How the arrest of Rwanda’s chief of intelligence in London
shows the British government projecting its behavior on RPF
Let us imagine a situation where a Spanish judge indicts 40
top Israel generals. The judge alleges that in 1933, Jews formed a terrorist
organisation in neighboring Poland aimed at exterminating the German people. He
further alleges that in 1939, Jews exploited circumstances of World War 11 to
execute genocide against Germans. If there were any killings of Jews by any
Germans, the judge alleges, it was spontaneous self-defense.
The Spanish government issues arrest warrants. It has an
extradition agreement with the British government. Let us also imagine Jews
liberated Germany from the iron grip of the Nazis. The Germans now live
comfortably with Jews. Finally let us imagine that the head of the Israel
intelligence was passing through London. Would the British government arrest
him on such an indictment?
Yet this is exactly what happened in London on June 20 to
the head of Rwandan intelligence, Gen. Karenzi Karake. Karake is one of the
generals who liberated Rwanda from the grip of Hutu genocidal extremists in 1994.
Yet according to the indictment, it is the Tutsi-led RPF that committed
genocide against Hutus. This is in circumstances where the Hutu extremists made
every effort to broadcast and publicise their plans on their radio Des Mille
Collins and in their newspaper, Kangura.
There is not a whit of ambiguity about the intentions and
actions of the Hutu extremists. Meanwhile, after their defeat, the same Hutu
extremists, using their friends and allies in France (which was an accomplice
to the genocide) and other parts of Europe have tried to create a narrative
that their genocidal killings were a self-defense effort against plans by the
RPF to exterminate them. They have never adduced any evidence to prove this.
However, their documents can be found online and show that this Spanish Judge
merely Xeroxed from them.
I have used the example of the Jewish holocaust not only to
demonstrate the hypocrisy or double standards of the British government but
mainly to underline the racist contempt European governments and their
offshoots in North America, Australia and New Zeeland have for Africans. It was
therefore even more painful when the British government issued a statement
pledging to remain a “strong” and “long term ally” of “the people and
government of Rwanda” in spite of arresting the head of that nation’s
intelligence service on charges of genocide, terrorism and crimes against
humanity. Inadvertently the British are also telling the world that they are
allies to, and are financing a government of genocidaires and terrorists.
There are many propaganda documents by Nazis claiming that,
“the German people” were in “a life and death struggle against international
Jewry”. It is intriguing how those who commit genocide argue that they were
defending themselves against a helpless minority they sought to
exterminate. One needs to have
monumental denseness to accept the claim that the RPF ever tried to commit
genocide against Hutus in Rwanda in 1994. The miracle of Rwanda was that there
was no counter genocide. It is a miracle without precedent in human history.
Imagine that in 1945, the Generals and soldiers under their
command who liberated Germany were Jews. Imagine these Jewish armies marching
through villages of Germany and opening up Nazi concentration camps and finding
their kith and kin slaughtered. What would have happened to the German
civilians in neighboring villages? We can get a glimpse of what the British did
to German civilians during World War 11.
According to the American World War 11 Museum in New
Orleans, six million German civilians were killed as a result of deliberate
allied (British and American) bombing of German villages. The British and
Americans deliberately targeted German civilians to avenge the Nazi bombardment
of England in the early years of the war and to also destroy German fighting
morale. This is not to mention other genocides the British government conducted
against the Boers in South Africa, the Ndebele and Shona in modern day
Zimbabwe, the Banyoro in Uganda, the Kikuyu in Kenya etc. But it is wrong for
the UK government to think RPF is like them.
In Rwanda, the Tutsi victors exhibited an unusual degree of
restraint that is difficult to fathom given the natural tendency of human
beings to seek revenge. Remember the Nazi genocide against Jews was executed by
highly specialised SS units in concentration camps away from the eyes of
ordinary Germans. The armies that liberated Germany and opened up concentration
camps were Russian, British and American, not Jewish. In Rwanda, although the
Tutsi genocide was organized by the state, it was executed by millions of
ordinary Hutu civilians using machetes. This made almost every Hutu civilian a
genocidaire.
Secondly, Tutsi soldiers were capturing territory and
finding their families slaughtered in thousands. And around the villages were
many Hutu civilians who had been conducting these massacres. Did some Tutsi
soldiers revenge? You bet they did. But the RPF severely punished many, some by
firing squad in front of their colleagues. Did some who killed avoid punishment?
I am sure many did. Whatever the details, even an idiot would agree that RPF
exhibited a degree of restraint that defies all imagination. The normal
expectation would have been counter genocide on a massive scale. How Paul
Kagame and his commanders pulled this off is a feat that deserves a Nobel Peace
Prize – if the prize was something genuine.
If there was any lingering doubt about RPF’s intentions,
here is the evidence. Today, Rwanda has the best healthcare system in this
region, 90% of its citizens are medically insured in this very poor country.
Consequently, the life expectancy of Rwandans, the vast majority of whom are
Hutus, has increased from 28 years to 64; and their infant, child and maternal
mortality have enjoyed the fastest decline in the whole world. These efforts by
the RPF government leave no doubt whatsoever about its intentions.
To therefore arrest and detain Gen. Karake on a charge of
genocide is not just an insult to the people of Rwanda but to all Africans and
the entire humanity – if the UK government acknowledges the existence of such a
concept. Some people argued that this may be a way the British are signaling to
Rwanda their apprehension about the current efforts to amend the constitution
to remove term limits on the presidency. If the British government felt a
neo-colonial responsibility to care more about the future of Rwanda than
Rwandans themselves, why use such an insensitive signal?
amwenda@independent.co.ug
No comments:
Post a Comment