[LINK] Two Rwanda links

[rfmcdonald]

I've two links of interest up, one of the replacement of French by English as Rwanda's dominant language, the other about the misuse of the Rwandan genocide of 1994 in politics.

In MacLean's, Kaj Hasselriis writes ("French is out of fashion in Rwanda"

Jean’s trip will mark the first state visit to Rwanda from a Commonwealth country since it joined that 54-state organization late last year. But cozying up to Britain and its former colonies is only the latest chapter in Rwanda’s move to English. Many say it all started with the Rwandan genocide of 1994, when members of the country’s Hutu ethnic group killed up to 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus. The country blames France for helping arm the instigators, and then not doing enough to stop the carnage.

In the wake of the genocide, Rwanda’s main donor became the United States. Meanwhile, thousands of exiles returned to their homeland from Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda—neighbouring English-speaking countries where many Rwandans picked up the language. Then, in 2006, a French judge dropped a bombshell. He accused Rwandan President Paul Kagame, a Tutsi, of helping start the genocide because of his alleged complicity in the rocket attack of April 6, 1994, that killed Rwanda’s Hutu president Juvenal Habyarimana—the spark for the massacre. Furious, Kagame shut down the French Embassy, kicked out the ambassador, ordered Radio France Internationale off the air in Rwanda, and closed the local French cultural centre.
Two years later, in 2008, Kagame announced that English—which became one of Rwanda’s official languages in 1994—would replace French as the official language of instruction in the country’s schools. In the wake of that momentous step, thousands of Rwandan schoolteachers were fired because they couldn’t teach the new language.

According to Nkusi, there has been very little public resistance to the government’s pro-English campaign. Kagame has a firm grip on power and Rwandans are not known as protesters. In fact, most citizens are reluctant to give their opinions even in private. But during an interview with a group of Rwandan teacher-trainers, some of them open up. “French flows in my veins,” says Ladislas Nkundabanyanga. “My father taught me French and my friends all speak French.” Nowadays, though, he knows kindergarten students who don’t understand the word “bonjour.” As a result, he’s convinced the French language in Rwanda is doomed. Nkundabanyanga’s colleague, Beatrice Namango, agrees. The new policy, she says, is “like telling me to keep quiet. It’s stopping me from talking.”

Meanwhile, over at the Invisible College, Lennart Breuker ("'Genocidal ideology". . . ) writes about how anti-genocide denial legislation in Rwanda is being used (Yes, it's that bad.)

Several news-agencies made mention of a prominent Rwandan opposition member, Victoire Ingabire, being arrested on charges of cooperation with a terroristic rebel group, and perhaps more conspicuously, on charges of ‘genocidal ideology’. The precise scope of the relevant criminal provision is not known to me, but according to a Dutch news-agency it concerns a legal prohibition to deny genocide. However, the same (brief) article (http://www.bndestem.nl/algemeen/buitenland/6579160/Oppositieleider-Rwanda-Ingabire-gearesteerd.ece) also states that merely addressing ethnicity is formally prohibited according to Rwandan legislation since the genocide. This seems a bit unlikely, but readers who can confirm this are cordially invited to comment.

Assuming that raising the issue of ethnicity is allowed as long as it does not amount to a denial of genocide, the question still arises whether a fair balance has been struck in this case between the right of freedom of expression and maintaining public order through a prohibition on hate speech. Particularly as Ingabire seemed to have been acting in the capacity of politician while making the concerned statements. Rwanda’s Prosecutor General confirmed the charges, but is not cited giving any concrete examples of ‘genocidal ideology’ (as the Cambodia Daily refers to the charge). The paper speculates that the charge may be based on public statements in which Ingabire has said that many Hutu’s – and not only Tutsi’s – have been killed during the genocide, who were never officially mourned. Ingabire, who is of the Hutu ethnicity herself, is said to have criticized the government for over-simplifying the account of the genocide on several occasions.

This aspect, criticism on the government, may actually have been perceived as more of a poignant statement by the authorities than Ingabire’s views on the historical accuracy of the genocide. Critics have put forward that the ‘genocidal ideology’ prohibition has been used before to restrain political dissent (Cambodia Daily April23). But also other legal grounds have been used recently in an alleged shake-up of the military, as two high ranking generals were arrested for corruption and immoral conduct. Another senior official and former general has defected to South Africa, claiming that his life was at risk for disagreeing with governmental policies. It is to be hoped that the repressive policy as regards addressing ethnic issues does not backfire by fuelling racial division more than avoiding it, by denying the (ethnic) opposition a voice.