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THE
HOLOCAUST IN RWANDA - 10 YEARS ON
Ten
years ago, on 6th April 1994, one of the most dreadful campaigns
of mass murder was unleashed upon the Tutsi people of Rwanda.
In just 100 days, more people had been slaughtered with
machetes and clubs than had died from atomic weapons in
all of history.
At
the time, world media attention was focused on South Africa's
first "One Man, One Vote" elections. When the
genocide was launched on 6 April 1994, most African correspondents
were in South Africa covering the elections. The MRND government
(Mouvement Revolutionnaire National pour le Development)
in Rwanda meticulously organised the genocide. The French
trained Presidential Guard, the army, the gendarmes and
civil administrators were mobilised to slaughter the Tutsi
minority.
Central
to the MRND strategy was to sow confusion so that no one
would know what was happening. They isolated their victims
by imposing a news blackout, cutting telephone links, establishing
a dense network of roadblocks and imposing a nation wide
curfew. These measures kept people in their homes and prevented
most people from fleeing. By cutting communications and
restricting travel, they isolated their victims and sought
to stifle the flow of news.
Following
the assassination of the president, by surface to air missile,
the MRND government launched a campaign of disinformation.
It portrayed the killings as a spontaneous outbreak of tribal
violence. It sought to confuse the mass killing of defenceless
people with "the war", and it played the humanitarian
card by pleading for emergency aid. All this was a smoke
screen to conceal the state sponsored genocide. Amidst this
calculated confusion, many foreign aid workers assisted
in the disinformation campaign by contributing ill informed
comments such as: "Everyone is killing everyone!";
"It's uncontrollable violence"; "The Hutus
and Tutsis are killing one another again!"
Having
killed opposition politicians, Rwandese journalists, human
rights activists and others who might present an accurate
report on the cold-blooded campaign of mass murder, the
MRND campaign continued their strategy of disinformation
by portraying the violence as spontaneous rage in response
to the assassination of the president.
Initially,
international attention generally focused on the plight
of foreigners. Camera crews were, understandably, only prepared
to travel with international troops - whose mission was
to evacuate foreigners. This naturally led to a slanted
and incomplete picture being portrayed to the world. The
murder of ten Belgian soldiers on 7 April only heightened
this pre-occupation with the evacuation of foreigners. It
is very probable that the killers were instructed to murder
the Belgians precisely in order to make the evacuation of
foreigners the international priority. It also further encouraged
the withdraw of UMAMIR (United Nations Assistance Mission
to Rwanda).
This
strategy of disinformation and terror was spectacularly
successful. To this day, most people worldwide do not understand
what happened in Rwanda or why it happened. That is why
after my mission to Rwanda I was compelled to produce a
compact book that would not only expose what had happened
in the horrific massacres in homes, hospitals, churches
and on the streets, but the reasons why this systematic
slaughter was unleashed. Holocaust
In Rwanda reveals the events leading up to the
intense and widespread violence, and more importantly the
lessons we need to learn from the genocide in Rwanda.
President
Paul Kagame at the formal commemoration of the Rwandan genocide
ten years ago condemned "the international community's
failure…a convenient failure to take responsibility."
President Kagame lead conference participants on a tour
of massacre sites including the churches in Nyamata and
Ntarama where 15000 people were slaughtered in the sanctuaries
where they had sought refuge.
The
cemetery at Nynaza was another place visited. The cemetery
contains the graves of 3500 people who were massacred after
being abandoned in a schoolyard by UN peacekeepers.
The
Holocaust In Rwanda book is unique in that it examines the
disgraceful involvement of liberal church leaders, gun control
and media manipulation. Rwanda was a gun free zone. The
mass murderers successfully manipulated and abused the media
to vilify the targeted Tutsis, and to mobilise masses of
Hutus to kill their neighbours. The scandalous role of the
French government in providing assistance, training and
weapons to the mass murderers, and even the French military
expedition to create a safe zone for the fleeing Hutu mass
murderers, providing sanctuary even for many of the architects
of the genocide is also revealed in this book.
In
addition Holocaust In Rwanda looks at the challenge the
Rwandan holocaust presents to the Christian church. The
killers did not merely kill people in churches, they killed
church workers - pastors, ministers, priests and nuns. However,
the most shocking aspect of the anti-Christian mass murders
was how many people responsible for the slaughter were trusted
members of the congregations. On many occasions even priests,
nuns and ministers were directly involved in the genocide!
Several heads of denominations co-operated with the Interahamwe
by betraying their Tutsi congregations and co-workers into
the hands of mass murderers.
The
role of these Christian traitors, bloodstained bishops and
murderous ministers of Rwanda are an indictment upon our
theological seminaries and church councils. Those who do
not wholeheartedly love the Lord Jesus Christ and His Word
are not qualified to be spiritual leaders. The Rwandan Holocaust
exposes the emptiness of the superficial and self centred
easy believism, which all too often masquerades as the Gospel.
Compromise and cowardice helped cause the catastrophe. Most
importantly, Holocaust In Rwanda looks at some of the lessons,
which need to be learned in order to ensure that such atrocities
do not reoccur. Far more important than the concerns for
retribution is the urgent need to lay foundations for the
future that will prevent such nationwide oppression from
ever occurring again. These are Biblical principles which
are not only important for Rwanda but for every society
which values life and liberty. Holocaust In Rwanda concludes
with the Biblical principles which, had they been adhered
to, there would have been no holocaust in Rwanda.
Holocaust
In Rwanda is available in both English and French (70
pages with 20 photographs, maps or charts)
Dr Peter Hammond
Frontline Fellowship, P O Box 74, Newlands, 7725, Cape Town,
South Africa
E-mail: admin@frontline.org.za
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