Wednesday, November 23, 2011

The Ordinary Man that Rwanda would like to silence

By Jennifer Fierberg, MSW
Africa Global Village
19 NOVEMBER 2011


(Washington, DC) Paul Rusesabagina is known to much of the world as the manager of the Hôtel des Mille Collines in Rwanda, where he saved the lives of over 1,200 people during the 1994 genocide. Because of his actions, Mr. Rusesabagina has received many humanitarian awards including the Immortal Chaplains Prize for Humanity in 2000, the Wallenberg Medal of the University of Michigan in 2005 and the National Civil Rights Museum Freedom Award also in 2005. In 2005 Mr. Rusesabagina also received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from former President George Bush for his heroic actions in 1994, yet this humble man would gladly trade them all to have been able to save more lives from the butchers outside the door.

Paul Rusesabagina received the prestigious Lantos Foundation Humanitarian Medal of Honor for his heroic actions during the 1994 Rwandan Genocide. He kept over 1,200 Tutsi and moderate Hutus from being brutally slaughtered by the Interahamwe who murdered over 800,000 others in just 90 days. While this recognition should be seen as an honor to the small but mighty country of Rwanda, it has become glaringly obvious that the Government of Rwanda does not support the decision of the Lantos Foundation. This government sent their propaganda machine into high gear in order to stop him from receiving this award.  Reports earlier this month falsely painted Mr. Rusesabagina as being barred from Canada to speak at an event he had been invited to, but the reality is, according to member of the Hotel Rwanda Foundation, he does not need a visa to enter Canada. He holds European citizenship and is not required to obtain a visa to travel to Canada. So, while the opposition celebrated his “visa denial” into Canada, the truth of the matter is that Mr. Rusesabagina cancelled his appearance due to the demands on his schedule and The Lantos Foundation Ceremony the following week.

Much controversy has surrounded Mr. Rusesabagina for receiving this award. He has been vilified in the press the world over and in many Rwandan blogs by RPF supporters. One only has to read a few of the articles and posts to see that the narrative is the same in all of the negative press. This commonality leads one to believe that much of this writing is coming from the same script that has been provided by key members of the current ruling regime in Rwanda. While the money trail is not clear yet, time will show that money is at the root of this negative press.

Of the many skeptics regarding the authenticity of Paul Rusesabagina and his actions at the Hôtel des Mille Collines, of which he has denied and disputed all allegations, one key allegation is that he demanded money from the people who lived in the hotel with him during this time. While it is true that money exchanged hands, he used the money he received to bribe the Interahamwe from killing his residents and his family,  and he also used this money to provide supplies, food and to purchase alcohol as further bribes and peaceful discussion to those who came to the hotel to do harm to the residents there.  During the preparations for filming the Academy Award nominated Hotel Rwanda the director of the film interviewed over 1000 people who resided at the hotel at the time of the genocide with Mr. Rusesabagina in order to verify his accounts of what happened there.  All 1000 people confirmed that Mr. Rusesabagina was a hero and saved their lives. They corroborated his accounting of events without hesitation.  Since 2008 when Mr. Rusesabagina began to speak out about the human rights violations committed by the ruling regime in Rwanda, suddenly the regime changed its opinion of Mr. Rusesabagina and began to tell a different tale of what happened at the Hôtel des Mille Collines.  He began to be branded as a “genocidaire” and accused of funding terrorist organizations in the DRC. There is very sketchy evidence to these accusations and no one can seem to confirm these allegations which Mr. Rusesabagina has vehemently denied.

Below is a transcript of the speech Mr. Rusesabagina gave at the Lantos Humanitarian Awards ceremony in which this reporter had the honor of attending.
Rusesabagina Lantos Foundation Human Rights Award Speech 11/16/11 Congressional auditorium:
“It is not always easy to stand and speak after such words, that today I am going to try to. My dear friends at the Lantos Foundation for Human rights, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen please help me to thank once again Katrina Lantos Svelte, the entire staff and good members at the Lantos Foundation for their convictions for human rights. They have stood up to threats and protest designed to silence our pleas for human rights and freedoms in my beloved Rwanda. My dear friends, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, I am deeply humbled to receive the prestigious Lantos Foundation Humanitarian Rights award. I am an ordinary man. I feel incredibly honored to be in related to the same class as his holiness the Dali Lama and Professor Elie Wiesel who have received this award before me. Please help me to thank these two distinguished and towering figures who have contributed so much to the advancement of humanity. They are now high on my list of my mentor and I hope they will be kind enough to share with me their precious knowledge and wisdom. As I receive this award to I ask you to join me in committing to the idea that never again must mean never again.

My name is Paul Rusesabagina; I am a child of Rwanda. My parents named me Paul Rusesabagina, that name means he who disburses in English. That is my name and that is my life. When I was a small boy growing up in Rwanda my dad was one of my heroes, he was my hero because he did not know he could not read and write he told me that whenever two brothers are fighting and I am supposed to separate them I am to stand in the middle and look straight up. Not to the left and not to the right because I could be influenced by one of the brothers. Today those brothers in Rwandan are Tutsis and Hutus always brothers but not always living in harmony. Today I do not charge that brother but I tell them I tell the truth about what they are doing. I want to create a world where those two brothers can live together in peace and harmony like brothers are supposed to do. Not one brother oppressing or imprisoning the other just living together as equals in harmony like brothers are supposed to do.
In 1994 I was a hotel manager, not a politician, not a soldier. Still I listened to a little voice inside me, my conscience and tried to do everything that I could to stop the violence and to shelter the 1,268 people who had come to my hotel for shelter. Some who had first could pay, some who asked for safety but who had made it through hell. I am proud to say that the Hôtel des Mille Collines was the only public place in Rwanda where no one died. No one was beaten and everyone who sought shelter made it through the genocide alive.
Today, I tell my story, the story of those who died during the terrible genocide in Rwanda 1994 over 400,000 Tutsi and now 400,000 Hutus were also killed. I tried to provide a voice to the voiceless. As you may know, a humanitarian cannot measure his success by how harshly his work is criticized and my critics often say that I deny the genocide. Nothing can be further from the truth. I am here a living testament to the genocide. To those who died to provide testimony about the horrible people in that Hutu elite government in in the military, in the militias who caused those deaths. The genocide was a terrible defining moment in my life and in that of my country and it must never be forgotten.
Seventeen years after the genocide we don’t have two armies fighting to the death for power control nor do we have roving guns, guns of militia men killing innocent villagers by the thousands every ten minutes. We have a country that, on the surface, appears to be peaceful but it is a country with no space for political dissent or real democratic action. The potential violence is just below the surface. As the human right abuses spreads and media oppression spreads things get more dangerous. I am calling up on the International community to work with me for a truth and reconciliation process to break the historic cycle of violence in Rwanda and replace it with sustainable peace.
But what I have found over the years is that Rwanda has unfortunately has not changed so much. The leaders who caused the genocide are now gone and this is an excellent thing. But Rwanda has new leader now, and as we say in Kinyarwanda, the dancers have changed but unfortunately the music stays the same.
Now, I spend my time as a humanitarian reminding people that we must never forget and saddened that we forget all too often. In addition to talking about the 1994 genocide I also cannot stay silent about what is happening in Rwanda today. Freedom of speech and freedom of the press do not exist. Political oppression is the norm. Opposition leaders are arrested and killed. Today in Rwanda leaders insist that a dictatorship is necessary to safeguard the people. In fact, as with all dictatorships, it only serves to safeguard itself.
In the current government, the government that we all believed in 1994 that saved Rwanda from the genocide is now responsible for unthinkable violence next door in the Congo over 6 million people dead in a war driven by conflict minerals. With so much that the United Nations said that war crimes have been committed by current war in government, crimes against humanity and possibly even a new genocide. I see my native country the home of my parents and I cannot stay silent. I feel that it is now a dormant volcano waiting to erupt again. As Katrina knows only too well, raising my voice comes to a price during the genocide I and my family were often in terrible danger. Now, I am threatened once again on a regular basis.
I want to thank very much Katrina who is just behind me and everyone at the Lantos Foundation not just for this award but for their support in recent weeks. As the Rwandan governments and its applicants tried to silence my voice,  they (Lantos Foundation) were steadfast in standing up for what was right, in standing up for free speech and for the prospect of truth, reconciliation and peace in my native Rwanda. They stood up for the power of words to heal our differences with a few more people like those at the Lantos Foundation our world will be a better place, much better.
In closing, I would like to leave you with the words of a good man Mr. Albert Einstein, he said, “The world is a dangerous place not because of those who do evil but because of some of us or because of those who look on and do nothing.” I hope you will join me in saying that never again must mean never again. I hope you will join me in doing something when we see evil and confronting it. I hope you will join me in leading ordinary people who take every opportunity to do the right thing. I thank you all for listening to my words today. I thank the Lantos Foundation from the bottom of my heart for this award. Thank you, thank you.”
A hero does not blink in the face of danger; he looks it in the eyes and faces down the challenge. Paul Rusesabagina did this in 1994 and continues to do so today.
Aluta continua

posted by Mamadou Kouyate @ 12:12 AM 0 Comments

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Worse than Penn State

Many American universities, including the three named below, continue to wrong African children even more egregiously.


By Claude Gatebuke
November 17, 2011
“It’s on us to protect the abused … the challenge has been issued … to do more.” – LaVar Arrington, former Penn State football star, Nov. 12, 2011.

LaVar Arrington speaks to thousands of Penn State students at their candlelight vigil Nov. 12. – Video: CSN
Penn State is not alone.
Higher education institutions in the U.S. that associate with heinous criminals are more common than you think. Beyond mere association, American universities have gone to great lengths to ignore, minimize and dismiss major crimes and outright support individuals who commit them, even those who commit heinous crimes against children. Assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky at Penn State got away for at least a decade with molesting and raping children. Penn State University officials either looked the other way or covered for Sandusky and allowed him to continue committing crimes.
Penn State, a prestigious American university, has been rocked by the scandal which became public on Nov. 4, 2011. A grand jury indicted retired assistant coach Jerry Sandusky on 40 counts of sex crimes against young boys. In American sports, Penn State football is one of the elite programs, boasting numerous championships and the winningest coach in college football, Joe Paterno. Data for the 2010-11 academic year from the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Postsecondary Education shows that Penn State football revenues were $72.7 million, of which $53.2 were profit.
According to the indictment, Mike McQueary, a lower ranked assistant coach, found Sandusky anally raping a 10-year-old boy in 2002. When McQueary reported the incident to Joe Paterno, he simply reported it to his superiors and kept quiet. Paterno, the most powerful man at Penn State who coached the Nittany Lions since 1966, was fired last Saturday and his superiors, Tim Curly and Gary Schultz, have also been indicted and face jail time if convicted. Their looking the other way and the cover-up that allowed Sandusky to sexually abuse at least eight children has cost them and Penn State a great deal.
Joe Paterno-dominated Penn State is not the only American institution of higher learning that has been failing recently to blow the whistle on egregious child rapists.
To aid your re-thinking, consider three other U.S. universities. Recently, each has knowingly welcomed and heaped honors on the same serial abuser, a man whose unspeakable crimes against children is actually the tip of an iceberg of crimes against humanity.
Congolese and Rwandans, including Claude Gatebuke, protested Rwandan President Paul Kagame’s appearance at Oklahoma Christian University on April 30, 2010. – Photo: Kendall Brown
Oklahoma Christian University in Oklahoma City, Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Sacramento State in California: Those are the three universities.
And the child abuser they have all deified recently? Paul Kagame, Rwanda’s dictator.
He, among many other massive crimes, has led direct and proxy armies of children to invade African countries. Not once. Not twice. But three times. The children in Kagame’s armies suffer horribly. Worse, Kagame uses them to inflict terrible suffering on un-armed children. Most of these lived in the Eastern Congo. Impeccable conservative assessments put the toll at over 5 million dead.
Let us now scrutinize each university’s refusal to distance itself from Kagame.
All three universities have honored Rwanda’s president, Gen. Paul Kagame, and praised him and his achievements, while ignoring his crimes, a la Penn State. The excuses made by these institutions to continue their association with Kagame reek of attempts to minimize his crimes, and worse, outright dismiss them.
In May 2010, Oklahoma Christian University President Dr. Mike O’Neal, a friend to Kagame, communicated to members of the African Great Lakes Coalition that he would not take part in the Congo “controversy.” Six months later, the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights released the UN Mapping Exercise Report for DR Congo. The report recounted one among many horror stories where Kagame’s troops lured refugees into meetings ostensibly to discuss repatriation back to Rwanda. Instead, “the victims, who included a large number of women and children, were led outside in small groups. They were bound and their throats were cut or they were killed by hammer blows to the head. The bodies were then thrown into pits or doused with petrol and burned. The operation was carried out in a methodical manner and lasted at least one month. Before vacating the premises, the soldiers tried to erase all trace of the massacres.” The UN Mapping Report, based on the accounts of more than 600 eyewitnesses, goes on to say that a competent court could find Rwandan troops guilty of genocide in Congo.
In September of 2011, officials at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) argued that the situation with Rwanda and Kagame in particular is “complicated,” but only after protests by students, faculty and activists, demanding that they consider President Kagame’s human rights violations record. CMU signed a deal with Kagame that will net CMU $100 million over 10 years. To grab these 30 pieces of silver, CMU ignored the cries of millions of children under the age of 5 killed as a result of Rwanda and Uganda’s invasion of the Democratic Republic of Congo. It seems that the several million deaths of these children are a mere afterthought or a non-factor for CMU. Instead, CMU continues to forge forward, calling it a “wonderful opportunity” and taking its massive financial outcomes. Rather than a multimillion dollar football powerhouse like Penn State, CMU is engaged in a multimillion dollar educational institution with a criminal at its forefront.
Child soldier in Congo – Photo: Finbarr O'Reilly, Reuters
In early November 2011, just as the Penn State scandal began exploding, Sacramento State University asked Kagame to be the honored keynote speaker at the university’s Third International Conference on Genocide. Keep the essential ingredient in mind: A general whose 40 current and former high-ranking military officials have been indicted by a Spanish investigative judge for crimes of genocide, among others, was being invited to speak about genocide prevention. You could argue that a perpetrator knows best how to prevent a crime – just like coach Sandusky of Penn State can probably provide tips on how to stop rapists like him.
The Cal State invitation to Kagame is no different from holding up coach Sandusky as the exemplar at a conference on preventing child rape. Such an invitation would be excused if the host did not know. However, Kagame’s hosts and friends had been informed by their faculty members, students and members of the Northern California community, including accounts from survivors and witnesses of Kagame’s massacres. They may want to see how ignoring facts has backfired on Penn State. Even as they continue to demonstrate lack of human compassion for the victims, the cover-up for major criminals will come forth. Just ask Penn State.
Voices of reason have cautioned these university pals of Kagame. Sadly, just like Penn State, the institutions are choosing to ignore these voices. Professors at CMU petitioned the university and Sacramento State university professors raised concerns about the association with Kagame. As usual, they were attacked and vilified by Kagame’s cheerleaders, who attack anyone who so much as disagrees with Kagame. These professors acted courageously before LaVar Arrington’s speech at Penn State at the Nov. 12, 2011, vigil.
Still, a caution must be heeded. Universities and school officials that partner closely with major criminals, especially those who kill, rape and molest children, would do well to heed LaVar Arrington’s advice. Let today be a start to protect the victims, instead of the perpetrators.
So a message to Oklahoma Christian University, to Carnegie Mellon University, to Sacramento State University, to Kagame’s cheerleaders: This is your wakeup call. Either hold Kagame accountable and empathize with his millions of victims, or simply ask Penn State how prevention is better than cure!
Claude Gatebuke, a Rwandan-born human rights activist, survived a civil war and genocide in Rwanda. Based in the U.S., he works for democracy and against dictators, believing that tyranny and repression make conflict and genocide more likely. He can be reached at claude.gatebuke@gmail.com.

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posted by Mamadou Kouyate @ 11:47 PM 0 Comments

Belgium: More than 300 Rwandans demonstrated in Brussels demanding for the release of Madame Victoire Ingabire

By Johnson
Umuvugi
Brussels

More than 300 Rwandans demostrating aganist president Kagame's progressive dictatorship !.
On Saturday November 19 .2011 from 2pm-6pm, more than 300 Rwandans and friends of Rwanda stormed the streets of Brussels in front of the Rwandese Embassy in Brussels to demand that the Rwandan Government should release Madame Victoire Ingabire and all political prisoners being held in Rwanda thus demanding for there immediate release .
The protests especially demanded for the release of Victoire Ingabire , a political prisoner who dared to challenge the present government with her dissenting views.
The demonstrations were organized by various opposition groups namely, FDU-INKINGI, RNC and Belgian civil society.
They were dressed in pink, a color that is worn by Rwandan prisoners and denounced President Kagame’s judicial exploitation to keep all opposition figures like Victoire Ingabire, Ntaganda Bernard and Mushayidi Deo behind bars.
Demostrators Burning President Kagame's photographs!
As shown above, some protestors resorted to burning photographs of President Kagame, demanding for his arrest and to be produced in an international criminal court to be tried for crimes against humanity.
Related Stories:
GRANDEMANIFESTATION A BRUXELLES SAMEDI LE 19/11/2011

Rwanda: depuis la Belgique, les opposants s’expriment


Marchecontre le procès politique intenté à Victoire Ingabire par le régime de P. Kagame

posted by Mamadou Kouyate @ 11:33 PM 0 Comments

Thursday, November 17, 2011

RWANDA: THE DUTCH GOVERNMENT’S ASSISTANCE TO THE TOTARITARIAN REGIME IN KIGALI IS SURPRISING

By Dr. Nkiko Nsengimana
FDU-INKINGI Coordinating Committee
Coordinator
November 16, 2011

Press release
What is the Dutch government’s role alongside the regime of General Paul Kagame in the judicial circus against the political leader Madame Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza?
The Coordinating Committee of FDU Inkingi has just learned with surprise that the Dutch government has handed over to the Rwandan government disputed documents against Madame Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza, FDU-Inkingi Chair, who is in prison for political reasons in Rwanda since October 14, 2010. It is important to recall that Madame Ingabire Umuhoza returned to Rwanda in January 2010 to register her political party and to run for presidential elections in August of that year. By sending these documents in rather obscure circumstances, the Dutch Government confirmed its complicity in a kangaroo process turned into a tool of oppression against the democratic opposition. 
The Rwandan national public prosecution authority confirmed that they have already received a bunch of 600 pages, whereas the ruling by the Court of Rotterdam on 23 October 2011 mentioned only three documents of less than twenty pages. From where did come more than 580 additional pages, while the Dutch police has already returned nearly all the documents taken from the residential home of Madame Ingabire during their search?
For more than five years, the Dutch government is providing more than ten million euros to support the restructuring of the justice sector and the Rwanda national police. These structures and others that are funded by the Netherlands have been exploited by the regime in order to hod on to power by silencing any opposition. The Dutch government justified its action by its confidence in the Rwandan judiciary, which it has been helping to polish.
Since the opening of the political trial of Madame Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza, the defense counsel filed a motion on the non-retroactivity of the criminal law in Rwanda and on the lack of jurisdiction ratione materiae and ratione loci of the High Court. The defence submissions to strike out more than 75% of the evidence was rejected by the ruling of High Court on 13 October 2011. No appeal was possible until the final decision on the case.
Besides the fact that Madame Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza is pleading not guilty, almost all the facts in the dossier which the Prosecutor suggests amounts to the criminal evidence occurred outside the territory of Rwanda. Beyond the lack of the terrirorial jurisdiction of the high court, the non-retroactvity of the criminal law is another question. Most of the allegations did not constitute crimes under the laws in force the time they occured.
The High Court ordered defense lawyers to submit in advance their questions of cross-examination to the prosecutor’s witnesses so that they could prepare them before any public hearing. This gave them enough time to harmonise their statements to the prosecutor’s submissions.
The FDU-INKINGI Coordinating Committee believes that these violations constitute enough grounds because of their extreme gravity, for the Dutch government to call into question all the judicial cooperation with Rwanda. Otherwise this gives an impression of siding too closely with a judicial circus that is disrespectful of equity and thus protecting a dictatorship ignoring the rule of law. It is unfortunate that the Dutch taxpayers’ funds continue to be used to fund a dictatorship. Time will come when the history will question the part of the Dutch government towards the current dictatorship in Rwanda. We acknowledge the presence of some Dutch diplomats in the court room in Rwanda following the trial of Madame Victoire Ingabire, but we still strongly believe that the Dutch public needs first hand information from an independent pluridisciplinary body, assessing the unfairness of this kangaroo process.
Could it be that the Dutch government is not aware that all opponents against the Kigali regime currently in prison (Charles Ntakirutinka, Deo Mushayidi, Bernard Ntaganda, Theoneste Niyitegeka) were convicted of charges that are similar to those brought forth against Madame Ingabire: collaboration with a terrorist organization, threatening the state security, divisionism, genocide ideology, genocide denial? Could it be that the Dutch government is not aware that most political dissents and journalists critical of the Kagame regime are either assassinated (i.e. Seth Sendashonga, André Kagwa Rwisereka, Jean Leonard Rugambage), either in prison (i.e. female-journalists Mukakibibi and Uwimana Nkusi, or political leaders mentioned above), or either in exile (almost all the leaders of the Rwandan opposition)?
It is now legitimate for FDU Inkingi to challenge the interests such a democratic state may be pursuing on the side of a totalitarian regime instead of promoting democratic values for mutual and sustainable interests for the people of both Rwanda and the Netherlands.
For these reasons, we ask the Dutch government:
  • To acknowledge that the political trial of Madame Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza has lost any guarantee for fairness and impartiality;
  • To cease all judicial cooperation in the flowed case of Madame Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza and in any other legal case related to the Rwandan judicial system;
  • To request an immediate and unconditional release of Madame Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza and other political prisoners;
  • To pay more attention to the plight of Rwandan Democrats and to the opening of political space.

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posted by Mamadou Kouyate @ 11:53 PM 0 Comments