Libyan Colonel Muamar Gaddafi and Rwandan General Paul Kagame: The Parable of the Mote and the Beam

By AfroAmerica Network
July 28, 2011

 

On July 22, 2011 Rwandan President General Paul Kagame addressed a youth militia in Gako, a dusty town in South Central Rwanda. The town is mostly occupied by a huge high security military academy known as Gako Military Training Center. The youth militia had just finished a compulsory military training, required for all the kids of the ruling Tutsi elite about to travel abroad to pursue government sponsored studies.

 

The composition of the audience was not surprising: the youth was mostly from the Rwandan Tutsi elite ruling the country. Rarely kids from the Hutu ethnic majority do qualify for the priviledge.

The place was also not a surprise: This is where General Paul Kagame feels comfortable among his heavy security services and in the middle of the almost completely military Tutsi officers who hailed from Uganda.

The surprise of the day was the topic: the uprising against the Libyan Colonel Muamar Gaddafi.
In his discourse, General Paul Kagame told the sons and daughters of his nepotistic regime how he supports the Libyan rebels.

The motivations for his support to the rebels are, he said,”the fact that some African leaders, including Colonel Muammar Gaddafi cling to power until the people have no other choices than armed rebellion.”

He also added that in Gaddafi’s Libya, several Libyans had taken the road of exile to poorer countries, instead of being subjected to repression, oppression, and dire economic inequalities, because the power and riches were concentrated among the few people among the elite around Colonel Gaddafi and his family.”

Some people in audience that subsequently contacted by AfroAmerica Network appeared puzzled by General Paul Kagame’s discourse. It appeared that whatever General Paul Kagame was talking about was exactly what is happening in Rwanda.

First, if there is a country with a lot of political refugees, it is Rwanda. According to the UNHCR, Rwanda is among the countries with large Refugees proportions. As of the end of 2010, the number Rwandan refugees recorded by UNHCR was 136,036. This does not include hundreds of thousands of Rwandan refugees roaming the jungles of the Democratic Republic of the Congo or those who have chosen to remain undocumented in countries like Uganda, Tanzania, Kenya, the Republic of the Congo, Gabon, Central African Republic, Zambia, and Mozambique. Independent sources put the number of Rwandan refugees between 500,000 and 1,500,000, or between 5% and 15% of the entire Rwandan population.

Second, General Paul Kagame has been in power, meaning effectively, for the last 17 years. More than most of African dictators, 3 years less than his predecessor General Habyarimana, whom he is accused of assassinating and 6 years more than the first Rwandan president Gregory Kayibanda. By the end of his current term, he will have stayed in power for close to a quarter century.

Third, there is a overwhelming consensus that the last two elections from which he claims to draw his legitimacy were the typical gimmicks by African dictators: General Paul Kagame barred his opposition from running and threw them in jail along with their lawyers, his intelligence operatives assassinated other opposition leaders, and he has been accused of ordering assignation of exiled opposition leaders in South Africa, United Kingdom, United States of America, and elsewhere, including Europe. Result: a score of more than 90%.

Fourth, one small clique within the minority Tutsi ethnic group, the core of which is composed of the relatives of General Paul Kagame and his wife Janet Kagame dominates if not completely owns the following:

military leadership: almost all the military officers are from the minority Tutsi elite. Almost all the commanders of military branches, schools, and training centers are Tutsi. All commanders of military intelligence and security services are Tutsis. The entire Republican guard, which is the private army of the President within the Rwandan Defense Forces, is composed of Tutsis.

The security and intelligence services are run, operated and organized around the Tutsi elite.

most of the businesses are owned by the relatives of General Paul Kagame and his wife Janet Kagame. Recently, a South African newspaper published an article which showed that General Paul Kagame, through his relatives owned two luxury jets worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Later, other sources indicated that General Paul Kagame owned a building worth hundred of millions dollars in London, accounts in Panama, the Seychelles, and Mauritius. The luxury jets were eventually moved to Greece and Turkey. Other shady business deals by General Paul Kagame and his cronies may be found here

Government: Key government ministers and ambassadors must come from the Tutsi elite

Others: basically, wherever there is a strategic function or business, education, or social opportunity, it is occupied by a member of the ruling elite

Scholarships: Janet Kagame, the wife of President General Paul Kagame, has created an Non-Government Organization (NGO), known as Imbuto, which selects any woman who could qualify for a government sponsored scholarship, including the scholarships awarded by foreign governments through aid. With the NGO, Mrs Janet Kagame is able to make sure that most of the scholarships, if not all, are awarded to the kids of the elite ruling the country.

Even the few ethnic hutu in the government must meet nepotistic criteria. For example, the Prime Minister Makuza is a first cousin of General Paul Kagame. Others must be related through marriages or others to the clique ruling the country.

Now, if all the power, including the military, judiciary, security, economical is concentrated in the hands of a small clique from the minority Tutsi elite ruling Rwanda, if Rwandan wealth is controlled by the relatives of General Paul Kagame and his wife, if General Paul Kagame is oppressing and repressing dissenting voices and assassinating opposition leaders, if people chose to roam the jungles that returning home, one may wonder what is the difference between him and Colonel Muammar Gadhaffi.

Or is General Paul Kagame seeing the mote in Gadaffi’s eyes when his eyes are blinded by huge beams?

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