This section covers a brief background history of Rwanda in order to appreciate the political and social dynamics that gave rise to the genocide. The political and ethnic tensions that culminated in the Rwandan genocide date back to the period of colonization by Germans in 1899 and later by the Belgians, after Germany lost her colonies in World War I (Destexhe 1995:40). The Rwandan population of seven million consists of two main ethnic groups, 85 percent Hutu and approximately 15 percent Tutsi (Jefferson, 1992). During the pre-colonial era, the terms ‘Tutsi’ and ‘Hutu’ were mainly depicting social and political status or categories, as opposed to being ethnic categorizations. In this regard, Tutsis were referred to as cattle owners, while the Hutus were considered to be cultivators (Gourevitch and Lamb, 1998). There are however conflicting views among historians and scholars regarding the exact origins of the Hutu/Tutsi ethnic conflicts.
According to Prunier (1997) the Hutu version is that the Tutsi were treacherous foreign conquerors who had oppressed the Hutu since time immemorial. The Tutsi version argues that the Hutu and Tutsi lived in harmony up to the time of colonization when artificial segregation and social divisions were created and nurtured; ultimately leading to the 1994 genocide. It is however generally agreed that the root causes of the Hutu-Tutsi conflicts revolved around the basic fundamental human needs for sustainable human life, namely: access to arable land, individual and group safety and human security, the need for tolerance of identity differences, respect for self-esteem and availability of unhindered opportunities for human development across all ethnic groups (Ibid.). Magnarella (2002:34) adds that the root causes of the Rwandan genocide were the disproportionate allocation of scarce agricultural land which led to fierce competition over the control of land resulting in food shortages and malnutrition due to periodic
112
famine. Magnarella (2002) also observed that Rwanda’s Hutu leaders felt that land related problems could only be addressed through the elimination of the entire Tutsi population as well as Hutu political rivals. Diamond (2005) adds that a combination of unsustainable farming practices that resulted in inadequate food supplies, recurrent drought, and high population migration to cities coupled with a very high population growth served as catalysts towards the genocide. It can be concluded from this background that foreigners, especially former colonial masters institutionalised and magnified the social differences between the Hutu and the Tutsi.17 The Germans introduced rivalries over ethnic and racial hierarchies that were based on the
‘Hamitic’ hypothesis that considered the Tutsi as a superior race to the subservient Hutu population (Watson 1992).
The “Hamitic hypothesis” argues that the Tutsi were off-springs from the superior “Caucasoid”
race that originated from the Nile Valley and were considered more similar to the whites than the black Bantu, Hutu majority who had typical African features (Prunier 1997:6-9). Belgium took over the colonial responsibility over Rwanda after World War I and entrenched the ethnic divide to enhance its control over the indigenous population by introducing far reaching measures that reinforced minority Tutsi domination of the Hutu majority (Shawcross 2001).
According to Destexhe (1995), Belgian administrative reforms drastically altered the Hutu- Tutsi political and social standing to the extent that identity cards were progressively introduced that reflected whether one was Tutsi or Hutu. Regrettably, the identity cards facilitated the identification of Tutsi targets for slaughter during the 1994 genocide (Prunier Op.Cit.).
At independence in 1961, the majority Hutu gained power over the Tutsi. A United Nations report of 1961 noted that an oppressive Hutu dominated system had replaced the previous Tutsi dominated political dispensation and that it was plausible to anticipate violent reactions and reprisals on the part of the Tutsi in the foreseeable future (Prunier 1997:53). This prediction was fulfilled in the early 1990s when the Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF) launched a series of
17In an interview with Dr. Martha Mutisi on 15 July 2015, she emphasised the fact that for African states to offer effective security to their citizens and not rely on outsiders to bring peace to their countries, they need to prioritise the provision of soft security that includes the following: improved livelihoods of all sectors of the population;
adoption of effective poverty reduction strategies; employment creation; guaranteeing human security through effective linkages between state security and human security, measures that reduce the likelihood of rebellions by the population. Failure to implement these soft security strategies result in conflicts that are taken advantage of by foreign powers whose Military Industrial Complexes are always on the lookout for opportunities to sell their military hardware to conflict areas.
113
incursions into Rwanda to force the Hutu dominated government to accommodate the Tutsi in the running of state affairs.
Unfortunately, the Hutu dominated Government of Rwanda (GoR) did not make any serious effort towards reconciliation with their Tutsi counterparts as they continued to widen their ethnic and social divisions at the same time blaming the Tutsi for political and economic problems facing the country during the years leading to the genocide (Hintjens 1999). The Hutu political elite indulged in Tutsi persecution and human rights violations resulting in approximately 100,000 Tutsis going into exile in neighbouring Congo, Burundi, Tanzania, and Uganda (Ibid.). Out of these refugees emerged a formidable guerrilla army under the political leadership of the Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF) that mounted its first serious attempt at defeating the Hutu dominated Rwandan Government on 01 October 1990 from Uganda.
Supported by Uganda, and her Western allies, the RPF launched military offensive operations into Rwanda in an attempt to force the Rwandan government to allow the exiled refugees to return and participate in political, economic, social and military activities of running the country (Doyle and Sambanis 2006:286). These military incursions into Rwanda culminated in the 1994 RPF “blitzkrieg style” military offensive operations that toppled the Hutu dominated government. This military success translated into the displacement of French influence from Rwanda by English speaking RPF government.
The assassination of the Rwandan president marked the launch of a deliberately planned
“blitzkrieg style” RPF military assault to seize political and military power from the incumbent government (Davenport and Stam 2009). In less than a month, the RPF had overrun almost half of the country demonstrating long term deliberate and detailed strategic, logistical, and operational planning for the offensive military assault by the RPF whose military superiority had been proven during the February 1993 military invasion.18 It is therefore critical to keep in mind the fact that the RPF entered the Arusha Peace negotiations with a superior military advantage over the GoR. In that regard, allowing the full implementation of the Arusha protocols would have meant that the RPF would become a minority political partner in the
18 General Dallaire confirmed this in his cable to New York, MIR 829, dated April 24, 1994. The testimonies at the ICTR reveal extensive evidence of detailed advance military planning for offensive war by RPF between June 1993 and April 1994. In an interview with one of the seniour commanders of the UN peacekeepers military contingents in Rwanda, he confirmed that they were aware of the meticulous and detailed military planning phases for the eventual takeover of the entire country by the RPF. This planning was proven by the efficient and effective execution of the rapid offensive operations in which the movement of advancing troops and logistical materiel demonstrated a very high degree of pre-planning of a military assault, that was a continuation of the February 1993 invasion that was stopped by the French military intervention.
114
post-transition government considering that the Tutsi constitute not more than 15 percent of the entire population. More importantly, the RPF would have given up its military superiority in a political environment where it was not guaranteed an outright majority at the polls scheduled after the transitional period (Valentino 2004:181).
Based on the discussion above, it is evident that whereas outsiders sowed the seeds of ethnic hatred and mistrust among the Rwandan population, poor management and distribution of resources, lust for absolute power and indifference to ethical practices in running the affairs of the state contributed to the lack of tolerant political practices in independent Rwanda19. In turn, this bred and nurtured the conflict between the majority Hutu and the minority Tutsi culminating into the genocide (Alozie 2007:223). Failure to accommodate and tolerate social and ethnic differences among African ethnic groups and failure to share power and national resources remain major sources of conflict in Africa as discussed in Chapter Four of this thesis on a case study of Somalia.
The next section examines the failure by the United Nations Security Council to authorise a peacekeeping mission strong enough to effectively deal with the volatile politico-security situation in Rwanda.