Hungry for Truth, Peace and Justice

PDR-Ihumure Supports FDUʼs Ingabire in the Fight for Democracy and Freedom in Rwanda

By Jérôme Nayigiziki
General Secretary,
PDR-Uhumure
Washington, DC - USA
January 20, 2010

The Party for Democracy in Rwanda (PDR-Ihumure) is deeply concerned by accusatory statements by Rwandan Minister of Internal Security Sheikh Mussa Fazil Harerimana that Ms. Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza, who as FDU-Inkingiʼs President arrived in Kigali this past January 16 from Europe to launch her campaign for presidential elections in August this year, is engaging in “revisionist and genocide denial pronouncements”.

Ms. Ingabireʼs statement that not only Tutsis but also Hutus died in the 1994 genocide and all must be memorialized without discrimination is not only the truth, it is the right thing to say and do if Rwanda is serious about one day achieving genuine reconciliation. We need to remind the world that the RPF now in power in Rwanda was busy killing thousands of Hutus for 4 years as a rebel group from October 1, 1990 to March 1994 before the genocide started in April 1994, and kept on killing thousands more Hutus in the years after 1994 in Rwanda and in the Democratic Republic of Congo, until today. It would be irresponsible to overlook this sad reality of our recent history.

The on-going practice by the Rwandan government to automatically label political opponents as revisionists or genocide deniers as they recently attempted to do against Bernard Ntaganda of PS-Imberakuri and are now attempting to re-edit against Ms. Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza, is a shameful and unacceptable smear campaign and criminalization of good citizens and must be vigorously condemned and resisted by the democratic and free world.

It is a disgrace for the RPF in power in Kigali to pretend to organize free and fair elections while at the same time mounting road blocks designed to disrupt the democratic process and a free-flowing election campaign by all political parties involved. The PDR-Ihumure will not join in this electoral masquerade because we know Rwanda is under a brutal military dictatorship that will not even play by its own rules. This will not be a democratic election when millions of our innocent brothers and sisters wonʼt be able to vote as they are being hunted down like animals deep in the DRCongo forest. This cannot be a democratic election when thousands of our innocent brothers and sisters are locked up in jails and wonʼt be able to vote, and those who are not in jail are under siege by the notorious witch-hunt Gacaca courts, and so cannot freely vote their mind. If Rwandans could vote freely this coming August and their votes counted fairly and accurately, there is no doubt the RPF would go down in a never-seen-before tsunami-like electoral defeat.

The FDU-Inkingi political party has decided to participate in this election, just as the PS-Imberakuri and the Green Party have, and it is their full right to do so. It is, therefore, only logical and appropriate for these partiesʼ candidates to have free reign to compete for votes throughout the country, explain their agenda to the population, and expose and denounce all the excesses, lies and abuses by the current RPF government so that Rwanda can heal and be whole again.

We will stand in unity with our brothers and sisters in the opposition, whether armed or non-armed, against the current brutal RPF military dictatorship in Rwanda, and once again we call upon President Paul Kagame to prove that he is a democrat by letting all political parties to sit together and jointly put in place favorable conditions for truly democratic elections, including a jointly drafted electoral code and a fully inclusive electoral commission.

January 20, 2010
Washington, DC - USA
Jérôme Nayigiziki (signed)
General Secretary,
PDR-Uhumure
Contact: jnayigizik@aol. com

posted by Mamadou Kouyate @ 2:22 AM