History of Rwanda - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Human occupation of Rwanda
Rwanda
Rwanda or , officially the Republic of Rwanda , is a country in central and eastern Africa with a population of approximately 11.4 million . Rwanda is located a few degrees south of the Equator, and is bordered by Uganda, Tanzania, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo...

is thought to have begun shortly after the last ice age. By the fifteenth century the inhabitants had organized into a number of kingdoms. In the nineteenth century, Mwami
Mwami
Mwami is the chiefly title in Kirundi and Kinyarwanda, the Congolese Nande and Bashi languages, Luhya in Kenya and various other Bantu languages, such as the Tonga language . The word is usually translated as king...

(king

Monarch

A monarch is the person who heads a monarchy. This is a form of government in which a state or polity is ruled or controlled by an individual who typically inherits the throne by birth and occasionally rules for life or until abdication...

) Rwabugiri of the Kingdom of Rwanda conducted a decades-long process of military conquest and administrative consolidation that resulted in the kingdom coming to control most of what is now Rwanda. The colonial powers, first Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

and then Belgium

Belgium

Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...

, allied with the Rwandan court, allowing it to conquer the remaining autonomous kingdoms along its borders and racializing

Racialization

Racialization refers to processes of the discursive production of racial identities. It signifies the extension of dehumanizing and racial meanings to a previously racially unclassified relationship, social practice, or group...

the system of minority Tutsi dominance created under Rwabugiri.

A convergence of anti-colonial, and anti-Tutsi sentiment resulted in Belgium granting national independence in 1961. Direct elections resulted in a representative government dominated by the majority Hutu under President Grégoire Kayibanda

Grégoire Kayibanda

Grégoire Kayibanda was the first elected and second President of the Republic of Rwanda. He led Rwanda's struggle for independence from Belgium, and replaced the Tutsi monarchy with a republican form of government. He asserted Hutu majority power.-Early life and education:Grégoire Kayibanda was...

. Unsettled ethnic and political tensions were worsened when Juvénal Habyarimana

Juvénal Habyarimana

Juvénal Habyarimana was the third President of the Republic of Rwanda, the post he held longer than any other president to date, from 1973 until 1994. During his 20-year rule he favored his own ethnic group, the Hutus, and supported the Hutu majority in neighboring Burundi against the Tutsi...

, also Hutu, seized power in 1973. In 1991, the Rwandan Patriotic Front

Rwandan Patriotic Front

The Rwandan Patriotic Front abbreviated as RPF is the current ruling political party of Rwanda, led by President Paul Kagame. It governs in a coalition with other parties...

(RPF), a rebel group composed of 6,000 Tutsi refugees from previous decades of unrest, invaded the country, starting the Rwandan Civil War

Rwandan Civil War

The Rwandan Civil War was a conflict within the Central African nation of Rwanda between the government of President Juvénal Habyarimana and the rebel Rwandan Patriotic Front...

. The war ground on, worsening ethnic tensions, as the Hutu feared losing their gains. The assassination of Habyarimana

Assassination of Habyarimana and Ntaryamira

The assassination of Juvénal Habyarimana and Cyprien Ntaryamira on the evening of April 6, 1994, was the catalyst for the Rwandan Genocide. The airplane carrying Rwandan president Juvénal Habyarimana and Burundian president Cyprien Ntaryamira was shot down as it prepared to land in Kigali, Rwanda....

was the catalyst for the eruption of the 1994 genocide

Rwandan Genocide

The Rwandan Genocide was the 1994 mass murder of an estimated 800,000 people in the small East African nation of Rwanda. Over the course of approximately 100 days through mid-July, over 500,000 people were killed, according to a Human Rights Watch estimate...

, in which hundreds of thousands of Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed. It ended when the RPF conquered the country. Millions of Hutu fled as refugees, contributing to large refugee camps of Hutu

Great Lakes refugee crisis

The Great Lakes refugee crisis is the common name for the situation beginning with the exodus in April 1994 of over two million Rwandans to neighboring countries of the Great Lakes region of Africa in the aftermath of the Rwandan Genocide...

in the neighboring Democratic Republic of the Congo

Democratic Republic of the Congo

The Democratic Republic of the Congo is a state located in Central Africa. It is the second largest country in Africa by area and the eleventh largest in the world...

, where there were already refugees from other countries. These were disbanded by an RPF-sponsored invasion

First Congo War

The First Congo War was a revolution in Zaire that replaced President Mobutu Sésé Seko, a decades-long dictator, with rebel leader Laurent-Désiré Kabila. Destabilization in eastern Zaire that resulted from the Rwandan genocide was the final factor that caused numerous internal and external actors...

in 1996 that replaced the Congolese president and resulted in the First Congo War

First Congo War

. A second invasion

Second Congo War

The Second Congo War, also known as Coltan War and the Great War of Africa, began in August 1998 in the Democratic Republic of the Congo , and officially ended in July 2003 when the Transitional Government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo took power; however, hostilities continue to this...

to replace the new Congolese president initiated the Second Congo War

Second Congo War

, the deadliest war since World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

and one involving many African nations.

Early history

The territory of present-day Rwanda has been green and fertile for many thousands of years, even during the last ice age, when part of Nyungwe Forest

Nyungwe Forest

Nyungwe Forest National Park is a national park in southwestern Rwanda, located south of Lake Kivu on the border with Burundi. The park was established in 2004 and covers an area of approximately 970 km² of rainforest, bamboo, grassland, swamps, and bogs. The nearest town is Cyangugu, 54 km to the...

was above the ice sheet. It is not known when the country was first inhabited, but it is thought that humans moved into the area shortly after that ice age, either in the Neolithic

Neolithic

The Neolithic Age, Era, or Period, or New Stone Age, was a period in the development of human technology, beginning about 9500 BC in some parts of the Middle East, and later in other parts of the world. It is traditionally considered as the last part of the Stone Age...

period, around ten thousand years ago, or in the long humid period which followed, up to around 3000 BC. The earliest inhabitants of the region are generally thought to have been the Twa

Great Lakes Twa

The Great Lakes Twa, also known as Abatwa or Ge-Sera, or in English Batwa, are a pygmy people who are generally assumed to be the oldest surviving population of the Great Lakes region of central Africa, though currently they live as a Bantu caste...

, a group of Pygmy

Pygmy

Pygmy is a term used for various ethnic groups worldwide whose average height is unusually short; anthropologists define pygmy as any group whose adult men grow to less than 150 cm in average height. A member of a slightly taller group is termed "pygmoid." The best known pygmies are the Aka,...

forest hunters and gatherers, whose descendants still live in Rwanda today.

Archaeological excavations conducted from the 1950s onwards have revealed evidence of sparse settlement by hunter gatherers in the late stone age

Stone Age

The Stone Age is a broad prehistoric period, lasting about 2.5 million years , during which humans and their predecessor species in the genus Homo, as well as the earlier partly contemporary genera Australopithecus and Paranthropus, widely used exclusively stone as their hard material in the...

, followed by a larger population of early iron age

Iron Age

The Iron Age is the archaeological period generally occurring after the Bronze Age, marked by the prevalent use of iron. The early period of the age is characterized by the widespread use of iron or steel. The adoption of such material coincided with other changes in society, including differing...

settlers. These later groups were found to have manufactured artifacts, including a type of dimpled pottery

Pottery

Pottery is the material from which the potteryware is made, of which major types include earthenware, stoneware and porcelain. The place where such wares are made is also called a pottery . Pottery also refers to the art or craft of the potter or the manufacture of pottery...

, iron tools and implements.

Hundreds of years ago, the Twa were partially supplanted by the immigration of a Bantu group, the ancestors of the agriculturalist ethnic group, today known as the Hutu

Hutu

The Hutu , or Abahutu, are a Central African people, living mainly in Rwanda, Burundi, and eastern DR Congo.-Population statistics:The Hutu are the largest of the three peoples in Burundi and Rwanda; according to the United States Central Intelligence Agency, 84% of Rwandans and 85% of Burundians...

s. The Hutu began to clear forests for their permanent settlements. The exact nature of the third major immigration, that of a predominantly pastoralist

Pastoralism

Pastoralism or pastoral farming is the branch of agriculture concerned with the raising of livestock. It is animal husbandry: the care, tending and use of animals such as camels, goats, cattle, yaks, llamas, and sheep. It may have a mobile aspect, moving the herds in search of fresh pasture and...

people known as Tutsi

Tutsi

The Tutsi , or Abatutsi, are an ethnic group in Central Africa. Historically they were often referred to as the Watussi or Watusi. They are the second largest caste in Rwanda and Burundi, the other two being the Hutu and the Twa ....

, is highly contested.Much Rwanda scholarship revolves around arguments as to the origin of Tutsi, Hutu and Twa as distinct racial groups. For example, David Newbury

David Newbury

David Newbury is the Gwendolen Carter professor of African studies at Smith College, Massachusetts. He received his PhD from the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1979. His academic work has three major foci within East and Central Africa. The first was pre-colonial societal transformation in...

rejects the migration thesis outright, but allows for "mobility" in which people of different physical stock arrived in the region, but without "an interpretation that relies on racial determinism or ethnic reification." In contrast, Gérard Prunier

Gérard Prunier

Gérard Prunier is a French academic and historian specializing in the Horn of Africa and East Africa.Prunier received a PhD in African History in 1981 from the University of Paris. In 1984, he joined the CNRS scientific institution in Paris as a researcher. He later also became Director of the...

accepts the theory that the Tutsi came from outside the Great Lakes region and were at the time of their arrival a distinct racial group. (Mamdani, fn #38, p. 292) But, DNA

DNA

Deoxyribonucleic acid is a nucleic acid that contains the genetic instructions used in the development and functioning of all known living organisms . The DNA segments that carry this genetic information are called genes, but other DNA sequences have structural purposes, or are involved in...

studies have shown the populations are not distinct.

By the fifteenth century, many of the Bantu-speakers, including both Hutu and Tutsi, had organized themselves into small states. According to Ogot, these included at least three. The oldest state, which has no name, was probably established by the Renge lineages of the Singa

Singa

Singa may refer to:*Places:** Singa, Bangladesh, village** Singa, Estonia, village in Mõniste Parish, Võru County, Estonia**Singa, Nepal** Singa, Sudan, town*Other:** Singa, a common transliteration of the name of Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba...

clan and covered most of modern Rwanda, besides the northern region. The Mubari state of the Zigaba (Abazigaba) clan also covered an extensive area. The Gisaka state in southeast Rwanda was powerful, maintaining its independence until the mid-nineteenth century. However, the latter two states are largely unmentioned in contemporary discussion of Rwandan civilization.

Reign of Rwabuguri

In the nineteenth century, the state became far more centralized, and the history far more precise. Expansion continued, reaching the shores of Lake Kivu

Lake Kivu

Lake Kivu is one of the African Great Lakes. It lies on the border between the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Rwanda, and is in the Albertine Rift, a part of the Great Rift Valley. Lake Kivu empties into the Ruzizi River, which flows southwards into Lake Tanganyika...

. This expansion was less about military conquest and more about a migrating population spreading Rwandan agricultural techniques, social organization, and the extension of a Mwami's political control. Once this was established camps of warriors were established along the vulnerable borders to prevent incursions. Only against other well developed states such as Gisaka, Bugesera

Bugesera

Bugesera is a district in Eastern Province, Rwanda. Its capital is Nyamata.The district is the location of two memorial sites of the Rwandan Genocide: the Ntarama Genocide Memorial Site and the Nyamata Genocide Memorial Site.- Geography :...

, and Burundi

Burundi

Burundi , officially the Republic of Burundi , is a landlocked country in the Great Lakes region of Eastern Africa bordered by Rwanda to the north, Tanzania to the east and south, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the west. Its capital is Bujumbura...

was expansion carried out primarily by force of arms.

Under the monarchy the economic imbalance between the Hutus and the Tutsis crystallized, and a complex political imbalance emerged as the Tutsis formed into a hierarchy dominated by a Mwami or 'king'. The King was treated as a semi-divine being, responsible for making the country prosper. The symbol of the King was the Kalinga, the sacred drum hung with the genitals of conquered enemies or rebels against the King.

The Mwami main power base was in control of over a hundred large estates spread through the kingdom. Including fields of banana

Banana

Banana is the common name for herbaceous plants of the genus Musa and for the fruit they produce. Bananas come in a variety of sizes and colors when ripe, including yellow, purple, and red....

trees and many head of cattle, the estates were the basis of the rulers' wealth. The most ornate of the estates would each be home to one of the king's wives, monarchs having up to twenty. It was between these estates that the Mwami and his retinue would travel.

All the people of Rwanda were expected to pay tribute to the Mwami; it was collected by a Tutsi administrative hierarchy. Beneath the Mwami

Mwami

Mwami is the chiefly title in Kirundi and Kinyarwanda, the Congolese Nande and Bashi languages, Luhya in Kenya and various other Bantu languages, such as the Tonga language . The word is usually translated as king...

was a Tutsi ministerial council of great chiefs, the batware b'intebe, while below them was a group of lesser Tutsi chiefs, who for the large part governed the country in districts, each district having a cattle chief and a land chief. The cattle chief collected tribute in livestock, and the land chief collected tribute in produce. Beneath these chiefs were hill-chiefs and neighborhood chiefs. More than 95% of hill and neighborhood chiefs were of Tutsi descent.

Also important were military chiefs, who had control over the frontier regions. They played both defensive and offensive roles, protecting the frontier and making cattle raids against neighboring tribes. Often, the Rwandan great chief was also the army chief. Lastly, the biru or "council of guardians" was also an important part of the administration. The Biru advised the Mwami on his duties where supernatural king-powers were involved. These honored people advised also on matters of court ritual. Taken together, all these posts from great chiefs, military chiefs and Biru members existed to serve the powers of the Mwami, and to reinforce the control of the Tutsi in Rwanda.

Located in the border camps, the military were a mix of Hutu and Tutsi drawn from across the kingdom. This intermixing helped produce a uniformity of ritual and language in the region, and united the populace behind the Mwami. Most evidence suggests that relations between the Hutu and Tutsi were mostly peaceful at this time. Some words and expressions suggest there may have been friction, but other than that evidence supports peaceful interaction.

A traditional local justice system called Gacaca predominated in much of the region as an institution for resolving conflict, rendering justice and reconciliation. The Tutsi king was the ultimate judge and arbiter for those cases that reached him. Despite the traditional nature of the system, harmony and cohesion had been established among Rwandans and within the kingdom.

The distinction between the three ethnic groups was somewhat fluid, in that Tutsis who lost their cattle due to a disease epidemic, such as rinderpest
Rinderpest
Rinderpest was an infectious viral disease of cattle, domestic buffalo, and some other species of even-toed ungulates, including buffaloes, large antelopes and deer, giraffes, wildebeests and warthogs. After a global eradication campaign, the last confirmed case of rinderpest was diagnosed in 2001...

, sometimes would be considered Hutu. Likewise Hutu who obtained cattle would come to be considered Tutsi, thus climbing the ladder of the social strata. This social mobility ended abruptly with the onset of colonial administration. What had hitherto been often considered social classes became fixed as inappropriate ethnic classifications.

Colonial era

Unlike much of Africa, Rwanda and the Great Lakes region was not decided by the 1884 Berlin Conference

Berlin Conference

The Berlin Conference of 1884–85 regulated European colonization and trade in Africa during the New Imperialism period, and coincided with Germany's sudden emergence as an imperial power...

. Rather the region was divided in an 1890 conference in Brussels. This gave Rwanda and Burundi

Burundi

to the German Empire

Germany

as colonial spheres of interest in exchange for its renouncing all claims on Uganda

Uganda

Uganda , officially the Republic of Uganda, is a landlocked country in East Africa. Uganda is also known as the "Pearl of Africa". It is bordered on the east by Kenya, on the north by South Sudan, on the west by the Democratic Republic of the Congo, on the southwest by Rwanda, and on the south by...

. The poor maps referenced in these agreements left Belgium with a claim on the western half of the country; after several border skirmishes the final borders of the colony were not established until 1900. These borders contained the kingdom of Rwanda as well as a group of smaller kingdoms on the shore of Lake Victoria

Lake Victoria

Lake Victoria is one of the African Great Lakes. The lake was named for Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom, by John Hanning Speke, the first European to discover this lake....

.

In 1894 Rutarindwa inherited the kingdom from his father Rwabugiri IV, but many of the king's council were unhappy. There was a rebellion and the family was killed. Yuhi Musinga

Yuhi IV of Rwanda

Yuhi Musinga , king of Rwanda, came to power in 1896 and collaborated with the German government to strengthen his own kingship. In 1931 he was deposed by the Belgian administration because of his inability to work with subordinate chiefs and his refusal to be baptized a Roman Catholic...

inherited the throne through his mother and uncles, but there was still dissent.

German

The first German to set foot in Rwanda was Count Gustav Adolf von Götzen

Gustav Adolf von Götzen

Count Gustav Adolf von Götzen was a German explorer and Governor of German East Africa. He was the second European to set foot in Rwanda, after Dr Oscar Baumann, and later presided over the bloody quashing of the Maji Maji Rebellion in what is now Tanzania.- Early life :Götzen studied law at the...

, who from 1893 to 1894 led an expedition to claim the hinterlands of the Tanganyika

Tanganyika

Tanganyika , later formally the Republic of Tanganyika, was a sovereign state in East Africa from 1961 to 1964. It was situated between the Indian Ocean and the African Great Lakes of Lake Victoria, Lake Malawi and Lake Tanganyika...

colony. Götzen entered Rwanda at Rusumo Falls, and then travelled through Rwanda, meeting the mwami

Mwami

(king) at his palace in Nyanza

Nyanza

Nyanza may refer to:*Nyanza, Rwanda**Nyanza District, the district surrounding Nyanza, Rwanda*Nyanza Province, Kenya*Nyanza Lac, Burundi*Nyanza, the Bantu word for lake, in particular:**Lake Albert **Lake Edward...

, and eventually reaching Lake Kivu

Lake Kivu

, the western edge of the kingdom. With only 2,500 soldiers in East Africa

German East Africa

German East Africa was a German colony in East Africa, which included what are now :Burundi, :Rwanda and Tanganyika . Its area was , nearly three times the size of Germany today....

, Germany did little to change social structures in much of the region, especially in Rwanda.

War and division seemed to open the door for colonialism, and in 1897 German colonialists and missionaries arrived in Rwanda. The Rwandans were divided; a portion of the royal court was wary and the other thought the Germans might be a good alternative to dominance by Buganda

Buganda

Buganda is a subnational kingdom within Uganda. The kingdom of the Ganda people, Buganda is the largest of the traditional kingdoms in present-day Uganda, comprising all of Uganda's Central Region, including the Ugandan capital Kampala, with the exception of the disputed eastern Kayunga District...

or the Belgian

Belgium

s. Backing their faction in the country a pliant government was soon in place. Rwanda put up less resistance than Burundi did to German rule.

In the early years the Germans had little control in the region and were completely dependent on the indigenous government. The Germans did not encourage modernization and centralization of the regime. They did introduce the collection of cash taxes. The introduction of cash taxes, rather then on agricultural produce was intended to increase cultivation of coffee as a cash crop. This had an impact of the Rwandan economy.

During this period, many Europeans had become obsessed with race, and this had an impact on life in Rwanda. The Germans believed the Tutsi ruling class was a superior racial type who, because of their apparent "Hamitic

Hamitic

Hamitic is an historical term for the peoples supposedly descended from Noah's son Ham, paralleling Semitic and Japhetic.It was formerly used for grouping the non-Semitic Afroasiatic languages , but since, unlike the Semitic branch, these have not been shown to form a phylogenetic unity, the term...

" origins on the Horn of Africa, were more "European" than the Hutu. Because of their seemingly taller stature, more "honorable and eloquent" personalities, and their willingness to convert to Roman Catholicism, the colonist, including powerful Roman Catholic officials, favored the Tutsis. They were put in charge of the farming Hutus (almost in a feudalistic manner), the newly formed principalities, and were given basic ruling positions. Eventually, these positions would turn into the overall governing body of Rwanda. The Tutsi oppression of the Hutus seemed somehow normal and expected.

Before the colonial period about 15-16% of the population was Tutsi; many of these were poor peasants, but the majority of the ruling elite and monarchy were Tutsi. A significant minority of the political elite were Hutu, however.

The Germans helped the Mwami

Mwami

gain greater nominal control over Rwandan affairs. But there were forces that entered with the German colonial authority that had the opposite effect. For instance, Tutsi power weakened through the exposure of Rwanda to capitalist

Capitalism

Capitalism is an economic system that became dominant in the Western world following the demise of feudalism. There is no consensus on the precise definition nor on how the term should be used as a historical category...

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

an forces. Money came to be seen by many Hutus as a replacement for cattle, in terms of both economic prosperity and for purposes of creating social standing. Another way in which Tutsi power was weakened by Germany was through the introduction of the head-tax on all Rwandans. As some Tutsis had feared, the tax also made the Hutus feel less bonded to their Tutsi patrons and more dependent on the European foreigners. A head-tax implied equality among those being counted. Despite Germany's attempt to uphold traditional Tutsi domination of the Hutus, the Hutu began to shift their ideas.

By 1899 the Germans placed advisors at the courts of local chiefs. The Germans were preoccupied with fighting uprisings in Tanganyika

Tanganyika

, especially the Maji Maji war

Maji Maji Rebellion

The Maji Maji Rebellion, sometimes called the Maji Maji War, was a violent African resistance to colonial rule in the German colony of Tanganyika, an uprising by several African indigenous communities in German East Africa against the German rule in response to a German policy designed to force...

of 1905-1907. On May 14, 1910 the European Convention of Brussels fixed the borders of Uganda, Congo, and German East Africa

German East Africa

German East Africa was a German colony in East Africa, which included what are now :Burundi, :Rwanda and Tanganyika . Its area was , nearly three times the size of Germany today....

, which included Tanganyika and Ruanda-Urundi. In 1911, the Germans helped the Tutsi put down a rebellion of Hutu in the northern part of Rwanda who did not wish to submit to central Tutsi control.

World War I

While the agreements dividing the region had called for the region to remain neutral in the event of European war, this was disregarded after the outbreak of World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

. Small forces of Europeans, backed by large numbers of locals, fought for control in the region. The main offensive was by the Belgians, who in 1916 advanced from the Congo into Germany's East African colonies, quickly forcing the German forces out. A British offensive from Uganda

Uganda

came next, British machine gunners preventing the Germans from mounting a successful counter-attack. The German army was now in almost a full panic and retreat. The Belgians released Congolese raiders who proceeded to loot and pillage the region. A great number of Rwandans fighting alongside the Germans were killed in the long German retreat.

Belgian colonialism

At the end of WWI, Belgium accepted the League of Nations Mandate

League of Nations mandate

A League of Nations mandate was a legal status for certain territories transferred from the control of one country to another following World War I, or the legal instruments that contained the internationally agreed-upon terms for administering the territory on behalf of the League...

of 1923 to govern Rwanda as the territory Ruanda-Urundi

Ruanda-Urundi

Ruanda-Urundi was a Belgian suzerainty from 1916 to 1924, a League of Nations Class B Mandate from 1924 to 1945 and then a United Nations trust territory until 1962, when it became the independent states of Rwanda and Burundi.- Overview :...

, along with its existing Congo colony to the west. The portion of the German territory, never a part of the Kingdom of Rwanda, was stripped from the colony and attached to Tanganyika

Tanganyika

, which had been mandated to the British. A colonial military campaign from 1923 to 1925 brought the small independent kingdoms to the west, such as Kingogo, Bushiru, Bukunzi

Bukunzi

Bukunzi, also known as Mbirizi, was a small kingdom located in the extreme southwest of what is now Rwanda. The kings of Bukunzi were renowned throughout the region for the legendary control of the rain. Located east of the Ruzizi River, Bukunzi was apparently founded by members of the Shi royal...

and Busozo, under the power of the central Rwandan court.

The Belgian government continued to rely on the Tutsi power structure for administering the country, although they became more directly involved in extended its interests into education and agricultural supervision. The Belgians introduced cassava

Cassava

Cassava , also called yuca or manioc, a woody shrub of the Euphorbiaceae native to South America, is extensively cultivated as an annual crop in tropical and subtropical regions for its edible starchy tuberous root, a major source of carbohydrates...

, maize

Maize

Maize known in many English-speaking countries as corn or mielie/mealie, is a grain domesticated by indigenous peoples in Mesoamerica in prehistoric times. The leafy stalk produces ears which contain seeds called kernels. Though technically a grain, maize kernels are used in cooking as a vegetable...

and the Irish potato, to try to improve food production for subsistence farmers. This was especially important in the face of two droughts and subsequent famines in 1928-29 and in 1943-44. In the second, known as the Ruzagayura famine, one-fifth to one-third of the population died. In addition, many Rwandans migrated to neighboring Congo, adding to later instability there.

The Belgians intended the colony to be profitable. They introduced coffee

Coffee

Coffee is a brewed beverage with a dark,init brooo acidic flavor prepared from the roasted seeds of the coffee plant, colloquially called coffee beans. The beans are found in coffee cherries, which grow on trees cultivated in over 70 countries, primarily in equatorial Latin America, Southeast Asia,...

as a commodity crop and used a system of forced labor to have it cultivated. Each peasant was required to devote a certain percentage of their fields to coffee and this was enforced by the Belgians and their local, mainly Tutsi, allies. A corvée

Corvée

Corvée is unfree labour, often unpaid, that is required of people of lower social standing and imposed on them by the state or a superior . The corvée was the earliest and most widespread form of taxation, which can be traced back to the beginning of civilization...

was also introduced, labour that was enforced by the whip. This forced labour approach to colonization was condemned by many internationally, and was extremely unpopular in Rwanda. Hundreds of thousands of Rwandans immigrated to the British protectorate of Uganda

Uganda

, which was much wealthier and did not have the same policies.

Belgian rule created more of an ethnic divide between the Tutsi and Hutu, and they supported Tutsis political power. Due to the eugenics

Eugenics

Eugenics is the "applied science or the bio-social movement which advocates the use of practices aimed at improving the genetic composition of a population", usually referring to human populations. The origins of the concept of eugenics began with certain interpretations of Mendelian inheritance,...

movement in Europe and the United States, the colonial government became concerned with the differences between Hutu and Tutsi. Scientists arrived to measure skull—and thus, they believed, brain—size. Tutsi's skulls were bigger, they were taller, and their skin was lighter. As a result of this, Europeans came to believe that Tutsis had Caucasian ancestry, and were thus "superior" to Hutus. Each citizen was issued a racial identification card, which defined one as legally Hutu or Tutsi. The Belgians gave the majority of political control to the Tutsis. Tutsis began to believe the myth of their superior racial status, and exploited their power over the Hutu majority. In the 1920s

1920s

File:1920s decade montage.png|From left, clockwise: Third Tipperary Brigade Flying Column No. 2 under Sean Hogan during the Irish Civil War; Prohibition agents destroying barrels of alcohol in accordance to the 18th amendment, which made alcoholic beverages illegal throughout the entire decade; In...

, Belgian ethnologists analysed (measured skulls, etc.) thousands of Rwandans on analogous racial criteria, such as which would be used later by the Nazis

Nazism

Nazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...

. In 1931, an ethnic identity was officially mandated and administrative documents systematically detailed each person's "ethnicity,". Each Rwandan had an ethnic identity card.

A history of Rwanda that justified the existence of these racial distinctions was written. No historical

History

History is the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. History can also mean the period of time after writing was invented. Scholars who write about history are called historians...

, archaeological

Archaeology

Archaeology, or archeology , is the study of human society, primarily through the recovery and analysis of the material culture and environmental data that they have left behind, which includes artifacts, architecture, biofacts and cultural landscapes...

, or above all linguistic

Linguistics

Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. Linguistics can be broadly broken into three categories or subfields of study: language form, language meaning, and language in context....

traces have been found to date that confirm this official history. The observed differences between the Tutsis and the Hutus are about the same as those evident between the different French social classes in the 1950s

1950s

The 1950s or The Fifties was the decade that began on January 1, 1950 and ended on December 31, 1959. The decade was the sixth decade of the 20th century...

. The way people nourished themselves explains a large part of the differences: the Tutsis, since they raised cattle, traditionally drank more milk

Milk

Milk is a white liquid produced by the mammary glands of mammals. It is the primary source of nutrition for young mammals before they are able to digest other types of food. Early-lactation milk contains colostrum, which carries the mother's antibodies to the baby and can reduce the risk of many...

than the Hutu, who were farmers.

Some observers have also noted an induced replica of the Belgian linguistic conflict in the Rwandan problem. It is undeniable that the Walloons

Walloons

Walloons are a French-speaking people who live in Belgium, principally in Wallonia. Walloons are a distinctive community within Belgium, important historical and anthropological criteria bind Walloons to the French people. More generally, the term also refers to the inhabitants of the Walloon...

, who were the majority in the beginning in Rwanda, and the Flemish continued their ideological fights and also tried to gain supremacy over one another on Rwandan soil. In the 1950s and 60s

1960s

The 1960s was the decade that started on January 1, 1960, and ended on December 31, 1969. It was the seventh decade of the 20th century.The 1960s term also refers to an era more often called The Sixties, denoting the complex of inter-related cultural and political trends across the globe...

, the back and forth of Belgian support for the Tutsis over the Hutus was articled at the same time over Tutsis demands for political independence, like everywhere in Africa

Africa

Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...

, and over the development of the presence of Flemish people in Rwanda who would see in the Hutu a people who were repressed just as they had been.

The fragmenting of Hutu lands angered Mwami Yuhi IV

Yuhi IV of Rwanda

, who had hoped to further centralize his power enough to get rid of the Belgians. In 1931 Tutsi plots against the Belgian administration resulted in the Belgians' deposing the Tutsi Mwami Yuhi. The Tutsis took up arms against the Belgians, but feared the Belgians' military superiority and did not openly revolt. Yuhi was replaced by Mutara III

Mutara III of Rwanda

Mutara III was the Mwami, or monarch of Rwanda between 1931 and 1959. As a member of the Tutsi people in Rwanda, stereotyped as tall, he stood a symbolic 6'8" tall...

, another Tutsi. In 1943, he became the first Mwami to convert to Catholicism

Catholicism

Catholicism is a broad term for the body of the Catholic faith, its theologies and doctrines, its liturgical, ethical, spiritual, and behavioral characteristics, as well as a religious people as a whole....

.

From 1935 on, "Tutsi", "Hutu" and "Twa" were indicated on identity cards. However, because of the existence of many wealthy Hutu who shared the financial (if not physical) stature of the Tutsi, the Belgians used an expedient method of classification based on the number of cattle a person owned. Anyone with ten or more cattle was considered a member of the Tutsi class. The Roman Catholic Church, the primary educators in the country, subscribed to and reinforced the differences between Hutu and Tutsi. They developed separate educational systems for each, although throughout the 1940s and 1950s the vast majority of students were Tutsi.

Destabilisation

Following World War II

World War II

, Rwanda-Urundi became a UN trust territory with Belgium as the administrative authority. Reforms instituted by the Belgians in the 1950s

1950s

The 1950s or The Fifties was the decade that began on January 1, 1950 and ended on December 31, 1959. The decade was the sixth decade of the 20th century...

encouraged the growth of democratic political institutions but were resisted by the Tutsi traditionalists, who saw them as a threat to Tutsi rule.

From the late 1940s, King Rudahigwa, a Tutsi with democratic vision, abolished the "ubuhake" system and redistributed cattle and land. Although the majority of pasture lands remained under Tutsi control, the Hutu began to feel more liberation from Tutsi rule. Through the reforms, the Tutsis were no longer perceived to be in total control of cattle, the long-standing measure of a person's wealth and social position. The reforms contributed to ethnic tensions.

The Belgian institution of ethnic identity cards contributed to the growth of group identities. Belgium introduced electoral representation for Rwandans, by means of secret ballot. The majority Hutus made enormous gains within the country. The Catholic Church, too, began to oppose Tutsi mistreatment of Hutus, and began promoting equality.

Mwami Mutara took steps to end the destabilization and chaos he saw in the land. Mutara made many changes; in 1954 he shared out the land between the Hutu and the Tutsi, and agreed to abolish the system of indentured servitude (ubuhake and uburetwa

Ubuhake

Ubuhake is the name given to the social order in Rwanda and Burundi from approximately the 15th century to 1958. It has been frequently compared to European feudalism. Based on cattle distribution, it was, however, a much smaller system than the one of uburetwa, which affected a much larger...

) the Tutsis had practised over the Hutu until then.

Strife and independence

In the 1950s and early 1960s, a wave of Pan-Africanism

Pan-Africanism

Pan-Africanism is a movement that seeks to unify African people or people living in Africa, into a "one African community". Differing types of Pan-Africanism seek different levels of economic, racial, social, or political unity...

swept through Central Africa, expressed by leaders such as Julius Nyerere

Julius Nyerere

Julius Kambarage Nyerere was a Tanzanian politician who served as the first President of Tanzania and previously Tanganyika, from the country's founding in 1961 until his retirement in 1985....

in Tanzania

Tanzania

The United Republic of Tanzania is a country in East Africa bordered by Kenya and Uganda to the north, Rwanda, Burundi, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the west, and Zambia, Malawi, and Mozambique to the south. The country's eastern borders lie on the Indian Ocean.Tanzania is a state...

and Patrice Lumumba

Patrice Lumumba

Patrice Émery Lumumba was a Congolese independence leader and the first legally elected Prime Minister of the Republic of the Congo after he helped win its independence from Belgium in June 1960. Only ten weeks later, Lumumba's government was deposed in a coup during the Congo Crisis...

in the Congo. Anti-colonial sentiment rose throughout central Africa, and a socialist platform of African unity and equality for all Africans was promoted. Nyerere wrote about the elitism of educational systems.

Encouraged by the Pan-Africanists, Hutu advocates in the Catholic Church, and by Christian Belgians (who were increasingly influential in the Congo), Hutu resentment of the Tutsi increased. The United Nations mandates, the Tutsi elite class, and the Belgian colonialists added to the growing unrest. Grégoire Kayibanda

Grégoire Kayibanda

, founder of PARMEHUTU

Parmehutu

Parmehutu , also known as MDR-Parmehutu is a now-defunct political party of Rwanda and Burundi.It was founded by Grégoire Kayibanda as a political party of moderate Hutu...

, led the Hutu "emancipation" movement. In 1957, he wrote the "Hutu Manifesto". His party quickly became militarized. In reaction, in 1959 the Tutsi formed the UNAR party, lobbying for immediate independence for Ruanda-Urundi, to be based on the existing Tutsi monarchy. This group also became militarized. Skirmishes began between UNAR and PARMEHUTU groups. In July 1959, when the Tutsi Mwami (King) Mutara III Charles died following a routine vaccination, some Tutsi thought he had been assassinated. His younger half-brother became the next Tutsi monarch, Mwami (King) Kigeli V.

In November 1959, Tutsis tried to assassinate Kayibanda. Rumors of the death of Hutu politician Dominique Mbonyumutwa

Dominique Mbonyumutwa

Dominique Mbonyumutwa was a Rwandan politician who served as the first and President of Rwanda, from January 28 to October 26, 1961, immediately following the abolition of the Rwandan monarchy. He took over the country after King Kigeri V of Rwanda was overthrown following the 1961 referendum...

at the hands of Tutsis, who had beaten him, set off a violent retaliation, called the wind of destruction

Wind of destruction

The Rwandan Revolution, also known as the wind of destruction, was a period of ethnic violence which occurred in Rwanda in the late 1950s and early 1960s, and was the culmination of years of tension between the Hutu and Tutsi groups. The violence began in November 1959, following the beating up of...

. Hutus killed an estimated 20,000 to 100,000 Tutsi; thousands more, including the Mwami, fled to neighboring Uganda before Belgian commandos arrived to quell the violence. Tutsi leaders accused the Belgians of abetting the Hutus. A UN special commission reported racism reminiscent of "Nazism" against the Tutsi minorities, and discriminatory actions by the government and Belgian authorities.

The revolution of 1959 marked a major change in political life in Rwanda. Some 150,000 Tutsis were exiled to neighbouring countries. Tutsis who remained in Rwanda were excluded from political power in a state becoming more centralized under Hutu power. Tutsi refugee

Refugee

A refugee is a person who outside her country of origin or habitual residence because she has suffered persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or because she is a member of a persecuted 'social group'. Such a person may be referred to as an 'asylum seeker' until...

s also fled to the South Kivu province of the Congo, where they were known as Banyamalenge.

In 1960, the Belgian government agreed to hold democratic municipal elections in Rwanda-Urundi. The Hutu majority elected Hutu representatives. Such changes ended the Tutsi monarchy, which had existed for centuries. A Belgian effort to create an independent Rwanda-Urundi with Tutsi-Hutu power sharing failed, largely due to escalating violence. At the urging of the UN, the Belgian government divided Rwanda-Urundi into two separate countries, Rwanda and Burundi

Burundi

. On 25 September 1961, a referendum

Rwandan monarchy referendum, 1961

A referendum on the monarchy was held in Rwanda on 25 September 1961, concurrent with parliamentary elections. The referendum asked two questions; whether the monarchy should be retained after independence the following year, and whether the incumbent, Kigeli V should remain King...

was held to establish whether Rwanda should become a republic

Republic

A republic is a form of government in which the people, or some significant portion of them, have supreme control over the government and where offices of state are elected or chosen by elected people. In modern times, a common simplified definition of a republic is a government where the head of...

or remain a kingdom

Monarchy

A monarchy is a form of government in which the office of head of state is usually held until death or abdication and is often hereditary and includes a royal house. In some cases, the monarch is elected...

. Citizens voted overwhelmingly for a republic. After parliamentary elections

Rwandan parliamentary election, 1961

Parliamentary elections were held in Rwanda on 25 September 1961 alongside a referendum on the country's monarchy. The result was a victory for MDR-Parmehutu, which won 35 of the 44 seats in the Legislative Assembly. Voter turnout was 95.6%.-Results:...

held on the same day, the first Rwandese Republic was declared, with Kayibanda as prime minister. Mbonyumutwa was named the first president of the transitional government.

Between 1961 and 1962, Tutsi guerrilla groups staged attacks into Rwanda from neighboring countries. Rwandan Hutu-based troops responded, and thousands more were killed in the clashes.
On 1 July 1962, Belgium, with UN oversight, granted full independence to the two countries. Rwanda was created as a republic governed by the majority MDR-Parmehutu

Parmehutu

Parmehutu , also known as MDR-Parmehutu is a now-defunct political party of Rwanda and Burundi.It was founded by Grégoire Kayibanda as a political party of moderate Hutu...

, which had gained full control of national politics. In 1963, a Tutsi guerrilla invasion into Rwanda from Burundi unleashed another anti-Tutsi backlash by the Hutu government; their forces killed an estimated 14,000 people. The economic union between Rwanda and Burundi was dissolved and tensions between the two countries worsened. Rwanda became a Hutu-dominated one-party state. In excess of 70,000 people had been killed.

Kayibanda became Rwanda's first elected president, leading a government chosen from the membership of the directly elected unicameral National Assembly. Peaceful negotiation of international problems, social and economic elevation of the masses, and integrated development of Rwanda were the ideals of the Kayibanda regime. He established formal relations with 43 countries, including the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

, in the first ten years. Despite the progress made, inefficiency and corruption developed in government ministries in the mid-1960s.

The Kayibanda administration established quotas to try to increase the number of Hutu in schools and the civil service. This effort ended up penalizing the Tutsi. They were allowed only nine percent of secondary school and university seats, which was their proportion of the population. The quotas also extended to the civil service. With unemployment high, competition for such opportunities increased ethnic tensions. The Kayibanda government also continued the Belgian colonial government's policy of requiring ethnic identity cards, and it discouraged "mixed" marriages.

Following more violence in 1964, the government suppressed political opposition. It banned the political parties UNAR

Unar

The Unar are a Sindhi clan of the Samma tribe settled in Sindh, Pakistan.- History :According to The News International, the tribe is regarded "as the highest tribe or 'elder brother' of all the Samat tribes of Sindh". The clan traces its lineage back to the 14th century Jam Unar, the founder and...

and RADER

Rader

Rader is a surname, and may refer to:In law:* Dennis Rader, American serial killer* Randall Ray Rader, circuit judgeIn religion:* Paul Rader, the 15th General of The Salvation ArmyIn sports:...

and executed Tutsi members. Hutu militants used the term inyenzi (cockroaches

Cockroaches

A cockroach is an insect of the order Blattaria. "Cockroach" may also refer to:*Cockroach , a 2001 album by Danger Danger*Cockroach , a 2008 novel by Rawi Hage...

) as a pejorative to describe Tutsi rebels for what was perceived as infiltrating the country. Hundreds of thousands of refugees moved to neighbouring countries.

Friendly to the West, the Rwandan government allowed the United States CIA to operate in its successful effort to oust the Patrice Lumumba

Patrice Lumumba

of the Congo. The Catholic Church was closely involved with Parmehutu, and they shared local resources and networks. Through the church, the government maintained links with supporters in Belgium and Germany. The country's two newspapers supported the government and were Catholic publications.

Military rule

On July 5, 1973, while serving as defense minister, Maj. Gen. Juvénal Habyarimana

Juvénal Habyarimana

, a Hutu native of the northwestern province of Gisenyi

Gisenyi

Gisenyi is a city in Rubavu district in the Western Province of Rwanda. Gisenyi is contiguous with Goma, the city across the border in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The population of the city is about 106 000 .-Description:...

, overthrew Grégoire Kayibanda, a native of central province of Gitarama. Habyarimana claimed the government to have been ineffective and riddled with favoritism. He installed his own political party into government. This occurred partially as a reaction to the Burundi genocide

Burundi genocide

Since Burundi's independence in 1962, there have been two events called genocides in the country. The 1972 mass killings of Hutus by the Tutsi-dominated army, and the 1993 mass killings of Tutsis by the Hutu populace are both described as genocide in the final report of the International...

of 1972, with the resultant wave of Hutu refugees and subsequent social unrest. Rwanda enjoyed relative economic prosperity during the early part of his regime.

Habyarimana dissolved the National Assembly and the Parmehutu Party, and abolished all political activity. Still, the issue of ethnicity remained powerful. Each ethnic group held onto the memories of massacres in the past, and for the predominantly Hutu establishment, Tutsis remained scapegoats of convenience. For instance, Kayibanda was born in a southern region of the country, while Habyarimana came from the north. Southerners, however, blamed Habyarimana's perhaps favoritism for the north on Tutsi plots and machinations.

In 1974, a public outcry developed over Tutsi over-representation in professional fields such as medicine

Medicine

Medicine is the science and art of healing. It encompasses a variety of health care practices evolved to maintain and restore health by the prevention and treatment of illness....

and education

Education

Education in its broadest, general sense is the means through which the aims and habits of a group of people lives on from one generation to the next. Generally, it occurs through any experience that has a formative effect on the way one thinks, feels, or acts...

. Thousands of Tutsi were forced to resign from such positions, and many were forced into exile. In associated violence, several hundred Tutsi were killed.

In 1975, President Habyarimana formed the National Revolutionary Movement for Development (MRND) whose goals were to promote peace, unity, and national development. The movement was organized from the "hillside" to the national level and included elected and appointed officials.

Under MRND aegis, a new constitution making the party a one-party state under the MRND was approved in a referendum

Rwandan constitutional referendum, 1978

A constitutional referendum was held in Rwanda on 17 December 1978. It followed a coup by Juvénal Habyarimana in 1973 and the dissolution of the former sole legal party, MDR-Parmehutu. The new constitution created a presidential republic with no term limits for the President, and made the National...

in December 1978, which was shortly followed by presidential elections

Rwandan presidential election, 1978

Presidential elections were held in Rwanda on 24 December 1978, a week after the country's new constitution was approved in a referendum. The constitution had made the country a one-party state with the National Revolutionary Movement for Development the sole legal party. Its leader, incumbent...

, in which Habyarimana was confirmed as president. President Habyarimana was re-elected with over 99% of the vote in 1983

Rwandan presidential election, 1983

Presidential elections were held in Rwanda on 19 December 1983. The country was a one-party state at the time, with the National Revolutionary Movement for Development the sole legal party. Its leader, incumbent President Juvénal Habyarimana, who had taken power in a coup in 1973, was the only...

and again in 1988

Rwandan presidential election, 1988

Presidential elections were held in Rwanda on 19 December 1988. The country was a one-party state at the time, with the National Revolutionary Movement for Development the sole legal party. Its leader, incumbent President Juvénal Habyarimana, who had taken power in a coup in 1973, was the only...

, when he was the sole candidate. Responding to public pressure for political reform, President Habyarimana announced in July 1990 his intention to transform Rwanda's one-party state into a multi-party democracy.

Inter-relationship with events in Burundi

The situation in Rwanda had been influenced in great detail by the situation in Burundi. Both countries had a Hutu majority, yet an army-controlled Tutsi government in Burundi persisted for decades. After the assassination of Rwagasore

Louis Rwagasore

Prince Louis Rwagasore is Burundi's national and independence hero. He was a Burundi nationalist and prime minister.- Biography :...

, his UPRONA party was split into Tutsi and Hutu factions. A Tutsi Prime Minister was chosen by the monarch, but, a year later in 1963, the monarch was forced to appoint a Hutu prime minister, Pierre Ngendandumwe

Pierre Ngendandumwe

Pierre Ngendandumwe was a Burundian political figure. He was a member of the Union for National Progress and was an ethnic Hutu. On June 18, 1963, about a year after Burundi gained independence and amidst efforts to bring about political cooperation between Hutus and the dominant minority Tutsis,...

, in an effort to satisfy growing Hutu unrest. Nevertheless, the monarch soon replaced him with another Tutsi prince. In Burundi's first elections following independence, in 1965, Ngendandumwe was elected Prime Minister. He was immediately assassinated by a Tutsi extremist and he was succeeded by another Hutu, Joseph Bamina. Hutus won 23 of the 33 seats in national elections a few months later, but the monarch nullified the elections. Bamina was soon also assassinated and the Tutsi monarch installed his own personal secretary, Leopold Biha, as the Prime Minister in his place. This led to a Hutu coup from which the Mwami fled the country and Biha was shot (but not killed). The Tutsi-dominated army, led by Michel Micombero

Michel Micombero

Michel Micombero was the first President of Burundi from November 28, 1966 to November 1, 1976. He was member of the Tutsi ethnicity....

brutally responded: almost all Hutu politicians were killed. Micombero assumed control of the government and a few months later deposed the new Tutsi monarch (the son of the previous monarch) and abolished the role of the monarchy altogether. He then threatened to invade Rwanda. A military dictatorship persisted in Burundi for another 27 years, until the next free elections, in 1993.

Another seven years of sporadic violence in Burundi (from 1965–1972) existed between the Hutus and Tutsis. In 1969 another purge of Hutus by the Tutsi military occurred. Then, a localized Hutu uprising in 1972 was fiercely answered by the Tutsi-dominated Burundi army in the largest Burundi genocide of Hutus

Burundi genocide

, with a death toll nearing 200,000.

This wave of violence led to another wave of cross border refugees into Rwanda of Hutus from Burundi. Now there were large numbers of both Tutsi and Hutu refugees throughout the region, and tensions continued to mount.

In 1988, Hutu violence against Tutsis throughout northern Burundi again resurfaced, and in response the Tutsi army massacred approximately 20,000 more Hutu. Again thousands of Hutu were forced into exile into Tanzania and Congo to flee another genocide of Hutu.

Civil war

Many exiled refugee Rwandan Tutsis in Uganda had joined the rebel forces of Yoweri Museveni

Yoweri Museveni

Yoweri Kaguta Museveni is a Ugandan politician and statesman. He has been President of Uganda since 26 January 1986.Museveni was involved in the war that deposed Idi Amin Dada, ending his rule in 1979, and in the rebellion that subsequently led to the demise of the Milton Obote regime in 1985...

in the Ugandan Bush War

Ugandan Bush War

The Ugandan Bush War refers to the guerrilla war waged between 1981 and 1986 in Uganda by the National Resistance Army against the government of Milton Obote, and later that of Tito Okello.-Events leading to the war:Following the Uganda-Tanzania War that removed Idi Amin in 1979, a...

and had then become part of the Ugandan military upon the rebel victory in 1986. Among these were Fred Rwigema

Fred Rwigema

Fred Gisa Rwigema , born Emmanuel Gisa , was a founding member of and leader of the Rwandan Patriotic Front, an anti-Hutu Power guerrilla group that fought in the Rwandan Civil War.Rwigema was born in Gitarama, in the south of Rwanda...

and Paul Kagame

Paul Kagame

Paul Kagame is the sixth and current President of the Republic of Rwanda. He rose to prominence as the leader of the Rwandan Patriotic Front , whose victory over the incumbent government in July 1994 effectively ended the Rwandan genocide...

, who rose to prominence in the Rwandan Patriotic Front

Rwandan Patriotic Front

The Rwandan Patriotic Front abbreviated as RPF is the current ruling political party of Rwanda, led by President Paul Kagame. It governs in a coalition with other parties...

(RPF), a Rwandan rebel group largely consisting of Tutsi veterans of the Ugandan war. On October 1, 1990, the RPF invaded Rwanda from their base in neighboring Uganda

Uganda

. The rebel force, composed primarily of ethnic Tutsis, blamed the government for failing to democratize and resolve the problems of some 500,000 Tutsi refugees living in diaspora around the world.

The Tutsi diaspora miscalculated the reaction of its invasion of Rwanda. Though the Tutsi objective seemed to be to pressure the Rwandan government into making concessions, the invasion was seen as an attempt to bring the Tutsi ethnic group back into power. The effect was to increase ethnic tensions to a level higher than they had ever been. Nevertheless, after 3 years of fighting and multiple prior "cease-fires," the government and the RPF signed a "final" cease-fire agreement in August 1993, known as the Arusha Accords

Arusha Accords

The Arusha Accords were a set of five accords signed in Arusha, Tanzania on August 4, 1993, by the government of Rwanda and the rebel Rwandan Patriotic Front , under mediation, to end a three-year Rwandan Civil War...

, in order to form a power sharing government, a plan which immediately ran into problems.

The situation worsened when the first elected Burundian president, Melchior Ndadaye

Melchior Ndadaye

Melchior Ndadaye was a Burundian intellectual and politician. He was the first democratically elected and first Hutu president of Burundi after winning the landmark 1993 election...

, a Hutu, was assassinated by the Burundian Tutsi-dominated army in October 1993. In Burundi, a fierce civil war then erupted between Tutsi and Hutu following the army's massacre. This conflict spilled over the border into Rwanda and destabilized the fragile Rwandan accords. Tutsi-Hutu tensions rapidly intensified. Although the UN sent a peacekeeping force named the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda

United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda

The United Nations Assistance Mission In Rwanda was a mission instituted by the United Nations to aid the implementation of the Arusha Accords, signed August 4, 1993, which were meant to end the Rwandan Civil War. The mission lasted from October 1993 to March 1996...

(UNAMIR), it was underfunded, under-staffed, and largely ineffective in the face of a two country civil-war. The UN denied Lieutenant-General Roméo Dallaire

Roméo Dallaire

Lieutenant-General Roméo Antonius Dallaire, is a Canadian senator, humanitarian, author and retired general...

's request for additional troops and changes to the rules of engagement to prevent the coming genocide.

The Rwandan genocide

On April 6, 1994, the airplane carrying Juvénal Habyarimana

Juvénal Habyarimana

, the President of Rwanda, and Cyprien Ntaryamira

Cyprien Ntaryamira

Cyprien Ntaryamira , was President of Burundi from 5 February 1994 until his death when his plane was shot down on 6 April 1994.-Biography:...

, the Hutu President of Burundi, was shot down

Assassination of Habyarimana and Ntaryamira

as it prepared to land at Kigali. Both presidents were killed when the plane crashed.

Military and militia groups began rounding up and killing Tutsis en masse, as well as political moderates irrespective of their ethnic backgrounds. The killing swiftly spread from Kigali

Kigali

Kigali, population 965,398 , is the capital and largest city of Rwanda. It is situated near the geographic centre of the nation, and has been the economic, cultural, and transport hub of Rwanda since it became capital at independence in 1962. The main residence and offices of the President of...

to all corners of the country; between April 6 and the beginning of July, a genocide of unprecedented swiftness left between 500,000 and 1,000,000 Tutsis (800,000 is a commonly noted number) and moderate Hutus dead at the hands of organized bands of militia (Interahamwe

Interahamwe

The Interahamwe is a Hutu paramilitary organization. The militia enjoyed the backing of the Hutu-led government leading up to, during, and after the Rwandan Genocide. Since the genocide, they have been forced out of Rwanda, and have sought asylum in Congo...

) or organized rebels (Inkotanyi). Even ordinary citizens were called on by local officials to kill their neighbors. The president's MRND Party was implicated in organizing many aspects of the genocide. The Hutu genocidaires were abetted by the Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines

Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines

Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines was a Rwandan radio station which broadcast from July 8, 1993 to July 31, 1994. It played a significant role during the April–July 1994 Rwandan Genocide....

broadcasting hate speech advocating violence against Tutsis. It broadcast at the same time as Radio Muhabura

Radio Muhabura

Radio Muhabura was a pro-Tutsi propaganda radio station of Paul Kagame's RPF during the period of his invasion of Rwanda from Uganda between 1990 and 1994. It was created in 1991 and broadcast from Uganda. It was the first alternative to Radio Rwanda, reaching all but the south of Rwanda by...

broadcast from Uganda, sponsored by the RPF and their Ugandan allies.

The RPF renewed its civil war against the Rwanda Hutu government when it received word that the genocidal massacres had begun. Its leader Paul Kagame

Paul Kagame

directed RPF forces in neighboring countries such as Uganda and Tanzania to invade the country, battling the Hutu forces and Interahamwe militias who were committing the massacres. The resulting civil war raged concurrently with the genocide for two months. The Tutsi-led RPF continued to advance on the capital, and soon occupied the northern, eastern, and southern parts of the country by June. Thousands of additional civilians were killed in the conflict. UN member states refused to answer UNAMIR's requests for increased troops and money. The remaining part of the country not under RPF control was invaded by France in Operation Turquoise. The government of genocidaires had been recognized only by France, and the deployment of French troops had the effect of protecting their Hutu allies, permitting the slaughter of Tutsis to continue in the French controlled area.

Aftermath and peace

Between July and August, 1994, Kagame's Tutsi-led RPF troops first entered Kigali and soon thereafter captured the rest of the country. The Tutsi rebels defeated the Hutu regime and ended the genocide, but approximately two million Hutu refugees - some who participated in the genocide and fearing Tutsi retribution - fled to neighboring Burundi

Burundi

, Tanzania

Tanzania

, Uganda

Uganda

, and Zaire

Zaire

The Republic of Zaire was the name of the present Democratic Republic of the Congo between 27 October 1971 and 17 May 1997. The name of Zaire derives from the , itself an adaptation of the Kongo word nzere or nzadi, or "the river that swallows all rivers".-Self-proclaimed Father of the Nation:In...

. This exodus became known as the Great Lakes refugee crisis

Great Lakes refugee crisis

.

After the Tutsi RPF took control of the government, in 1994, Kagame formed a government of national unity headed by a Hutu president, Pasteur Bizimungu

Pasteur Bizimungu

Pasteur Bizimungu was the fifth President of Rwanda from 19 July 1994 until 23 March 2000. He is considered belonging to the Hutu caste/ethnic group and was born in the Gisenyi prefecture of Rwanda. Bizimungu worked within the Hutu MRND regime which ruled Rwanda , including as director general of...

. Kagame became Minister of Defence and Vice-President, and was the de facto leader of the country.

Following an uprising by the ethnic Tutsi, sometimes referred to as a whole as Banyamulenge

Banyamulenge

The Banyamulenge is a term historically describing the ethnic Tutsi Rwandans concentrated on the High Plateau of South Kivu, in the eastern region of the Democratic Republic of the Congo , close to the Burundi-Congo-Rwanda border...

(although this term only represents people from one area in eastern Zaire—other ethnic Tutsi Kinyarwanda-speaking people include the Banyamasisi and the Banyarutshuru, as an example) people in eastern Zaire in October 1997, a huge movement of refugees began which brought more than 600,000 back to Rwanda in the last two weeks of November. This massive repatriation was followed at the end of December 1996 by the return of another 500,000 from Tanzania, again in a huge, spontaneous wave. Less than 100,000 Rwandans are estimated to remain outside of Rwanda, and they are thought to be the remnants of the defeated army of the former genocidal government, its allies in the civilian militias known as Interahamwe, and soldiers recruited in the refugee camps before 1996. There are also many innocent Hutu who remain in the forests of eastern Congo, particularly Rutshuru

Rutshuru Territory

Rutshuru Territory is a territory in the North Kivu province of the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo , with headquarters is the town of Rutshuru....

, Masisi and Bukavu, who have been misinformed by rebel forces that they will be killed upon return to Rwanda. Rebels also use force to prevent these people from returning, as they serve as a human shield.

In northwest Rwanda, Hutu militia members killed three Spanish aid workers, three soldiers and seriously wounded one other on January 18, 1997. Since then, most of the refugees have returned and the country is secure for tourists.

Rwandan coffee began to gain importance after international taste tests pronounced it among the best in the world, and the U.S. responded with a contribution of 8 million dollars. Rwanda now earns some revenue from coffee and tea export, although it has been difficult to compete with larger coffee-producing countries. The main source of revenue, however, is tourism, mainly mountain gorilla visitation. Their other parks, Nyungwe Forest (one of the last high-altitude tropical forests in the world) and Akagera National Park (a safari game park) have also become popular on the tourism circuit. The lakeside resorts of Gisenyi and Kibuye are also gaining ground.

When Bizimungu became critical of the Kagame government in 2000, he was removed as president and Kagame took over the presidency himself. Bizimungu immediately founded an opposition party (the PDR), but it was banned by the Kagame government. Bizimungu was arrested in 2002 for treason, sentenced to 15 years in prison, but released by a presidential pardon in 2007.

The postwar government has placed high priority on development, opening water taps in the most remote areas, providing free and compulsory education, and promulgating progressive environmental policies. Their Vision 2020 development policy has the aim of achieving a service-based society by 2020, with a significant middle class. There is remarkably little corruption in the country.

Hutu Rwandan genocidal leaders are on trial at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda

International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda

The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda is an international court established in November 1994 by the United Nations Security Council in Resolution 955 in order to judge people responsible for the Rwandan Genocide and other serious violations of international law in Rwanda, or by Rwandan...

, in the Rwandan National Court system, and, most recently, through the informal Gacaca programme. Recent reports highlight a number of reprisal killings of survivors for giving evidence at Gacaca. These Gacaca trials are overseen by the government established National Unity and Reconciliation Commission. Gacaca is a traditional adjudication mechanism at the umudugudu (village) level, whereby members of the community elect elders to serve as judges, and the entire community is present for the case. This system was modified to try lower-level génocidaires, those who had killed or stolen but did not organize massacres. Prisoners, dressed in pink, stand trial before members of their community. Judges accord sentences, which vary widely, from returning to prison, to paying back the cost of goods stolen, to working in the fields of families of victims. Gacaca is expected to conclude in December 2008. For many, gacaca has been a vehicle for closure, and prisoners' testimonies have helped many families locate victims. Gacaca takes place once a week in the morning in every village across Rwanda, and is compulsory.

Ethnicity has been formally outlawed in Rwanda, in the effort to promote a culture of healing and unity. One can stand trial for discussion of the different ethnic groups.

Rwanda has become a President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief

President's Emergency Plan For AIDS Relief

The President's Emergency Plan For AIDS Relief was a commitment of $15 billion over five years from United States President George W. Bush to fight the global HIV/AIDS pandemic...

(PEPFAR) focus country, and the United States has been providing AIDS programming, education, training, and treatment. Rwandans who have been infected can now receive free antiretroviral drug

Antiretroviral drug

Antiretroviral drugs are medications for the treatment of infection by retroviruses, primarily HIV. When several such drugs, typically three or four, are taken in combination, the approach is known as Highly Active Antiretroviral Therapy, or HAART...

s in health centers across the country, as well as food packages.

First and Second Congo Wars

In order to protect the country against the Hutu Interahamwe forces, which had fled to Eastern Zaire, Kagame's RPF forces invaded Zaire in 1996, following talks by Kagame with US officials earlier the same year. In this invasion Kagame allied with Laurent Kabila, a progressist revolutionary in Eastern Zaire who had been a foe of Zaire's long-time dictator, Mobutu Sese Seko

Mobutu Sese Seko

Mobutu Sese Seko Nkuku Ngbendu wa Za Banga , commonly known as Mobutu or Mobutu Sese Seko , born Joseph-Désiré Mobutu, was the President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo from 1965 to 1997...

. In addition to Rwandan forces, Laurent Kabila's AFDL (Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Congo) forces were also supported by Ugandan forces, with whom Kagame had trained in the late 1980s, which then invaded Eastern Zaire from the northeast. This became known as the First Congo War

First Congo War

.

In this war, militarized Tutsi elements in the South Kivu area of Zaire, known as Banyamulenge to disguise their original Rwandan Tutsi heritage, allied with the Tutsi RDF forces against the Hutu refugees in the North Kivu area, which included the Interahamwe militias.

In the midst of this conflict, Kabila, whose primary intent had been to depose Mobutu, moved his forces to Kinshasa, and in 1997, the same year Mobutu Sese Seko died of prostate cancer, Kabila captured Kinshasa and then became president of Zaire, which he then renamed to the Democratic Republic of the Congo. With Kabila's success in the Congo, he no longer desired an alliance with the Tutsi-RPF Rwandan army and the Ugandan forces, and in August 1998 ordered both the Ugandans and Tutsi-Rwandan army out of the DRC. However, neither Kagame's Rwandan Tutsi forces nor Museveni's Ugandan forces had any intention of leaving the Congo, and the framework of the Second Congo War

Second Congo War

was laid.

During the Second Congo War, Tutsi militias among the Banyamulenge in the Congo province of Kivu desired to annex themselves to Rwanda (now dominated by Tutsi forces under the Kagame government). Kagame also desired this, both to increase the resources of Rwanda by adding those of the Kivu region, and also to add the Tutsi population, which the Banyamulenge represented, back into Rwanda, thereby reinforcing his political base and protecting the indigenous Tutsis living there, who had also suffered massacres from the Interhamwe.

In the Second Congo War, Uganda and Rwanda attempted to wrest much of the Democratic Republic of the Congo from Kabila's forces, and nearly succeeded. However, the DRC being a member of the SADC (Southern Africa Development Community) organisation, President Laurent Kabila called this regional organisation to the rescue. Armies were sent to aid Kabila, most notably those of Angola and Zimbabwe. These armies were able to beat back Kagame's Rwandan-Tutsi advances and the Ugandan forces.

In the great conflict between 1998 and 2002, during which Congo was divided into three parts, multiple opportunistic militias, called Mai Mai

Mai-Mai

The term Mai-Mai or Mayi-Mayi refers to any kind of community-based militia group active in the Second Congo War and its aftermath in the Democratic Republic of the Congo , formed to defend their local territory against other armed groups...

, sprang up, supplied by the arms dealers around the world that profit in small arms trading

Small arms proliferation

Small arms proliferation is a term used by organizations and individuals advocating the control of small arms and their trade; the term has no precise definition...

, including the US, Russia, China, and other countries. Over 5.4 million people died in the conflict, as well as the majority of animals in the region.

Laurent Kabila was assassinated in the DRC (Congo) in 2001, and was succeeded by his son, Joseph Kabila

Joseph Kabila

Joseph Kabila Kabange is a Congolese politician who has been President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo since January 2001. He took office ten days after the assassination of his father, President Laurent-Désiré Kabila...

. The latter was chosen unanimously by the political class because of the role he played in the army, being the "de facto' officer in charge of the well trained batailions that defeated the Mobutu army and were fighting along side SADC coalition forces. Joseph speaks fluent French

French language

French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...

, English

English language

English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

and Swahili

Swahili language

Swahili or Kiswahili is a Bantu language spoken by various ethnic groups that inhabit several large stretches of the Mozambique Channel coastline from northern Kenya to northern Mozambique, including the Comoro Islands. It is also spoken by ethnic minority groups in Somalia...

, one of the four national languages of the DRC. He studied in Tanzania

Tanzania

and Uganda

Uganda

in his earlier years. He completed his military training in China

China

Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...

. After serving 5 years as the transitional government president, he was freely-elected in the Congo to be president, in 2006, largely on the basis of his support in the Eastern Congo.

Ugandan and Rwandan forces within Congo began to battle each other for territory, and Congolese Mai Mai

Mai-Mai

militias, most active in the South and North Kivu provinces (in which most refugees were located) took advantage of the conflict to settle local scores and widen the conflict, battling each other, Ugandan and Rwandan forces, and even Congolese forces.

The war was ended when, under Joseph Kabila's leadership, a ceasefire was signed and the all-inclusive Sun City (South Africa) talks were convened to decide on a two years transition period and the organisation of free and fair elections.

Rwandan RPF troops finally left Congo in 2002, leaving a wake of disease and malnutrition that continued to kill thousands every month. However, Rwandan rebels continue to operate (as of May 2007) in the northeast Congo and Kivu regions. These are claimed to be remnants of Hutu forces that cannot return to Rwanda without facing genocide charges, yet are not welcomed in Congo and are pursued by DRC troops. In the first 6 months of 2007, over 260,000 civilians were displaced. Congolese Mai Mai rebels also continue to threaten people and wildlife. Although a large scale effort at disarming militias has succeeded, with the aid of the UN troops, the last militias are only being disarmed in 2007. However, fierce confrontations in the northeast regions of the Congo between local tribes in the Ituri region, initially uninvolved with the Hutu-Tutsi conflict but drawn into the Second Congo War, still continue.

Rwanda today

Rwanda today struggles to heal and rebuild, showing signs of rapid economic development,
but with growing international concern about the decline of human rights within the country.

Economically, the major markets for Rwandan exports are Belgium, Germany, and People's Republic of China. In April 2007, an investment and trade agreement, four years in the making, was worked out between Belgium and Rwanda. Belgium contributes €25-35 million per year to Rwanda. Belgian co-operation with the Ministry of Agriculture and Animal Husbandry continues to develop and rebuild agricultural practices in the country. It has distributed agricultural tools and seed to help rebuild the country. Belgium also helped in re-launching fisheries in Lake Kivu, at a value of US$470,000, in 2001.

In Eastern Rwanda, The Clinton Hunter Development Initiative

Clinton Foundation

The William J. Clinton Foundation is a foundation established by former President of the United States Bill Clinton with the stated mission to "strengthen the capacity of people throughout the world to meet the challenges of global interdependence." The Foundation focuses on four critical areas:...

, along with Partners in Health, are helping to improve agricultural productivity, improve water and sanitation and health services, and help cultivate international markets for agricultural products. Since 2000, the Rwandan government has expressed interest in transforming the country from agricultural subsistence to a knowledge-based economy, and plans to provide high-speed broadband across the entire country.

Rwanda applied to join the Commonwealth of Nations

Commonwealth of Nations

The Commonwealth of Nations, normally referred to as the Commonwealth and formerly known as the British Commonwealth, is an intergovernmental organisation of fifty-four independent member states...

in 2007 and 2009, a sign that is trying to distance itself from French foreign policy. In 2007, it applied unsuccessfully to join at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting

Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting

The Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting, , is a biennial summit meeting of the heads of government from all Commonwealth nations. Every two years the meeting is held in a different member state, and is chaired by that nation's respective Prime Minister or President, who becomes the...

at Kampala in Uganda, but was accepted into membership in 2009 at the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in Port of Spain

Port of Spain

Port of Spain, also written as Port-of-Spain, is the capital of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago and the country's third-largest municipality, after San Fernando and Chaguanas. The city has a municipal population of 49,031 , a metropolitan population of 128,026 and a transient daily population...

, Trinidad. Australian Foreign Minister Stephen Smith publicly stated this would help "entrench the rule of law and support the Rwandan Government's efforts towards democracy and economic growth."

However, since then Freedom House

Freedom House

Freedom House is an international non-governmental organization based in Washington, D.C. that conducts research and advocacy on democracy, political freedom and human rights...

rates Rwanda as "not free", with political rights and civil liberties trending downwards. In 2010 Amnesty International

Amnesty International

Amnesty International is an international non-governmental organisation whose stated mission is "to conduct research and generate action to prevent and end grave abuses of human rights, and to demand justice for those whose rights have been violated."Following a publication of Peter Benenson's...

"strongly condemned a worrying attack on a Rwandan opposition group" in the lead-up to presidential elections, citing the case of Victoire Ingasbire, president of the FDU-Inkingi (United Democratic Forces) and her aide Joseph Ntawangundi, attacked in February 2010 while collecting party registration documents from a government building in Kigali. In April, Rwandan Immigration proceeded to reject a work visa re-application by the Rwanda-based researcher for Human Rights Watch

Human Rights Watch

Human Rights Watch is an international non-governmental organization that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. Its headquarters are in New York City and it has offices in Berlin, Beirut, Brussels, Chicago, Geneva, Johannesburg, London, Los Angeles, Moscow, Paris, San Francisco, Tokyo,...

. The sole new opposition party to secure registration, PS-Imberakuri, had its presidential candidate Bernard Ntaganda arrested on June 24, charged with "genocide ideology" and "divisionism".

Rwandan Greens Party President, Frank Habineza also reported threats. In October 2009 a Rwandan Green Party meeting was violently broken up by police, with authorities placing preventing the registration of the party or allowing it to run a candidate in the presidential election. Only weeks before the election, on 14 July 2009, André Kagwa Rwisereka, the vice president of the opposition Democratic Green Party was found dead, with his head severed almost entirely, in Butare, southern Rwanda.

Public scrutiny of the government's policies and practices has been limited by press freedom. In June, 2009 journalist for Umuvugizi newspaper Jean-Leonard Rugambage was shot dead outside his home in Kagali. Umuvugizi at the time was supporting a critical investigation into the attempted murder of former Rwandan general Faustin Kayumba Nyamwasa, in exile in South Africa. In July, 2009 Agnes Nkusi Uwimana, editor of the "Umurabyo" newspaper, charged with "genocide ideology." As the presidential election got closer, two other newspaper editors left Rwanda.

The United Nations, European Union, the United States, France and Spain publicly expressed concerns.

The new group of Rwanda led by INGABO became the new leaders of Rwanda. They are divided in two groups; The Rwanda-EACU group of most KIGA and the Banyamulenge of Rwanda Kazembe. In 2011 war broke out in Libya, the African Military Contingent will be part of the new settlement that happens in Libya, Rwanda will be part of it, with particular cooperation between Rwanda, Uganda, and Sudan to the Libyan Conflict.

Early history

Reign of Rwabuguri

Colonial era

German

World War I

Belgian colonialism

Destabilisation

Strife and independence

Military rule

Inter-relationship with events in Burundi

Civil war

The Rwandan genocide

Aftermath and peace

First and Second Congo Wars

Rwanda today

See also

Further reading