President of Rwanda, Paul Kagame – An All Achiever

What happened in 1994, of course, was on the scale that no one imagined, but we had had a history of killings in Rwanda since 1959. In fact, during that period we became refugees. There were many killings between 1959 and 1961. So many killings had been taking place, and that’s how people ran to different parts of the region. They were running away from these political killings. But throughout the years, up to the time we started the armed struggle in 1990, there had been oppression. There had been killings of people, targeted people. All along, a section of our population was the target from the ‘60s up to that moment, but the scale of this one was more than anyone could imagine. But during the fighting — during 1990 to ‘94 — what was happening — in ‘91, ‘92, ‘93, there were always indications that something like what happened in many years before could easily happen. Because the government was so much whipping up sentiments — ethnic sentiments — and saying, “These people are returning. They are the same people who survived the killings of the ‘60s…” and so on. “After all, these are foreigners. They shouldn’t be around to go back to home, you know. They should stay where they are. The country’s very small. It’s only for another section of the oppression of Rwanda, not for these ones who are foreigners,” and you could see they were building up these — and, in fact, they started arresting people. They started killing them in different parts of the country, those who had stayed in the country who were never refugees but who were identified as this group that they should exterminate.

Paul Kagame: It was ‘61, then ‘66, many killings. Then ‘73, so many killings. In fact, they had — some of my sisters had stayed. I have four sisters, and I had a brother who died in the struggle in Uganda. But two of my sisters had stayed in the country with relatives. They didn’t flee with us. They stayed with those who stayed.  But in 1973, they actually ran away this time, and they became refugees because they almost killed them.  So you can see, there were killings in ‘61, there were killings in ‘73, and then there were killings at this time. And as I mentioned to you — so unless one could really say, “If the war had not started, if we hadn’t waged an armed struggle, probably that would not have happened.” But that would only be leaving it to saying, “No, they could kill like they killed in ‘61. They could kill as they killed in ‘73. So let those killings of a certain low number — a small number — continue, and so continue with the people having no right to their country. Maybe this is the best way to manage it.” So if we hadn’t waged an armed struggle, maybe these things wouldn’t have happened.

Paul Kagame: I have come to settle to the idea and understanding that problems of any country, or later on — I mean if we start with mine, my country, and my country’s problems, they will never be settled by people from outside. Never. I haven’t known of any country where problems of this kind are resolved from outside, rather than people themselves from inside. I don’t know of an example, so the outside having not helped, well, we can spend a lot of time blaming people or others, but we are not expected to do it anyway from experience. That’s what I know. That won’t be solved.

Paul Kagame: I’ve found some logic that helps me to not spend so much time blaming people —other people — for the genocide, much as even the origin of it was contributed from outside. It has a history. You can trace it from outside, but it wouldn’t work unless conditions inside of the country allowed it to take the shape it did.  So in other words, we are to blame, too, we Rwandans. And in the end, whoever — when it came from outside, maybe people from outside were very clever to start something and let us be the ones to carry it out. And it would be outside, as innocent people who would come to rescue us, when they’re the ones who actually started it. You see my point? So if we hadn’t really taken on this kind of politics that divides our society that later on ended in a genocide, we ourselves, if we hadn’t — meaning the Rwandans who were in power from independence up to the time this happened — for us, the blame — if one may call it so, meaning from outside, we, the refugees — is that we fought a war to better our country, to better ourselves. Maybe somebody comes along and says, “You shouldn’t have done that.” But my question would be, “What did you want me to do?” Well, if somebody goes, “Oh no, you should have stayed as Ugandan and become Ugandan.” Yeah, but there’s somebody somewhere else.

Paul Kagame: I was more than happy to get involved from the beginning.  And by the way, we agreed, risking my own life — like many other people risked and even lost their lives — this was something much bigger than just feeling comfortable in Uganda, where I was, or somebody else, wherever they were, and saying, “No, no, no. This has gone on for too long. We are stateless. We are refugees.” We couldn’t just allow ourselves to live at the mercy of people, where we were refugees, or where somebody could decide what happens to us and what should not happen to us. No, this was something that any of us was happy to have stood up and fought against.

Paul Kagame: Very happy, very proud, apart from the loss of many lives, which can never be corrected, or we can’t do much about it. It’s probably the most expensive part of the struggle. But to have won the war and won the peace for ourselves, because if you look at those years of the war, of the genocide, and they are brought to an end, and then we started building and rebuilding and a sense of reconciliation, a sense of allowing Rwandans to live together as a nation. And now a proud people of Rwanda, and socially made progress politically, significant progress, economically the same. I think we could not have asked for more.

Paul Kagame: It will never be one single thing. It’s normally going to be a combination of things, but it builds around a determination, a single-mindedness of all of us coming together and saying we need to change the course of history and politics in our country, and we are one nation. We are different. We will be different, but we can use this difference to build rather than destroy what belongs to all of us. So that organization, that coming together, that vision, and deciding that this is what we deserve is really — so for that, you need to have vision, leadership, and organization, organization which brings in people to be part of that vision and to feel they own it.

Paul Kagame: It’s painful. It’s very hard even to explain. In fact, I remember, on one occasion we were commemorating the genocide. Every year we do it.  Every 7th of April of every year we do that. We remember our people. And I remember there was a story. Indeed, the survivors and others were agitated, and rightly so, and were saying, you know, it’s like the story of the cost of reconciliation is only carried by them. Meaning they are the ones who lost people, and they are the ones who suffered, but they are always asked to do something so that the reconciliation process succeeds. And they had to engage them at various levels, and had a discussion with them and had even to make a public speech on that day, telling people that, first of all, we hear them. We are part of them. This is not that we are dealing with a foreign situation or a foreign idea or anything. It’s us. They and us are the same. There’s no distinction. And that the reason, the fear — or anybody would see that they are the ones carrying the burden — is to be explained only by one, and I put it to them, I said, “Yes, I can come to you and look you in the eyes and ask you to forgive and not forget, and I am with you on that. But it’s only you that I can ask that, and it’s only you that can be asked to do something about this story of Rwanda.” Because I can’t go to the perpetrators and ask them anything. There is nothing to ask from them. I can’t go to these ones who killed, who are in prison or who are wherever they are, and say, “Please forgive us, and next time don’t behave like this.”  No. I said, “There’s nothing to ask from these people. They are condemned. They killed, carried out a genocide of other people. We just have to decide what to do about that.”  We don’t even have to ask their consent because they have condemned themselves to being in a situation where forgiveness — they should be forgiven or they should be tried. “So there’s nothing to ask of these people, but there’s a lot to ask from you.”  And this conversation helped people to understand and say, “Oh, this is why we carry the burden.”  And I said, “You — we — lost people. Your people, our people. I lost many relatives in the genocide. So when I’m saying this, I’m with you. I’m one of you. But we need to live beyond this tragic story. We don’t need any more, and the only way is to ask you — is to ask ourselves — to forgive but not forget.” Yes.

Paul Kagame: We pushed that from the beginning, to have women be in their rightful place, and that — from the beginning, even in our conversations with different people, leaders of our country at different levels, I have always emphasized that this is not doing them a favor. We are not doing women any favors. It’s their right. We are only allowing them to have their rights. In fact, even in a joke, I say, “If these women were like me, growing up and having to take up arms to fight for my right, maybe these women should take up arms and really fight those who are denying them their rights.” But the situation is such that we can handle it differently. There’s no need for there to be fights. Generally, women are 52 percent of our population. Right? And from what I said, that being their right, I think if you give 52 percent of our population their right, that’s sort of the big thing. That’s huge, but now in Parliament — 64 percent — so I’m just saying, even if things just remain the same — that these are just rights being realized — you’re already gaining. But now, 52 percent of the population empowered and being part of whatever is happening in the country, you gain socially, you gain economically, you gain in all ways. Now when we have them in Parliament, 64 percent, and Parliament making laws and so on, they are already helping this transformation.