Rwandan presidential candidate plans to visit Dayton on Saturday

Many of the about 300 Rwandans living in the Dayton area are refugees.

By Hannah C. Bealer
Dayton Daily News
Staff Writer
June 26, 2009

Rwandan presidential candidate and United Democratic Front party member Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza will be at the Dayton North Holiday Inn at 3 p.m. Saturday, June 27.

Dayton has a Rwandan population of about 300, said Kristine Ward, chair of the board at the House of the People, a shelter for Rwandan refugees in Dayton.

Ward said 17 refugees are currently housed at the center, where they have the opportunity to seek employment and focus on education.

In September 2010, Umuhoza will run against President General Paul Kagame of the Rwandan Patriotic Front.

The Tutsi-formed RPF as well as Hutu extremists are widely believed to have played a part in the killings of Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana and Burundian President Cyprien Ntaryamira, who died when their plane was shot down in 1994. The assassinations caused controversy among the two groups, and led to the Rwandan genocide.

“Those who ignore all about Rwanda think that Kagame is a hero for his country whereas he is co-responsible for the Rwandanese tragedy,” Umuhoza said April 15 while giving a lecture at the University of Leiden in the Netherlands.

Ward said as an American citizen, she does not have a position in the Rwandan election. She believes that the local refugees, however, will “have a great deal to say about it. They were the ones who fortunately lived through the genocide.”

Renewal ceremony
“We gather not because we are all the same. We gather because we are all in this together,” Father John Krumm said at St. Mary’s Church on Saturday, June 20.

Krumm, who has been the priest of St. Mary’s for nine years, led a ceremony for the renewal of Isaie Sibomana’s and Sylvie Incuti’s marriage vows. The couple married in 1999 in Burkina Faso, a nation in West Africa. Their first child, Brice Sibomana, 8, was born in the country.

When the couple moved to Dayton, Incuti gave birth to their now 1-year-old twins, Bryan and Bright.

The family felt it was “important to renew their vows in a church for the community and their children,” Ward said. Brice’s first communion was included in the ceremony as well as the twins’ baptism.

Many Rwandan refugees who escaped the 1994 genocide were in attendance for the ceremony, and Krumm’s words must have hit home for many of them.Ward has only positive things to say about the refugees she assists at the House of the People. “They’re very forgiving,” she said.
“That’s why it’s hard for them to understand the genocide.”

Ward also noted that many of the refugees held high-ranking jobs in Rwanda, ranging from university professors to doctors. However, when they arrive at the House of the People, “they take any job they can get.”

Many will agree to work the night shift so they can spend the daytime with their children, she said.

“If there’s a gift they can give, it’s the way they care for their children,” Ward said. “These men are the most dedicated fathers I have seen.”

Ward, who’s work at the House is voluntary, says it’s a miracle when a Rwandan family comes to live at the House with all members intact. Despite their misfortunes, “they never lost their dignity, their hope or their love,” said Ward.

Now, the refugees have a new hope for the country they fled.

That hope comes in the form of Umuhoza.

Umuhoza did not witness the genocide personally.

In an interview with Oliver Nyiruburgara, a journalist who focuses on African affairs, she explained she left Rwanda in 1994 to live in the Netherlands. She watched the genocide progress on television.

“It hurt me deep in my heart,” she told Nyiruburgara. “My political determination is based on that. We suffered a genocide and the first step should be reconciliation.”

Philippe Bizimana, the Rwandan community coordinator in Dayton, says that Umuhoza will be the first politician the community will see when she comes to speak in Dayton.

Bizimana came to live in the U.S. 10 years ago when he left a Kenyan refugee camp and arrived in Dayton. “This is my place,” he said of the city.

Bizimana said not many people know of Umuhoza, but “many people would support anyone who could bring peace in Rwanda.”

Dr. Joseph Twagilimana, another Rwandan refugee, feels similarly. He explained the name ‘Umuhoza’ means a person who cleans the tears off of a crying person’s cheeks.

If Umuhoza defeats the current president, she will be the country’s first female president.
“That would be great. I feel like everyone will be happy like they are in Liberia now,” said Bizimana, referring to Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf who won the 2005 Liberian presidential election and became its first elected female head of state.

“We don’t distinguish between male or female,” explained Twagilimana. “We distinguish who can do what and the way he or she can do it. A president is a president, not a male or a female.”

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-9370 or hbealer@DaytonDailyNews.com.

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