JCTR Bulletin 47 - Rwanda, An Inheritance of pain...

RWANDA: AN INHERITANCE OF PAIN IN NEED OF HEALING

A reflection on the Rwandan genocide brings back sad memories to humanity. What is particularly painful is the fact that while the genocide was taking place the world stood by and looked on. No one would imagine that two groups of people would turn against each other in such a dehumanising, callous and unpalatable way. Colm Brophy, S.J., shares with us a story as told to him by a Rwandese of his experiences during the genocide.

I met John by chance when he visited Zambia. Maybe God sent him to help me keep alive an awareness of the unhealed wounds of Rwanda and our need to pray for reconciliation. I asked John how were things in Rwanda now. This question drew from him, in his own quiet and reflective way, a torrent of words. With few interspersed questions from me, this is what followed from the mouth of the prophet:

NARRATION

''There were thirteen, including my parent, in my immediate family plus 36 grandchildren--a total of 49. After the 1994 genocide only five remained, my sister and her daughter, another niece, a nephew and myself. When you talk about reconciliation, the problem is often that there is no one left to be reconciled to. The families are dead who are supposed to be reconciling with the families who have remained alive.

But there are many groups in the country working for reconciliation and peace. They visit many places including the refugee camps where they try to encourage people to return to Rwanda. Of course the war is still going on in Burundi and Congo which makes the reconciliation process difficult.

HISTORY OF CONFLICT

The history of the conflict is like this. There was no division between the Hutus and the Tutsi before the Belgians came. We lived together in the same villages. We mixed together, we spoke the same language. It is true that historically the kings and chiefs were generally from the Tutsi group. But the Hutu were not excluded and some of them were kings and chiefs also. When the Belgians came they decided to back the Tutsi leadership. All Hutu chiefs were demoted.

But coming up to independence, the Belgians changed their view and stopped backing the Tutsi. In the resulting conflict, many wealthy and military Tutsi went into exile in the surrounding countries. Whenever there was an attempt by the exiled Tutsi to return and take power, it was the poorer village Tutsi who suffered reprisals. And so this conflict went on until 1990.

It was then that this terrible plan was hatched. It was supposed that the only way to end the incursions of the exiled Tutsis was to kill all the Tutsis within Rwanda. Then those outside would certainly be afraid to return. It was the event of the plane crash in which the Rwandan President was killed that was used as the occasion to spark off this genocide plan. The Belgians had introduced identity cards in the colonial times on which your ethnic origins were indicated. These were still in use. It was this one point which made it so easy for people to be killed in 1994.

You were forced to show your identity card and once you did you could be killed. If you had Tutsi neighbours and you were a Hutu you were asked to kill them. If you did not, you were killed for being a bad Hutu and failing to kill. If you were a Hutu husband and your wife was Tutsi, you were called on to kill her. If you simply could not you were forced to call your neighbour to do it for you. If you refused you would die with your wife. And the way in which you knew you would die… is unspeakable. The choices people were given in this time of human blindness were impossible.

THE EXPERIENCE

The radio announced that everyone was to stay indoors for safety. That is how people were caught. My parents stayed at home when they heard the announcement. Then the militia entered. They already knew my parents, so there was no need for identity cards.

They grabbed my mother and slit her throat with a long knife. Then they grabbed two of my brothers and one sister and hacked them to death with machetes. My father was a heavy drinker. But he was also very generous. He would buy drinks for many people at his usual drinking places. Because of his well known generosity they decided to leave him alone. He fled to one of the camps and told the story of how my mother died to a friend who later told me. But two years later everyone, as far as we know, from that camp was wiped out. My father must have been among them.

FUTURE OF TRUST

What still troubles my sister is not so much the killing but the awful way in which people were killed. And the way their bodies were left naked and unburied. I was working in Rwanda at the time. I was hidden for two weeks in a friend's house and then I escaped into Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo).

One of my surviving nieces was only ten years old as the killings took place. I knew her when she was a beautiful child. She was raped many times by soldiers and bandits. When I met her again after five years, it took her a long, long time to tell me what happened. Now she has gone mad. There is no treatment for her.

My sister tries to take care of her but she wanders too much. She will die of AIDS. There are many like her in Rwanda who are mentally disturbed as a result of the violence. My nephew and other niece are all right but their schooling has been badly disturbed. Many children of the genocide lost all confidence in life. They cannot trust any adults because of the things they saw adults doing.''

John looked at me for a long time with pools of suffering in his dark eyes and added: ''The young still look at the old without any trust in their eyes.'' Then he fell silent. In my silent response I felt the need for prayer.

Colm Brophy, S.J.
Provincial's Office
Lusaka

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