as the main survivor organizations. This is sending important signals of hope for survivors: for the first time since the genocide the government of Rwanda – through the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Rwanda- publicly recognized that survivors of the genocide have a right to reparation.
The Minister of Justice expressed the government’s commitment to support initiatives addressing the right to reparation. In addition to the IOM study, the government announced the establishment of a new national forum for discussion on reparation within the Ministry of Justice to serve as a joint think-tank on how best to realize the right to reparation.
These developments are long overdue. For the past twenty years, survivors and survivor organizations have continuously called on the government of Rwanda as well as the international community to provide adequate reparation to survivors. However, their calls remained mostly unheard, instead, the emphasis was placed on the prosecution of the perpetrators before traditional ‘Gacaca’ (community) courts and the ICTR. The majority, if not all of these prosecutions, relied heavily on survivors’ testimonies.
For many of those who testified in proceedings before Gacaca and the ICTR, their testimony came at a high price: survivors have been ostracized from their communities and continue to fear reprisals as a result of their testimonies. Women who were raped and who came forward with their testimonies frequently complain about being stigmatized and humiliated by their rapists.
The closure of Gacaca courts in July 2012 and the winding down of the ICTR left survivors disillusioned by the justice processes they have done so much to support. Failure by national and international processes to provide reparation for victims and survivors with reparation has left a sense of unfinished business.
For genocide survivors, reparation is the most tangible manifestation of the state and the international community’s efforts in acknowledging and repairing their lives. The IOM
study, carried out on in collaboration with the Government of Rwanda and civil society, is an encouraging step in the right direction.
It is expected that the IOM’s final report will outline the roadmap for the way forward and include recommendations for all actors involved including the government of Rwanda and the international community.
The real test, however, will be whether there will be the necessary political will to implement the recommendations in practice and provide adequate reparation to survivors.
First appeared in Pan-African Reparation Perspectives | July 2014 | Issue 2 page 4
Twenty years later, a new momentum to provide reparation for genocide victims in Rwanda
By Albert Gasake,
Nyina na murumuna we bishwe n’abo mu muryango yashatsemo, ndetse ngo umugabo we Kanyangoga ni we wamusohoye aho yari yihishe muri Mata 1994.
Minister Kaboneka responds to queries from senators at Parliament yesterday. (Timothy Kisambira)
