A History of Rwandan Identity and Trauma by Fegley Randall;

Author:Fegley, Randall;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: undefined
Publisher: Lexington Books
Published: 2012-08-15T00:00:00+00:00

Fueling fears on all sides is the continuing struggle to grapple with the inhumanity of the genocide and the need to build a new Rwandan identity. After the RPF’s victory in July 1994, the teaching of Rwandan history in schools was halted for a decade and a half, while educators, academics, and officials wrestled to develop a new narrative of the country’s past. Meanwhile the attitudes of both the government and its opponents hardened. Increasingly the genocide is now portrayed as “a Tutsi genocide,” despite a December 1994 UN declaration that officially described the victims as both Tutsis and moderate Hutus.[66] When presidential candidate Victoire Ingabire asked for recognition of Hutu losses on official memorials in 2010, she and her American lawyer were detained for propagating ethnic hatred and were bitterly criticized in the local media.[67] She has since been sentenced to fifteen years in prison. That same year foreign observers in Rwanda noticed that the original inscriptions, on signs and in stone, at genocide memorials had been covered by banners declaring a purely Tutsi genocide.[68] At many of these sites, local docents had been replaced by activists touting an uncompromisingly official view. These observers also noted damage to sites that had previously been reconstructed. Clearly, people were not as willing to express themselves openly about the past or present. Any mention of Hutu and Tutsi identities and differences, apart from the term “Tutsi Genocide,” was no longer allowed in public. Even the Twa have been obliged to rename themselves “potters.” Long disconnected from the forests where they hid from past conflicts and killed by both sides in the civil war and genocide, they were believed to account for only about 0.4 percent of the population in 2010. Generations of sexual violence and consensual unions, but seldom marriage, with other groups have obscured their pygmy origins.[69]

Tutsi and Hutu identities are real, even if the often nervous government frowns on their very mention. A “them-and-us” mentality is deeply rooted. Everyone, especially older Rwandans, knows “what” their co-workers and neighbors are.[70] Teaching history did not stop in 1994; it simply became the domain of parents and peers, whose narratives have often exacerbated differences. Others have opted to ignore the past. Developing the notion of “chosen amnesia,” deliberate loss of memory, Buckley-Zistel notes that many Rwandans seem to be “pretending peace.”[71] This denial of the unfathomable seems a natural human reaction. But in Rwanda, it appears on a national scale.

The direction of Rwanda’s language policies has also played a major role in building tensions. From 1994 until 2009, education was offered in either French or English. The government’s policy of dropping French and promoting English as the only language of instruction in secondary and higher education has been very controversial with French-speakers. Part of the rationale behind this change is the country’s increasing ties with the East African Community and Commonwealth of Nations.[72] Undoubtedly, another factor is the RPF’s desire to distance itself from France, a country that actively supported the genocidal regime.

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