rwanda: beyond ethnic conflict

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Rwanda: Beyond ethnicconflict'Anne MackintoshPublished online: 01 Jul 2010.

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A shared vision, a global cause

Let me begin with a personal reminiscence. Likemany others, I vividly recall the day of NelsonMandela’s release from prison in February 1990.It was the eve of my departure to Rwanda for athree-month assignment for Oxfam. I was athome watching televis ion. I still recall theexcited antic ipation of Mandel a’s walk tofreedom, the overwhelming sense ofachievement (utterly insignificant though myown part in the South African struggle hadbeen), the tears of jubilation when he finallyappeared. ‘He did it! He did it!’ I cried, punchingthe air. I well know that my feel ings wereheightened by apprehension of the challenges Ianticipated facing in Rwanda, though these wereas nothing compared with what I was actually toexperience. Nevertheless, I was conscious ofsharing an extraordinary moment with millionsof sympathisers around the world.

With hindsight, I wonder whether this was thelast time the world community united effectivelybehind a just cause (though one should notoverrate or idealise the role of external actors in

bringing about the end of apartheid). However, itis no exaggeration to say that the Anti-ApartheidMovement, and the campaign to release NelsonMandela from prison, inspired a generation.There was almost a sense of loss when the goalwas achieved: what would replace the rallyingcry of ‘Free Nelson Mandel a!’? While thissentiment could rightly be regarded as self-indulgent (and as demonstrating the failure tounderstand that solidarity was needed as neverbefore — after al l, the hard part was justbeginning), it also reflected something not sotrivial: the loss of a shared vision, a universalaspiration uniting people across national andcontinental boundaries. I shall return to this later.

The following day, I departed for Rwanda. Ihad no idea that this would eventually lead to mybeing drawn into one of the greatest cataclysmsof the twentieth century. It was partly as aconsequence of this assignment that I laterbecame Oxfam’s Regional Representative inKigali. I took up this post in June 1991, just oversix months af ter the outbreak of fightingbetween the Rwandan government army and theRwandan Patriotic Front (RPF). The war had by

464 1364-9213-11 © Oxfam UK and Ireland 1997

Rwanda: beyond ‘ethnic conflict’

Anne Mackintosh

This paper 1 explores some of the reasons for the failure of the international community to actdecisively in preempting the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. These are rooted both in long-distant historyand in the dynamics of post-Cold War international politics. Drawing on a decade of experience inCentral Africa, the author looks critically at the widely accepted explanations of the genocide and itsaftermath as ‘simply tribal fighting’, and considers the role of external agents — journalists and aidagencies alike — in fostering this view. The paper ends with a reflection on the complex challengesposed by ‘reconciliation’ in the wake of the genocide.

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then reached a semi-quiescent phase. However,over the next three years, violence graduallyescalated unti l, on 6 April 1994, PresidentHabyarimana’s plane was shot down, triggeringthe genoc ide with which we are now sodreadfully familiar.

Paradox ically, while my experi ence inRwanda inflicted terrible wounds — even forone who escaped so lightly — it was a tre-mendous learning experience. Through thecrisis, I was exposed to people, ideas , andchal lenges I would never otherw ise haveencountered, and I have undoubtedly grown as aresult. It also brought me a certain minorprominence, such as appearing on CNN andpublishing papers such as this one! I have mixedfeel ings about this: the Rwanda crisis hasprovided career opportunities for many, andgenerated material for Master’s degrees ,doctorates , and academic conferences fordecades to come. It has led to a proliferation ofrelief NGOs, electronic information networks,and conflict-resolution initiatives — a band-wagon of which I am now a small part. Billionsof dollars continue to be spent on the reliefeffort, yet the international community com-pletely failed to act before the genocide. Why?

In this paper, I shall explore some of thereasons for the failure to act, which are rootedboth in long-distant history and in the dynamicsof international politics in the contemporaryworld. I shall also look critically at the widelyaccepted explanations of the genocide and itsaftermath as ‘simply tribal fighting’ . I concludewith some reflections on the nature of ourinternational responsibilities in the modernworld, and on the complex challenges posed by‘reconciliation’ in the wake of such an extremeexperience as genocide.

A failure to act: indifference,indecision, and incomprehension

The short answer to the question why theinternational community failed to take decisiveand timely action is that Rwanda did not matter.A tiny, landlocked country with few naturalresources, it was considered strategically and

materially unimportant. Unlike Kuwait, it doesnot produce oil and was of no consequence to theinfluential members of the UN Security Council,with the exception of France.

The French government played a bafflingrole in relation to the former Rwandan regime,attributable in part to its preoccupation withretaining its influence on the world stage byfostering the community of French-speakingnations known as la francophonie. Hence theprevious French-speaking régime in Rwandareceived unwavering support, despite mountingevidenc e of human-rights abuses instigatedlargely by Habyarimana’s inner circle; and hencethe hostility and suspicion with which the currentgovernment — mainly English-speaking — isregarded by the French. However, as I write, eventhe French government is announcing its intentionno longer to intervene politically or militarily inthe affairs of its former colonies in Africa, pre-ferring to support ‘African solutions to Africanproblems’ — the euphemism for disengagementnow current in international circles.

Another reason for the international com-munity’s failure to respond to danger signals inRwanda was the ‘Somalia factor’ . The UN’sintervention in Somalia had been so disastrous,and the humiliation of US troops in particular soprofound, that the Security Council hesitated torepeat any such exercise.

Coupled with this reticence was the inc-reasingly prevalent analysis — epitomised byRobert Kaplan’s paper ‘The Coming Anarchy’— of conflicts in Africa as controlled by dark,unpredictable forces, impenetrable to outsiders,and impossible to influence. Kaplan’s paper wascirculated to all US embassies early in 1994, asrequired reading for US diplomats. Thefollowing quotation illustrates Kaplan’s drift:

Sierra Leone is a microcosm of what isoccurring ... throughout West Africa and much ofthe underdeveloped world: the withering awayof central governments, the rise of tribal andregional domains, the unchecked spread ofdisease, and the growing pervasiveness of war.(Kaplan, 1994).

The belief that several African countries werethreatened by ‘an anarchic implosion of criminal


465Development in Practice, Volume 7, Number 4, November 1997

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violence’ reinforced the tendency of powerfulNorthern nations, since the end of the Cold War,to pull back from meaningful engagement withAfrica. Detachment can more easily be justifiedif African States are perceived to be disinte-grating along internal fault-lines. The impact ofexternal factors, such as structural adjustmentpolicies and international terms of trade, appearsto have been conveniently forgotten.

Yet, nearly two years before the genocide,Oxfam UK and Ireland commissioned a reporton the question of Rwandese refugees andmigrants in the Great Lakes region. The authorhad warned that ‘the ... region remains poten-tially extremely unstable, and ... unless seriouswork is done on all fronts to tackle the economic,social and political problems of the region ...{t}he potential for further explosive conflict isconsiderable’ (Wiles, 1992). He made a series ofrecommendations, emphasising the need for aconcerted approach, arguing that regional co-operation and development offered the onlylong-term solutions.

One year later, Oxfam’s former Repre-sentative in Kigali wrote:

Rwandan society is now more violently dividedagainst itself than at any time since Inde-pendence. The war has done incalculabledamage to the economy and environment, andmuch needs to be done to encourage people towork together to heal the wounds of sectarianhatred ... Rwanda stands on the brink of anuncharted abyss of anarchy and violence, andthere are all too many historical, ethnic,economic, and political pressures that are likelyto push it over the edge. (Waller, 1993)

However, despite the unequivocal nature of suchwarnings and the urgency of their tone, it seemedimpossible to push Rwanda higher up anyone’sagenda even within the aid-agency world —whether in terms of programme funding or as afocus for lobbying and communications work.One reason for Rwanda’s marginalisation wasthat, as a former Belgian colony and part of lafrancophonie, it was virtually unknown in theEnglish-speaking world. Many agency staffwere simply unable to read reports about oremerging from the region.

Then, in February 1994, just as the situationwas becoming more grave, the ‘South Africafactor’ supervened. Elections were forthcoming;given South Africa’s place in the Britishconsciousness, there was real potential tointerest Members of Parliament and the generalpublic. In addition, Oxfam (like many other aidagenc ies) had a long-term commitment toadvocacy on South Africa. When the genocidebegan, many of the sympathetic parliament-arians whom we would have lobbied, or seriousjournalists who might otherwise have reportedon Rwanda, were in South Africa. As a result,the crisis was not covered until the genocide wasvirtually over, by which time it had been over-shadowed by a refugee crisis as the RPF gainedcontrol of the country, prompting the massexodus of mainly Hutu refugees (including theformer army and militias) into Tanzania,Burundi, and eastern Zaïre. Coming in at thislate stage helped to create a distorted view ofwhat the crisis was about. Genocide and therefugee crisis became conflated. Refugees werenot, as some journalists and aid agencies stated,‘fleeing the genocide’: they fled with those whohad perpetrated it, fearing revenge.

Long-term neglect, instant expertise

Suddenly, everyone was there: a plethora of aidagencies, some of them newly created, and over500 journalists were operating out of Goma (theprincipal city of North-Kivu in eastern Zaïre) atone point. Yet, only a year before, Oxfam hadeven had to pay journalists to visit Rwanda andKivu, and help them place their stories, simply toensure some serious coverage in the Britishmedia of the region and its latent conflicts.

It appeared that, having failed to act on thepolitical front, governments were anxious toraise their profile in the relief effort. ‘In effect’ ,commented the Steering Committee on a majorjoint evaluation exercise, ‘humanitarian actionsubstituted for political action’ (Joint Evaluation,1996). In lieu of meaningful involvement at anearlier stage, donors were now running after apiece of the action, eager to fund high-profile but

Anne Mackintosh

466 Development in Practice, Volume 7, Number 4, November 1997

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relatively short-term interventions, in order toconceal a ‘policy vacuum’.

Describing and shaping events

As I have already mentioned, there was so littleinterest in the Great Lakes region before theevents of 1994 that Oxfam had facilitated visitsby selected journalis ts, in order to raise theprofile of the area, and to generate internationalconcern about what was taking place. However,‘ foreign news’ stories in the major nationalmedia are strictly rationed; even the BBC WorldService will rarely feature more than oneAfrican story during a half-hour news program-me. When a foreign news story is featured ondomestic radio or television, it is generallybecause there is a crisis of some kind. But thereis seldom much exploration of the background,even in a situation given as much exposure as thewar in former Yugoslavia. For parts of the worldconsidered to be of less importance, all too oftenthere is just a one-off report which is neverfollowed up.

In the wake of the Goma experience, NGOshave been criticised for competing for favour-able media exposure (for months, one agency oranother featured on every news bulletin), andunduly influencing reporters by facilitating andeven financing their visits. With a plethora ofnew organisations now in the lists, profile is all,and accentuating the positive becomes a ‘must’.This is particularly important for those agenciesthat depend heavily on official funding, sincegovernments want to support organisations thatare doing highly visible work. Even an agencylike Oxfam, which draws most of its long-termfunding from the British general public, is farfrom immune to such pressures.

Jostling for media coverage seems to gohand-in-hand with the development of a ‘con-tract culture’ in the aid world — where NGOscompete to be contracted by donors , UNagencies, and local government bodies to carryout relief and long-term welfare work. This maybe a way of identifying those who are efficientor, rather, those who best meet the criteria offunders as regards reporting and accounting, for

example. The disturbing corollary, however, isthat NGOs’ accountability is perceived more inrelation to their donors than to the supposedbeneficiaries of their aid programmes.

The Goma experience was in many ways awatershed for relief agencies which will haveimplications for their work elsewhere in future.The proliferation in the number of relief NGOs,their sudden prominence (not only in the media,but in terms of access to decision-makers), theirincreasing dependence on money channelledthrough UN agencies and competition for fundsin general have all resulted in pressure for effortsto regulate NGOs. There is still little such regula-tionbeyond a voluntary code of conduct that wasdrawn up in the wake of the Rwanda crisis.Nevertheless, the code is being developed into aset of minimum standards which are expected tobe widely adopted, and the likelihood is that NGOswill have to demonstrate greater ‘professionalism’,and enjoy less individual autonomy, in future.

I am referring here to international NGOs,local NGOs having been almost completelymarginalised during the crisis. The reasons forthis are not only that few of the internationalactors who became involved in the emergencyresponse had any prior experience in the region,still less knowledge of, or contact with, localorganisations. Despite their reputation withinthe region as a substantive force in civil society,and notwithstanding the courage of individualstaff in attempting to combat ethnic hatred,Rwandan NGOs as a body — along with everyother institution in the country, including theChurches — completely failed to provide anymoral leadership or counterforce to the violence,prior to or during the genocide. Following theepic exodus of refugees into neighbouringcountries, a situation arose where the staff ofRwandan NGOs who had ended up on theZaïrean side of the border fought for legitimacy— and control of their organisations’ resources— with other (often more junior) staff whoremained inside the country. The NGO staff inexile were regarded by many as apologists forthe perpetrators of genocide and inadmissible as‘partners’, while, on the other hand, some inter-national organi sations made the egreg iousmistake of employing known killers.



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A critical assessment of the performance ofaid agencies and NGOs is necessary, especiallyin light of some of the more shameful spectacleswitnessed during the Rwanda crisis. However, tofocus primarily on the ‘humanitarians’ is, in myopinion, to pick the wrong target. It isn’t thefirefighters who should be receiving most of theattention, but those who allowed the fire toignite, or, worse, fanned the flames.

The relief–development‘continuum’

It has become very obvious to those working insituations of conflict, though not always todonor agencies, that conflicts do not follow alinear pattern: from crisis through rehabilitationand back to ‘normal’ . Conflicts fluctuate inintensity or may become chronic: aid agenciesand donors need, therefore, to think more interms of permanent emergency. In manysituations (as in Liberia), perpetuating war ishow the fighters and their entourage sustainthemselves; it is not in their interests to win. Itbecomes increasingly implausible to seeemergencies as temporary interruptions to asmooth process of linear development. Morepositively, it is crucial to recognise that develop-ment can take place, and sometimes be pre-cipitated, in the midst of crisis.

However, even agencies who recognise theinappropriateness of regarding ‘relief ’ and‘development’ as separate phenomena perpet-uate this false dichotomy, through resourcinglong-term and emergency programmes indifferent ways and having them managed bydifferent departments and staff. This often leadsto unhelpful tensions and rivalry. Linked withthis is a widespread rejection of ‘ develop-mentalism’. Given the evident failure of develop-ment programmes to real ise the aim ofconvergence, i.e. an ideal world where everyoneis on the same material level, the cry goes up that‘development is dead’. This is equated in somequarters with rejection of everything that long-term programmes have ever aimed to do. In myview, this is a false argument. Recognition of theneed to reassert the ‘redistributive function of

aid’ does not in any way imply that we shoulddisregard the value of long-term process work.

The legacy of the past: can lessons be learned?

The case of Burundi is being handled ratherdifferently by the international community,thanks to greater awareness of the dangerousnature of the situation. No-one wants ‘anotherRwanda’, and some investment in preempting ithas been made by the UN and EU, as well as bywhat Jenny Pearce calls the ‘peaceologists’ —through, for instance, facilitating visits to SouthAfrica by Burundian politicians. Journalistshave tended to blow hot and cold on Burundi:they are waiting for the country to explode, and ithasn’t — or so they seem to think. Only thehandful of those who covered Burundi before1994 retain any interest.

However, the current concern over Burundi inimportant and influential circles hardlyconstitutes conflict-prevention: the explosionhas already happened, but few internationalactors took any notice at the time. It was back inOctober 1993 that Burundi’s first democraticallyelected leader President Ndadaye was assas-sinated by the army, after barely four months inpower. Many saw in this the end of hopes forpeace in the region. Up to 100,000 Burundians,both Hutu and Tutsi, are believed to have died inthe violence that followed, and 700,000 refugeesf led into Tanzania, Zaïre, and Rwanda.Humanitarian agencies, already struggling torespond to the needs of people displaced by civilconf lict in Rwanda and Kivu, opened upoperations on yet another front. Meanwhile,intransigents in the Rwandan political estab-lishment used the crisis to justify further retreatfrom the peace accords signed with the RPF afew months before: after all, how could anyonetrust the Tutsis now?

Yet the international community scarcelyblinked, despite the elections having been hailedas a ‘model of democratisation’ for Africa —which they were not. The elections were toorushed, and they were not preceded, or followed,by anything like the kind of process South Africa

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has been through. President Ndadaye was noNelson Mandela, but he was nevertheless asincere moderate. When an earlier coup attemptfailed, it seemed as if accommodation couldwork. The assassination brought a crushingsense of betrayal, a destruction of hope not onlyfor Burundians but for all those working towardsnon-violent resolution of conflict in the region.

The impact of events in Burundi on theRwanda peace process was significant. Theformer régime could argue that Tutsis were notto be trusted, while the feebleness of theinternational community’s response served toreinforce the ‘ culture of impunity’ in bothRwanda and Burundi — where, for decades,massacres and atrocities have gone unacknow-ledged with no-one held to account, thusbeginning the next cycle of violence. As a result,the International Tribunal investigating theRwandan genocide commands little respect: theinternational community failed to prevent thegenocide but is now, it seems, setting itself up totry the perpetrators. Is this mere hypocrisy? Inmy view, while the UN is flawed, it remains thebest mechanism we have. But it requires thewhole-hearted commitment of its memberStates: the Tribunal has been further hamperedby delays in setting it up, difficulty in obtainingfunding and, more recently, accusations ofmismanagement.

In any event, the Tribunal cannot deal withevery case, but only the main architects of thegenocide. Of these, only six suspects have beendetained so far, and none has yet been prose-cuted. Meanwhile, the new Rwandan admini-stration is attempting to bring to justice the hugenumber of minor players, as well as some of themore significant actors. Some 100,000Rwandans suspected of having participated inthe genocide are being held in prisons with thecapacity for barely one quarter as many, andthousands have already died of disease. TheRwandan judicial system was effectivelydestroyed in the genocide, but appeal s forinternational assistance to rebuild it are beingmet only after considerable delay. The enormityof the task of dealing with so many suspects,while simultaneously trying to rebuild the entiresystem, presents the relatively inexperienced

new administration with an unprecedentedchallenge.

Ironically, while the death sentence is ruledout for those being tried by the internationalTribunal, it is admissible under Rwandan law —so that those who masterminded the genocideare likely to receive lighter punishment thanlesser suspects. Nevertheless, however unsatis-factory this dual process, until there has beensome form of public recognition of whathappened, and punishment for those principallyresponsible, there can be no ‘reconciliation’ ineither country.

Ethnicity, poverty, and politicalpower-games

In both Rwanda and Burundi, ethnic division haslong been fostered by the ‘culture of impunity’referred to above, along with the politics of‘winner-takes-all’ . With the formation of atransitional government in Rwanda in early1992, and in anticipation of negotiations withthe RPF, political activity intensified. A patternbegan to emerge in which, whenever negotia-tions with the RPF became particularly strainedor delicate, ‘spontaneous’ inter-ethnic violencewould suddenly break out somewhere in thecountry.

The killings in north-west Rwanda whichprovoked the RPF advance early in 1993 eruptedwithin hours of the departure of an internationalcommission investigating abuses of humanrights. The commission’s report providedevidence that government authorities wereinvolved in the systematic killings of Tutsi andpolitical opponents ; their findings weresupported by the UN Special Rapporteur onextrajudicial executions, who visited the countrya few months later. However, neither the UNhuman-rights bodies nor the donor countrieswith most influence on the Rwandan govern-ment responded to these reports in anymeaningful way.

Scarcely had the renewed fighting in Rwandaabated when conflict erupted in the North Kivuprovince of neighbouring Zaïre, chiefly betweenthe Hunde people and the Banyarwanda: ethnic



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Rwandans who are a mixture of refugees ,economic migrants , descendants of peopleresettled by the Belgian colonialists, and thosewho affirm that their ancestors have always livedin Kivu and that only colonial manipulation ofnational boundaries has separated them fromtheir fel low countrymen. Around 250,000people were displaced and up to 10,000 killedduring the violence, in which hundreds ofvillages were burned down, one after the other,in tit-for-tat sabotage attacks. At issue was theentitlement of the Banyarwanda to Zaïreancitizenship, strongly contested by the Hunde,who dominate the traditional authority struc-tures but are outnumbered by the Banyarwandain many areas of the province.

A few months later, a peace agreement wassigned in Arusha between the government ofRwanda and the RPF, after which it was hopedthat there would be relative stability. The agree-ment was a compromise, ungraciously reached,but a start. However, it rapidly became clear thatat least one of the signatories (President Habya-rimana) had no intention of implementing theaccords. Every conceivable pretext was used todelay the installation of a new, broad-based trans-itional government, which had been expanded toinclude the RPF. One reason adduced was thefailure of UNAMIR (the UN force tasked withoverseeing implementation of the accords) to mater-ialise within 35 days of the agreement beingsigned, which everyone knew to be impossible. (UNtroops eventually began to arrive in November 1993.)

In January 1994, General Roméo Dallaire,the Canadian commander of UNAMIR, faxedthe UN Security Council with detailed evidenceof preparations for the large-scale, organisedmassacre of Tutsis. Although the fax was seen bysenior UN officials , it was not circulated tomembers of the Security Council. Later, herequested permission to search for arms caches(which was beyond the existing mandate of theUN force) and appealed for reinforcements tobring UNAMIR up to its agreed strength. Itappears that UN officials judged these requestsso unlikely to succeed that they omitted toconvey them to the Security Council.

The following month, there was what withhindsight could be seen as a ‘dress rehearsal’ for

the massacres to come: politicians from two rivalparties were murdered amid mutual accusations,and hundreds of Tutsi were killed in revengeattacks in Kigali. The killings ceased after barely48 hours — an indication that they were far fromspontaneous, and that the violence could beswitched on and off at will by those in control. Iwas away at this time, and returned to Kigali atthe end of February feeling sick with appre-hension. Before doing so, I had told seniormanagers in Oxfam that the war was certain tostart again soon and that the consequences wouldbe very serious. I did not imagine what wouldprecipitate the resumption of fighting betweenthe two armies, nor how monstrous this would be.

Nevertheless, it is critical to counter the con-ventional notions of ‘tribal fighting’ so prevalentin the initial reporting of the Rwanda crisis. Toexplain away the genocide in terms of atavistic,irrational hatreds — typical of conflict on the‘dark continent’ of Africa — is to avoid lookingat some of the root causes, to distance ourselvesfrom the conflict, and to justify our impotence inthe face of it. At the same time, it is now clearthat, whether or not it was truly so before,‘ethnicity’ has become a key factor. Howeverspecious the arguments on which it is based,playing the ethnic card has succeeded: the realityis that divisions between Hutu and Tutsi havenow been dug deeper, and wounds have beeninflicted which will take decades to heal.

‘Ethnic conflict’ remains, however, a pro-foundly inadequate description of whathappened in Rwanda in 1994. Regional, econ-omic, and party-political divisions were also part ofthe dynamic.And there does not in any case seemto be agreement on what exactly is meant by ‘ethni-city’. Is ‘ethnic group’ just another word for‘tribe’,but one which is deemed more politically correct?

In fact, many anthropologists contest thenotion that Hutu and Tutsi can be considereddistinct groups. They share a common languageand traditions; there has never been segregationof territory between them (though the north-west region is Hutu-dominated); and they haveinter-married for centuries. The distinction, it isargued, is more one of class or caste, but hasbeen fossilised largely as a result of colonialinfluence. Moreover, unlike many African

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countries where the re-drawing of nationalboundaries by the European colonial powersbrought together very disparate groups withinthe same nation-State (such as Sudan), Rwandais no such artificial creation.

On the other hand, according to a widelyaccepted version of history, what is nowRwandan territory was originally inhabited bypygmoid, forest-dwelling hunter-gatherersknown as the Twa, who now form a minuteproportion of the population. Between the tenthand fifteenth centuries, the Twa were increas-ingly displaced by Bantu-speaking peoplesmigrating northwards; these were predomin-antly agriculturalists, supposedly the ancestorsof the Hutu. The Tutsi, by contrast, are said tohave originated in the Horn of Africa: a Niloticpeople, tall and fine-featured, who migratedsouth with their large cattle herds, from thefifteenth century onwards. Through a mixture ofconquest and control of access to land and cattle-wealth, they gradually achieved dominance overthe other two groups.

Whichever theory you pick, it is clear that bythe late nineteenth century the Tutsi were at thetop of the social hierarchy, with Hutu and Twa atthe bottom, though there was considerablemobility between Hutu and Tutsi at middle-ranking levels.

Both the Germans, who control led theterritory as part of German East Africa beforethe First World War, and the Belgians, who weresubsequently mandated to administer it (first bythe League of Nations, then by the UN), electedto govern indirectly through the indigenous(Tutsi) monarchy. This was partly because of theso-called Hamitic thesis, according to which‘everything of value in Africa had been intro-duced by the Hamites, supposedly a branch ofthe Caucasian race’ (Sanders 1969). In Rwanda,it was the Tutsi who were identified with theHamites, and with whom the colonialists felt agreater sense of affinity. As ‘natural leaders’ ,they were given favoured access to education,and a virtual monopoly of political and admini-strative power. When the Belgians introducedidenti ty cards in 1933 , all Rwandans wereclassified according to how many cattle theyhad: if you owned more than ten cows, you were

counted as Tutsi; with fewer than ten cows, youmust be Hutu; and if you were a mere potter, youwere Twa. Thereafter, it was the father’s ethnicgroup that determined his children’s groupidentity: the stratification was complete andirreversible. Thus, a complex web of socio-eco-nomic relations and mutual obligations wastransformed into something far more rigid anddivisive.

By the late 1980s, however, many Rwandansasserted that ethnic divisions were a thing of thepast; after nearly 30 years of Independence, theuse of ethnic quotas in government appoint-ments and the allocation of secondary-schoolplaces had ensured that unfair historicaladvantages were overcome and the mentionethnique might as well be abolished. Far morecontentious was evidence of discrimination infavour of those from the President’s home area(particularly in the allocation of secondary-school places, which were universally regardedas the passport to escape from poverty). However,with the outbreak of the civil war in 1990, ethnicdivisions were once again sharpened. Ethnicitywas used as a tool to foster mistrust of the min-ority, and to conceal divisions within the majority— in order that a tiny élite might retain its powerand privileges. When the interahamwe road-barriers went up in April 1994, the very identitycards which the liberals had fondly imagined tobe an anachronism served to facilitate the task ofgenocide, enabling the killers to determine whocould live and who must die.

Do we share a common humanity?

I recently heard two women from NorthernIreland, one Protestant, one Catholic , speakabout the vital contribution of communitygroups to the peace process there. Not for thefirst time, I was struck by the many parallels withRwanda and Burundi: there, too, the cycle ofviolence has obscured a history of injustice inthe control of economic resources and politicalpower, and ensured that successive generationson both sides of the sectarian divide have reasonto be imbued with hatred for the ‘other’ group. Itis also noteworthy that, in both cases, the



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perpetrators of violence (though not theplanners) have often been disaffected, poorlyeducated young men with little hope of a betterfuture.

In 1995, Europe celebrated the fiftiethanniversary of the end of the Second World War,and re-examined the dreadful history of theholocaust. In countless radio and televisionbroadcasts, those involved — combatants andnon-combatants alike — recalled their exper-iences and reflected on how they now regardtheir former enemies. For many, despite the factthat the warring parties have become politicaland economic allies, it is still impossible toforgive; their distress and bitterness is as acutetoday as it was 50 years ago. Rwanda cannoteven expect the palliative of an ‘ economicmiracle’ , yet some in the international com-munity appear to expect the Rwandese alreadyto ‘forgive and forget’, to resume cohabitation asif nothing had happened — and allow them toturn their attention elsewhere.

If we accept a shared humanity, then we mustalso accept greater responsibility for the conse-quences of poverty and injustice. In the case ofBurundi and Rwanda, for instance, internationalresponsibility should not have been confined topicking up the pieces afterwards, but shouldhave ensured a more effective response to thepoverty afflicting those two countries before.There is a need to reassert notions of collectiveresponsibility in the world community, whatMark Duffield (1994) calls ‘a new politicalconsensus {which would} re-establish a sense ofcollective international responsibil ity forpoverty and violence ... Never before has there beensuch a need for sustained public action and anunflinching support for international mandates.’

However, the fact is that the notion ofeventual convergence between Northern andSouthern economies has been quietly aban-doned. Even within strong Northern economies,there is now a tacit acceptance of increasingpolarisation and disparity between rich and poor.The economist Will Hutton (1995) has written ofthe ‘30/30/40’ society in Britain: 40 per cent ofthe population are in prosperous , secureemployment and are pulling away from the rest;30 per cent are in insecure, often low-paid

employment; while the bottom 30 per cent areeither unemployed or working for poverty wages.To project economic decline and the risk of socialchaos on to the South, without recognising what isgoing on within the North, is therefore mistaken.

The serious media have begun to look morecritically at the rôle of NGOs, particularly incomplex emergencies such as the Rwanda crisis.It is right that NGOs’ performance be scrutinisedmore closely, and that they be challenged to facewith greater openness the dilemmas posed byhumanitarian work. The honeymoon period forNGOs is over at last, and that is healthy. However, Iwould argue that the focus is wrong: NGOs, andthe UN’s humanitarian agencies, have gained suchprominence only because of the effective disengage-ment by powerful governments from parts of theworld which no longer interest them. Equalattention should be paid to what the academic FredHalliday has called the ‘retreat from universalism’,2

and to the effects of the new international economicorder in terms of the enormous and growingdisparity in standards of living between andwithin North and South: poverty, in other words.

Similarly, legitimate criticism of the perform-ance of UN agencies, and cynicism regarding theeffectiveness of the UN generally could easilyslide into a retreat from commitment to inter-national moral and legal obligations, and dimini-shed respect for the principles on which the UNwas founded. Wealthy governments are far moreready to contribute to emergency relief than tolong-term measures to promote post-conflictrecovery, still less comprehensive programmesaimed at combating the poverty and inequalitywhich do so much to fuel conflict. If only theenormous sums expended on the Rwandan refugeecrisis had been invested earlier to help to createthe conditions for peace and stability in Rwanda,and to ensure viable livelihoods for more of itscitizens, it is just possible that the genocidewould not have happened.

Reconciliation: justice and acknowledgement

There can be little hope of reconciliation inRwanda without justice; however, as discussed

Anne Mackintosh


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above, there is no simple means of achievingthis. Many look to South Africa, with its Truthand Reconciliation Commission, to provide amodel which might be applied in Rwanda andBurundi. But there are significant differencesbetween these countries . In Rwanda, forexample, there was a complete takeover by oneside in the battle, with no political settlement, nocritical mass of political awareness among thegeneral population, nor the will to move forwardtogether in peace. The current government iscriticised for being drawn almost exclusivelyfrom the ranks of the victors in the civil war —but most of the moderate opponents of theformer genocidal regime were also killed.

Moreover, one cannot look at the peace-making process in isolation from other factors.Rwanda has very few resources and little poten-tial for development. The desperate shortage ofland remains a problem, along with an increas-ingly youthful population with little prospect ofserious employment or other means of earning aliving. Attempts to apply a regional approach todeveloping the various national economies areundermined by recurrent conflict. Both Rwandaand Burundi were on a knife-edge before thefighting began: it is hard now to see how theycould return even to that precarious position.

At the human level, how does a society dealwith so many killings and so many killers — inparticular, the ‘victim-killers’ , those who wereindoctrinated, and those who faced the choicebetween killing or being killed? How does asociety respond to the thousands of bereaved,mutilated, and disabled people, and victims ofrape? Traditional community-support mechanismshave been completely swamped by the scale andnature of the bereavement. Moreover, many ofthose to whom it would have been normal to turnfor support — teachers, church leaders, localadministrators, members of the extended family— themselves participated in the genocide. Aspeople look through their photograph albums,they point to the individuals whose faces appear,and recount: ‘He’s dead, she’s dead, these twodisappeared, this one was killed’.

Many of the killers stayed in Rwandathroughout the crisis; many more re-entered thecountry in the massive wave of returning

refugees late last year. The fact that killers andvictims are mixing in the same society meansthat redress and reconciliation must happen atmany different levels. In addition to the mainorchestrators of the genocide, and those at theforefront of the killing, there are those who werecomplicit, others who tacitly consented toparticipate, those who feared they would bekilled if they did not, and those who stood by.And there are those who feel that because amember of their family killed, they too are guiltyby association. NGOs and the churches werecompletely divided by the crisis, and are in noposition to provide leadership in any reconcil-iation process until they have honestly examinedtheir own role in the genocide.

‘Reconciliation’ in Rwanda has been used tomean many, quite different, things: the return ofthe refugees, peaceful cohabitation betweenkillers and survivors , publ ic naming andpunishment of the main offenders, forgiving andforgetting, atonement. Within the internationalcommunity, it too often appears to signify‘getting back to normal’ — and ceasing to be adrain on its political and financial resources. Asa team, we in Oxfam came to regard ‘reconcil-iation’ as a dirty word and agreed not to use it.

The key issue is that of acknowledgement. Inthe words of a friend and colleague who lost 31members of her family in the genocide, ‘ I’mready to forgive, but no-one has said they’resorry’. In an attempt to honour those killed in1994, there have been ceremonies of remem-brance and symbolic re-burials of some of thosewhose bodies had simply been dumped in pitlatrines and ditches, or left in the schools, healthcentres, and churches in which they soughtrefuge. However, many feel that the failure todeal with the thousands of detainees, along withabuses by the present government and its allies,amount to a dishonouring of the dead.

Survivors also have to contend with the poison-ous process of denial. Many of the refugees aresimply not prepared to accept that genocide tookplace: they claim that those who died were thevictims of war. In addition, they point to abusescommitted by the present government and thoseassociated with them, notably the alliance whichrecently brought Laurent Kabila to power in the



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Democratic Republic of Congo (formerlyZaïre). There is little doubt that many refugeeshave suffered greatly, thousands have died inappalling conditions, and it is feared that manyothers have been killed. As I write, a team of UNhuman-rights and forensic experts is attemptingto investigate the fate of around 200,000 refugees‘missing’ in the DRC, and is, it would seem,being hindered by the new régime at every turn.

International observers have also equated theatrocities of 1994 with the abuses perpetrated bythe present government and its allies. Indeed, theformer UN Secretary-General referred to therefusal by Laurent Kabila’s forces to allowaccess to civilians trapped between the warringparties as ‘genocide by hunger’ , while othersspoke of a ‘ hidden holocaust’ . But abusescommitted in the wake of the genocide must notbe allowed to obscure the enormity of whathappened during it. Memories are already be-coming blurred; if they are allowed to disappear,and Rwanda fades into the background oncemore, we will all be diminished.

References

Joint Evaluation of Emergency Assistance toRwanda (1996) The International Response toConflict and Genocide: Lessons from Rwanda,Volume 2, Copenhagen: Joint Evaluation.Duffield, Mark (1994) ‘Complex emergenciesand the crisis of devel opmental ism’ , IDSBulletin Vol. 25, No. 4.Fédération Inter nationale des Droits del’Homme et al (1993), Report of the InternationalCommission of Investigation of Human RightsViolations in Rwanda since October 1 1990,Paris and Washington, March 1993.

Hutton, Will (1995) The State We’re In,London: Jonathan Cape.Kaplan, Rober t D. (1994) ‘ The cominganarchy’, Atlantic Monthly March 1994.Mackintosh, Anne (1996) ‘International aidand the media’ , Contemporary Politics Vol. 2,No. 1, South Bank University, Spring 1996.Sanders, E. R. (1969) ‘The Hamitic hypothesis:its origin and function in time perspective’ ,Journal of African History, pp. 521–32.Waller, David (1993, revised 1997), Rwanda:Which Way Now?, Oxford: Oxfam UK and Ireland.Wiles, Peter (1992) ‘Rwandese Refugees andMigrants in the Great Lakes Region of CentralAfrica’, unpublished report, Oxford: Oxfam UKand Ireland, December 1992.

Notes

1 Parts of this paper appear in an earlier article(Mackintosh 1996), in which I focus in moredetail on my personal experience of the genocideand the media’s role in reporting on Rwanda.

2 Speaking in the World Tonight debate onconflict in the twenty-first century, BBC Radio4, 17 March 1997.

The author

Anne Mackintosh began working on Oxfam’sCentral Africa Desk in 1985, and was Oxfam’sRegional Representative for Rwanda, Burundiand Kivu (Zaïre) from 1991 to 1994. In 1995 shewas awarded an MBE for humanitarian work inRwanda. She can be contacted at 59 MaidcroftRoad, Oxford OX4 3EW, UK. Fax: +44 (01865)437019.

Anne Mackintosh


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rwanda: beyond ethnic conflict

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