10. A DILEMMA WITH MANY HORNS

KIGALI, 9 FEBRUARY

Our century has endured four large-scale genocides: the Turks against the Armenians in 1915, the Nazis and their allies against the Jews, the Suharto regime against the people of East Timor and the Hutu extremists against the Tutsi. In 1948 the UN General Assembly approved the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. According to Article I: ‘The Contracting Parties confirm that genocide, whether committed in time of peace or in time of war, is a crime under international law which they undertake to prevent and to punish.’ This explains why the US government and the UN at first refused to recognise as genocide what was going on here; had they done so they would have been obliged to intervene. Instead, the ‘international community’ drove its humanitarian machine onto the scene after the event – with a shameless fanfare of publicity trumpets.

The UN’s military failure in Rwanda has had a sequel in the failure, to date, of its judicial intervention, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, established on 8 November 1994 by Security Council Resolution 955 and based in Arusha, Tanzania, The ICTR’s mandate confines it to judging events (physical acts) which took place in Rwanda during ’94 and prevents it from investigating either the extensive, long-term preparations and propaganda campaigns which preceded the massacres or the collusion with génocidaires which took place r outside Rwanda after ’94. These restrictions infuriate the Rwandan government (and others) because their genesis is so obvious. They serve to protect from the ICTR spotlight both the French government’s collaboration with the génocidaires and the Security Council’s lethal passivity. Among those who thirst for justice to be seen to be done, the ICTR arouses both derision and anger. In June ’95 its six judges were appointed for a four-year term, its budget for ’96 was US$36 million – yet so far it has indicted only twenty-one people, thirteen of whom are in detention while the others remain at liberty. It complains of being understaffed, having scant resources (!) and being ‘unsuitably based’ because Arusha has ‘poor communications and complicated logistics’. A recent report on the ICTR by the UN Office of Internal Oversight Services (mark the UN’s bureaucratic fecundity) described it as ‘slow and ineffective’ – a laughable understatement. Even by UN standards, its gross incompetence and reeking corruption are breath-taking. Galvanized by this report, Kofi Annan, the Secretary-General, sacked two senior officials, Mr Honore Rakotomanana, Deputy Prosecutor, and Mr Andronico Adede, Registrar. In September ’96 the outgoing Prosecutor, Judge Richard Goldstone of South Africa, remarked that ‘bureaucratic tussles’ were among its main problems as recruitment had to be carried out through the UN. Also, ‘sufficiently qualified staff’ were in general unwilling to work either in Arusha or in Kigali, where the Prosecutor has his main office.

Rwanda’s gaols and detention centres by now hold some 95,000 and daily the numbers increase as ‘accused’ returnees are arrested. On 30 August ’96 the Organic Law was promulgated in Kigali to deal with crimes committed between 1 October 1990 and 31 December 1994. It divides those accused of genocide and crimes against humanity into four categories:

1. The national organizers and those found guilty of ‘incitement to hatred’.

2. The local leaders, who arranged the distribution of weapons and grenades and transported the killer squads around the hills,

3. Those who killed under duress, or caused serious physical injury.

4. Those who looted, destroyed property, stole cattle - but did not kill.

Recently, the crimes of rape and sexual torture have been moved from (3) to (1) in response to pressure from women’s groups.

This categorizing represents a frantic effort to deal fairly with an evil minority (the genocidal leaders) and an abused majority (their credulous followers). Given approximately 800,000 victims, a figure not disputed, it has been estimated that there must be at least 80,000 killers, assuming ten murders each to be a reasonable average and including the few maverick Tutsi whose ferocity has become legendary, so keen were they to flaunt their loyalty to the MRND. (The relevance of this macabre estimate escapes me – and how does one arrive at ‘a reasonable average’ in such a ghastly context?) However, whether the killers number 60,000 or 100,000, they are too many to be dealt with in the normal way as ‘murderers’. The abnormality of genocide extends beyond the deeds to judicial procedures and punishments. Another of the ICTR’s perceived flaws is its inability to hand down death sentences. Of those awaiting trial here in Rwanda, 2000 or so are in Category 1 for whom the death sentence will be mandatory if they are found guilty.

Today I was shown an Amnesty International ‘URGENT ACTION!’ circular, dated 3 January ’97, requesting Amnesty supporters to ‘express deep concern about the sentencing to death of Deogratias Bizimana (a nurse) and Egide Gatanazi (a commune official) after an unfair trial in the Kibungo High Court which lasted only about four hours on 27 December ’96.’ The circular continued:

The defendants had no access to legal council either before or during their trial. They were not given adequate time to prepare their defence. They were not allowed to summon witnesses for their defence or to cross-examine prosecution witnesses. It has been reported they were booed and prosecutors applauded during the trial, without any intervention by the presiding judge … Most of Rwanda’s judicial officials, including prosecutors and judges, have received only up to four months training. The impartiality and independence of many of the judicial officials is questionable, following statements by some judicial and government officials that defendants should not request legal counsel … There are only sixteen defence lawyers currently practising in Rwanda … Please appeal to the authorities to take all measures necessary to ensure that all trials taking place in Rwanda conform to international standards of fairness as required by international human rights treaties to which Rwanda is a party, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights.

Reading this unrealistic rubbish, I felt angry. Demands such as Amnesty’s are, in effect, attempts to protect genocidal criminals from the only form of justice (rough) now available in Rwanda. And the criminals are lightning quick to seize on gullible allies and use their misplaced concern to the full. What right do we outsiders have to meddle thus? We cannot claim to be in the business of consistently upholding international law – as distinct from endlessly mouthing platitudes about democracy, justice and human rights – otherwise the genocide would not have happened. The UN had the right man (General Dallaire) in the right place at the right time. But they chose not to use him.

A few days ago Gerald Gahima of the Rwandan Ministry of Justice pointed out that no judicial system existed after the genocide. All those qualified to operate it had either been killed or fled into exile. He quoted somebody’s bizarre calculation: to provide fair trials (or indeed any trials) for the numbers now in gaol would take more than two centuries. Mr Gahima is adamant that all Category 1 prisoners must be tried but he hopes many others will avail of the ‘Confession and Guilty Plea’ procedure, provided for in the Organic Law; this guarantees reduced penalties in return for confessions. Category 1 defendants can also confess and plead guilty and though the death sentence is mandatory they have a right to appeal within fifteen days. Many believe that this mandatory death sentence with a right to appeal constitutes a fudge, that in the end no one will be executed. According to the Organic Law’s introduction, ‘The exceptional situation in the country requires the adoption of specially adapted measures to satisfy the need for justice of the people of Rwanda.’ Yet the first Tribunal court did not sit until 27 December ’96 and to date only twelve cases have been tried with eleven Category 1 defendants given death sentences and one Category 2 defendant given life imprisonment. For the mainly Tutsi government, and the newly established judiciary, and the Tutsi survivors, and the killers themselves and their communities, the post-genocide administration of justice presents a dilemma with many sharp horns – ethical, emotional, psychological, political, economic. Maybe a fudge is inevitable, though pregnant with peril.

10 FEBRUARY

The Mille Collines hotel does have one thing in its favour: it is easy to find, on its shrubby city centre hilltop. Today I again braved its nastiness in search of an elusive Irish friend – my third attempt to contact him. At Reception the usual queue, long and restive, was being dealt with by one smartly uniformed man, all his movements exaggeratedly slow. One feels his only pleasure in life is thus to torture busy and impatient muzungus. Today, as before, he claimed never to have heard of my rather famous friend or his equally famous TV crew.

Hoping that Fergal might appear by chance, I sat in the middle of the vast foyer. Here the furniture is designed to prevent non-spending drop-ins from relaxing for a few hours; uncomfortable little stools with low backs accompany round metal tables too small to write on, their plastic tops feigning wood. Towering jungle plants occupy every corner; elsewhere are ferns, orchids, mini-palms and weirdly contorted bushes that seem to be attempting some painful acrobatic feat. Gigantic illuminated advertisements for Sabena Airways decorate the walls; Sabena and the State are co-owners of this hotel, originally built as a tourist trap. The golden ceiling has built-in lighting, the square pillars are mirrored, the souvenir shops expensive and second-rate. Nuzungus mill around, their expressions anxious or ill-tempered or both. Most belong to an obvious category: UN, media, corporate. A few are indefinable, looking very rich and vaguely sinister. (Arms dealers? At present Kigali is their favourite Central African rendezvous.) It was not long after noon, yet elegant young women of all races and mixtures of races were prowling to and fro, the Africans usually the most elegant. The Mille Collines is Kigali’s main ex-pat brothel where business has not – I’m reliably informed – been noticeably affected by AIDS but condom sales are off the scale. It’s odd seeing no tourists in a hotel of this type.

An Israeli journalist, waiting for his photographer, talked to me about failed peace processes. Then I became aware of a youngish man sitting at a nearby table, listening to our conversation. When I was alone he introduced himself: Melchior, who ‘returned’ from Uganda in August ’94 to work for a small NGO devoted to Oldies, His wife (‘she has a good UNICEF job’) still lives in Kampala with their twelve-year-old daughter. ‘Some old people’, said Melchior, ‘suffer most of all, seeing children and grandchildren dead. That makes their life meaningless, some do kill themselves.’ I thought of Alphonsine …

The Oldies’ aid agency suddenly ran out of money, a not uncommon occurrence among the smaller NGOs. During some much-televised major emergency they can collect what seems like a lot of cash but too often they lack the skill to manage it prudently. ‘So our old people had to say goodbye to their foreign friends, very quickly, and me and my colleagues – we’ve no more jobs. It’s not good, everybody thinks aid workers have plenty all the time and we trust them, feel safe with them. Those old people got a bad shock, seeing this is not true. Now I get angry, seeing Health Department men driving round in the vehicle I used to drive. It’s wrong how NGOs leaving must give all imported property to the State. As presents – big presents! Vehicles, computers, copiers, fax machines, filing cabinets, desks, cameras – everything not a personal possession!’

Melchior begged me to try to find him a job in Rwanda – or, better still, in Ireland. (Which explains his frequenting the Mille Collines.) He showed me his ID card – ‘You take my details’. Now he looks shockingly unlike the chubby man in the photograph; on first seeing him, his extreme thinness worried me. It could be hunger but I fear it’s AIDS; this would explain his not rejoining his family on losing his job,

Having discovered my profession, Melchior eagerly suggested our collaborating on a book about Oldies and the genocide; he would act as my interpreter and guide. This was one of those pathetic plans so often dreamed up by Africa’s educated jobless when they meet a writer. He wants to work on such a book himself but has no tape-recorder or camera so how could he? Did I know anybody who might lend him those aids to authorship? I pointed out that both are unnecessary – in fact counter-productive. Then I gave up on Fergal and invited Melchior to lunch with me. As nobody in their right mind buys anything in the Mille Collines we strolled down to the Restaurant Metropole on the Rue du Travail.

This is a large, dimly lit, agreeably no-nonsense eating-place: bare wooden floor, bare wooden tables and benches, a choice of good plain food at reasonable prices – chicken, beef, goat, fish, potatoes, matoke, rice, beans. Curious glances followed the ex-pat to a table at the back, as far as possible from the ghetto-blaster on the bar counter. Melchior chose matoke, goat and beans but couldn’t finish his meal. Apologetically he explained, ‘I’m not used to so much food at one time.’

Two middle-aged men in a corner had smiled a greeting as we arrived, ‘They’re Big Men,’ said Melchior sotto voce. ‘The tall one, he’s Mr S–––, the Tribunal judge for his prefecture. The small thin one is an editor, very influential, teaching RPF ideas for our future.’ When I asked, ‘Are they Tutsi?’ Melchior laughed. ‘You shouldn’t say that, we’re all Banyarwanda!’ It pleased me to see Big Men eating in the Restaurant Metropole. I said as much to Melchior who remarked, ‘The best of our new leaders are poor because honest.’ Soon after, the Big Men introduced themselves, using the novelty of my mini-cigars as an excuse. Both speak English – not fluently, but Melchior helped out. At first the conversation centred on me and the editor suggested an article, to be translated into Kinyarwanda, about why neighbours kill each other in Northern Ireland. Politely I declined this commission. Mr S––– nodded approvingly and observed, ‘Too complicated for newspapers.’

To think of Mr S––– as a typical Tribunal judge would be comforting but probably not very realistic. He impressed me as a man who is kind, imaginative, intelligent, with a dry sense of humour which must help to keep him sane despite his present job. Referring to the hideously over-crowded gaols, now attracting so much foreign criticism, he reminded me that it was part of the génocidaires’ overall plan to implicate the maximum number of Hutu. In many communes the role of the FAR soldiers was to stand by with their guns, supervising the use of machetes, massues and spears. When fragmentation grenades were thrown into crowded buildings not everyone died instantly; hundreds – sometimes thousands – had to be finished off with ‘rural weapons’, often on the following day. And it was usual for the organizers to arrange relays of killing teams, thus ensuring that no male in a commune could plead innocence.

In practice, said Mr S–––, the Organic Law’s categorizing makes life no easier for judges like himself who are genuinely striving to be impartial. It’s impossible to prove , given such a welter of blood and fear and hate, that one peasant was acting under duress while another was enjoying himself. As for the commune officials, there is ample evidence that a number participated in the slaughtering with the greatest reluctance. Yet when compelled at gun-point to ‘do their duty’ and put their people ‘to work’, some of those men became the most implacable hunters of Tutsi. This does not surprise Mr S–––. He believes that having had to anaesthetize their consciences they literally went mad and sought to become ‘champion killers’ in an insane attempt to justify to themselves their overcoming of that initial reluctance. But how to deal with such people when they are standing in front of you, being judged? Not seen as abstract component parts of a genocidal machine but as individual human beings … Leaving aside the organizers, who can know how culpable any killer on the hills really was? ‘That’, said Mr S—-, ‘is between a man and his God.’

Recalling the two unbloodied communes, I asked, ‘If those burgomasters could defy the organizers so successfully, why didn’t others do likewise?’

Mr S––– had a plausible answer: two defiant men could be ignored because ‘the work’ was going so well elsewhere. A more widespread defiance would merely have altered the management of the genocide, causing it to become more ‘military’ – as happened to an extent in Butare prefecture – without reducing the death-rate.

I asked then how often uncomplicated cases come up, like the beheading of Alphonsine’s three-year-old son. One man murdered that child in the presence of witnesses who have survived. If he were to be accused, and the witnesses were brave enough to give evidence., would that not be a straightforward case? Shouldn’t he immediately be sentenced to, at least, life imprisonment?

Wearily Mr S––– explained that there are, as he sees it, no uncomplicated cases. What was that man’s mind-set when he murdered? Probably he had been conditioned for years, through RMC broadcasts and otherwise, to regard as a mistake the sparing of infants and children during the earlier pogroms because so many of those spared became RPA soldiers. Therefore Rwanda’s ‘final solution’ required the killing of all Tutsi males. (Some girl children were allowed to live; by marrying Hutu they would cease to be Tutsi.) To us this cultivated mind-set is incomprehensible. We cannot come to terms with its hideous spurious logic, with an inhumanity totally negating everything that sustains normal societies, whatever their state of ‘development’. Ever since July ’94 academic outsiders have been busy analysing the genocide, holding conferences to consider it, writing papers to explain it, being intensely cerebral about it. Mr S––– commends those intellectual exertions but admits they are of little help to him as he tries to assess the culpability of the accused individuals standing before him.

The Tribunals’ hearings are open to the public and Mr S––– has invited me to observe him in action ‘when the security situation improves’. But when will that be?

Usually I choose to travel in peaceful places; never before has a security problem hampered me. And being confined to a tense NGO community in a subcutaneously hostile city is undeniably infecting me with ex-pat unease. Which is silly – but: proof that most humans are herd animals, even if they like to think of themselves as sturdy individualists. Yes, aid workers do by now have some reason for unease. However were I to go on my merry way across the hills it’s unlikely any Rwandan would mistake me for NGO staff, a species well known for its aversion to walking. Be all that as it may, the decisive factor has to be John Walton’s conviction that I should remain in Kigali, not even venturing to other prefectures by minibus. His letter of invitation obtained me my Rwandan visa and it would be unfair to put him in the position of having to worry about me – or, if the worst happened, feel guilty about me.

Each morning now one wakens wondering what the day’s horror will be. Last Sunday there was the matatu massacre, next day the bomb in the bus-station – luckily noticed and defused in time – and today in Kibungo an evangelical NGO’s compound was fired on and looted.

Sunday’s matatu ambush has shaken Rwandans as ex-pat murders do not. Two vehicles, travelling in convoy from Gisenyi, were held up ten miles outside Kigali, where the descent from the high plateau begins, and the passengers ordered out – Tutsi this side, Hutu that side … There has been no coherent report of exactly what happened next but eleven Tutsi (some say thirteen) were shot dead and of those who tried to run away (both Tutsi and Hutu) twenty-six (or twenty—eight) are now seriously injured in hospital. Given the crucial significance of road-blocks and wayside mass-murders during the genocide, this ambush has put the hairs up on the backs of many necks. The killers (number unspecified) wore military uniforms but that surprises no one. Ex-FAR ‘refugees’ cherished their uniforms for use on Special Occasions.

I have recently been befriended by two mixed (Tutsi and European) couples with small children and in both families the anxiety level has risen perceptibly since Sunday. Every room in each house is being ‘alarm-buttoned’, with a ten-minute response time guaranteed. It would however take less than ten minutes to kill and escape. The Tutsi partners are, physically, very obviously Tutsi. In one case the survivor husband knows who macheted his parents but the Hutu witnesses, though willing at the time to identify the two men, are afraid, with good reason, to give evidence in public. Jason often sees those killers around Kigali – for survivors a profoundly disturbing though quite usual experience.

Mixed marriages are much commoner in the NGO world than a generation ago. Cynics attribute this to AIDS, some ex-pat men having abandoned the happy-go-fucky life-style and some African women now shrewdly insisting on marriage, refusing to be monogamous mistresses jettisoned when the male moves on. Yet many relationships remain recklessly casual; several of my young UN acquaintances have live-in partners (usually lissom Tutsi lasses) and no one pretends these alliances are other than temporary.

11 FEBRUARY

What does Kigali offer the likes of me, by way of diversion? Walking is the answer, this idiosyncratic capital being in fact a series of villages. Daily I roam over the hills, following rough tracks through semi-rural districts rich in bird-life and overlooking wide valleys – part bushy, part cultivated (maize), part papyrus swamp. Here the traffic fumes and noises are far away – far below, on the dual carriageways. Between small cellules, on ledges bulldozed out of steep slopes, stand numerous palatial new villas – many already occupied, others being built. All are well guarded, some by three armed men if the high surrounding walls have not yet been completed. Post-genocide Kigali is awash with money, its torrent of aid dollars augmented by the lavish spending of rich Tutsi returnees.

Long walks engender thirst and to reach my favourite city centre ‘pub’ I cross a valley, then zig-zag upwards on narrow footpaths that wriggle through a slummy area of one-roomed shacks. Nowadays the Addis is a subdued place, suffering from a UN diktat forbidding aid workers to frequent any open-air bar, restaurant or cafe into which some passer-by might fling a grenade or two. This afternoon I was alone with my Primus until a gloomy young Ethiopian appeared. He has been working here for a year and complained bitterly that every fifteen days he and his compatriots must renew their visas at a cost of US$30. He has a theory that most Tutsi hate muzungus because they let the genocide happen. And most Hutu, he reckons, hate Ethiopians because MRND propaganda, imitating the colonial variety, convinced them that the Tutsi are of Ethiopian descent. I was glad when Pius arrived to deliver me from all this negativity. Not that he was in a very positive mood today, Since the matatu ambush his mother has been begging him to return to Uganda – ‘But I can’t run away, I have my crusade here and the worse things get the more it’s needed. Those militia, they’re sure of support in hard-line areas – where the RPA have gone to crack-down on them. And maybe all over the country they can stir things up. They’re so clever at managing simple people’s minds, with talk of Tutsi domination again. What we most fear is a Burundi-type situation developing – not formal war but regular small massacres. The ex-pats are all in a heap now but for us this increased violence is much more frightening. They can up and run, like they always do, when the heat comes on.’

By now I feel I know Pius well enough to ask awkward questions. While a ‘madam in a vehicle’ I met five burgomasters and all were Tutsi: three returnees from Zaire or Uganda and two survivors. The latter expressed some opinions that made it hard to imagine them being genuinely acceptable to the ordinary Hutu folk of their commune. However all five are reputed to be efficient administrators. Sometimes one’s mind is invaded by thoughts so politically incorrect that it’s difficult to articulate them. But I bravely asked Pius, ‘When it comes to running the show, is it possible the Tutsi in general have something the Hutu in general lack? Is this why pre-colinists, 15 per cent were able to rule 85 per cent for centuries.’

Pius smiled, for the first time today. ‘You look embarrassed,’ he said. ‘And the short answer is – I don’t know. But I think it unlikely. I do know it’s pointless looking back to colonial or pre-colonial times, in this context. Under our government the Banyarwanda have their first chance ever to live together as equals, having the same educational ad economic opportunities. After a generation of fair competition we’ll have the answer to your question.’

I took a deep breath and asked the really awkward question. ‘How equal will equal be? The RPF is, essentially, Tutsi. It proclaims a Banyarwanda ideology and perhaps people like Paul Kagame are true believers. But how keen are most Tutsi returnees on power-sharing with the majority? Given their memories of pogroms and genocide – and a built-in superiority complex?’

‘The Tutsi peasants had no superiority complex,’ retorted Pius sharply. ‘They shared poverty with the Hutu on the hills.’

‘But now most of those are dead,’ I said – feeling as I spoke a little wave of physical nausea. (Rwanda affects one like that.) ‘And many of the 400,000 Tutsi returnees are educated and fairly well-off – some very well educated and rich. They’re in a position to try to reassert themselves as a dominant minority. Thousands of the Hutu leadership class were either moderates and killed or extremists and killers – now exiles. So there’s a big gap. And plenty of Tutsi to fill it. How much influence does the Museveni-inspired wing of the RPF have over the average Tutsi returnee?’

Pius smiled again – rather a forced smile this time. ‘You ask too many questions too soon. We must wait and see.’ He looked at his watch and stood up – ‘See you tomorrow!’

12 FEBRUARY

This morning, an odd incident – more saddening than frightening. As I walked down a track away from the motor road – bananas on my left, maize on my right – three young men were coming towards me. I noted their faces hardening on seeing the muzungu but that’s nothing new in Kigali. We passed each other and all three addressed me jeeringly in Kinyarwanda. I ignored them, then one man turned back and pushed me into the grassy ditch on my left. It wasn’t a very vigorous push, I don’t believe he intended me to topple over. But his companions applauded him – relished seeing the muzungu humiliated, scrambling out of a quite deep ditch with some difficulty. I can’t imagine this sort of harassment happening anywhere else in Africa. Although a very unlucky elderly woman might be murdered, robbed or raped in some urban shanty-town, an incident involving jeering and jostling is unthinkable. Only in Rwanda is being a mama no protection. Ex-pats are bad news – fair game – legitimate targets. And, of course, collectively, we have rather asked for it.

By now the air of Kigali is dense – sometimes foetid – with rumour. Rwandans and ex-pats are agreed that it is peculiarly unnerving to have the facts about various incidents remaining so elusive. Some say the HRFOR ambush was meant for a government delegation, also expected that afternoon in the commune. But this is unconvincing; UN vehicles are distinctive and Graham and Sastra could hardly be mistaken for Rwandans. However, if Big Men from Kigali were expected in that dangerous area at that time, why were there no RPA around? Or were there? Some people are convinced that the monitors were killed by the RPA who reportedly ran amok in that commune last month, murdering several recently returned Hutu women because they couldn’t find their ‘accused’ husbands. Allegedly the burgomaster had requested HRFOR to investigate, specifying that he wanted Sastra Chim-Chan to be one of the team. It seems the Cambodian was known for his courageous reports – no diplomatic vagueness or sweet euphemisms or tactful omissions. (But there is nor record of effective action being stimulated by any HRFOR report.)

The ambiguity surrounding the current violence is itself destabilizing. One knows, in Northern Ireland or Sri Lanka or Kashmir or Israel, why and how and by whom the battle-lines are drawn. Not so in the new Rwanda. Maybe the monitors were murdered by the Interahamwe, maybe by a faction of The RPA, maybe by local officials resentful of outsiders probing their application of rough justice or real to suspected genocide killers. The government’s silence fertilizes wild theories and scare stories – which can hatch out into powerful myths believed in by many and of use to anyone with an interest in keeping the pot of trouble on the boil.

Today one NGO Field Director remarked plaintively ‘If only we had more accurate information it would be easier to make rational decisions about where we go – or don’t go – next.’ He acknowledged that when the militia returned behind the shield of the refugees the foreign community should have foreseen ‘destabilization’ and planned accordingly. As usual, the Americans are the most twitchy ex-pats. They recall, shudderingly, last year’s threat from a Nairobi-based Hutu Power group known as Palir (People in Arms to Liberate Rwanda). In June ’96 Palir issued a communiqué urging all Hutu ‘to stand up and fight the vampires who have taken hold of our country. To start off our combat on the right foot, we must attack every person or entity which helps in the consolidation of the power of the RPF.’ Palir offers rewards to anyone who kills Americans resident in Rwanda; the sums are comparatively modest, by international standards: $1,500 for the assassination of the Ambassador, $1000 for any other US citizen. The latest Palir communiqué, dated 23 January, threatens all ex-pats.

The Internal Resistance Front (FRI) of Palir makes the following announcement:

Its objectives are strictly military and target only positions of the army of occupation. At the same time, the FRI declines all responsibility for the injuries which may be sustained by those who work and live with the soldiers of that army. It is astonishing that expatriates calling themselves humanitarians live with the army of occupation where they are used as human shields. Since Palir is determined to track down every soldier wherever he may be, we can only counsel expatriates to keep their distance.

Since ’95 the US government has been an energetic and vocal supporter of the RPF regime – to the fury of France, which sees its linguistic empire dwindling as Rwanda is lured by dollars and sweet words into the Anglophone camp. Complaining noises still come at intervals from the Quai D’Orsay: ‘Why is America supporting a regime that took power by force, is dominated by a minority and uninterested in democracy?’ Everyone knows the answer. Rwanda is America’s new puppet, fitting neatly into that row of other recently acquired puppets – Uganda, Ethiopia, Eritrea – who in November ’96 were presented by the US with $20 million worth of military equipment to enable them ‘to contain Islamist Sudan’.

13 FEBRUARY

Several NGO Directors have recently arrived in Kigali ‘to look at the security situation on the ground’. This afternoon I had a robust argument with one such character. When questioned about his agency’s prolonged support for the refugee camps in Zaire his answers were those of a professional politician. Smoothly he pointed out that an NGO’s duty is to be ‘neutral’, to provide succour all round. (An attitude praised in a recent UNESCO bulletin dealing with human rights – ‘Political considerations must not be allowed to tarnish humanitarian actions in any way.’) Less smoothly, I pointed out that this neutrality, post-genocide, amounted to an evasion of what had been going on in Rwanda. The Hutu refugees were not the victims of conflict in any ordinary sense. Genocide is not war, nor is it ‘political’. It is a crime under international law and the humanitarians’ amoral stance was the last thing Rwanda needed. Now the RPF’s struggle to establish some semblance of normality is being thwarted by those murderous militia who were among the beneficiaries of ‘neutral’ aid.

‘But’, protested the Director, ‘our job is to help all in need, It’s somebody else’s job to sort out the guilty from the innocent. And what happens if we hang back waiting for that to be done? What happens all the kids? In some camps a thousand babies and more were born every month - no one can say they’re guilty!’

Fair enough. In this case, the only ‘somebody else’ with the necessary authority was the UN, which lacked the will to intervene. No wonder the NGOs and the UN agencies do not form a mutual admiration society.

Humanitarianism has long since become big business, a useful safety valve for a Rich World increasingly afflicted by unemployment. Yes, there must always be an emergency humanitarian machine oiled and ready to go when disaster strikes: but by definition ‘emergencies’ do not occupy most aid workers. With certain honourable and well-known exceptions, aid agencies concentrate on the effects of poverty while ignoring (often remaining unaware of) the political causes. They rally round the victims of corporate greed, people hungry and/or ill because of some cataclysmic drop in the price of a commodity (copper, coffee, cocoa or whatever), or as a result of communal pesticide poisoning or artificially created drought. Yet what such situations most urgently require are not palliative and too often inappropriate ‘development projects’ but loud political protests against the GATT Agreement, the WTO’s machinations and those SAPs so callously imposed on the poorest countries by the World Bank/IMF. However, ‘charitable organizations’ are forbidden to meddle in or even comment on matters political. This exposes the agencies themselves to many corporate viruses and the symptoms of their consequent debilitation are plain to be seen. Ferocious funding wars lead to all manner of dirty tricks, dishonest advertising and exaggerations of the extent of a ‘human tragedy’. And each strives to be always in the foreground, having its logo seen here, there and everywhere, get most attention whenever the media or some visiting dignitary takes an interest in its area of operations. On balance, a sordid scene.

Thirty-three years ago, in India, I was shocked to observe how quickly fund-raising rivalries on the international stage percolate down to local scenes of action. There they can do much damage, both to personal relationships between NGO teams and to the cost-effectiveness of their obdurately non-co-operative endeavours. Even in the ’60s, far too many NGOs cluttered the world; more than 200 of them were working with 85,000 Tibetan refugees. Already the waste of resources was scandalous. By now it verges on the criminal – such a duplication of offices, equipment, vehicles, staff, residences. And the high Kigali rents, paid in dollars to local landlords already affluent, are enraging Rwandans who do not earn dollars. The employing of house-servants, guards, gardeners and drivers spreads wealth – it is argued – throughout the community. But – it is counter-argued – the comparatively high wages paid set a standard unrelated to the national economy and are therefore a source of future discontent and dissension.

Three years ago, in Mozambique, if first noticed how many new rôles are being taken on by the bloated aid industry when had country had disintegrated under the pressure of war and related miseries. This change is neatly summed up in an African Rights Discussion Paper, Humanitarianism Unbound?

In countries like Somalia and Mozambique, relief agencies play a crucial role in setting the international agenda. They may be the chief providers of public welfare, among the main sources of salaried employment and commercial contracting, but even more significantly they act as news agencies and diplomats. In short, relief agencies are expanding into a void left by the contracting power of host governments and the declining political interest of western powers. But it is a void they cannot fill.

To an extent, this applies now in Rwanda, which may partly explain the government’s lack of affection for NGOs.

Apart from the ‘training programme’, my glimpses of the various aid agencies’ projects on this hills did not impress me. The motives and/or competence of many of the people who run NGOs from Rich World head offices need careful scrutiny but rarely get it. When criticized, it is in the interests of all these agencies, as component parts of the same machine, to cover up for each other. Nor is criticism always welcome from field-workers who might venture to suggest, when they go home, that such-and-such is not the best way to achieve so-and-so. Some young people who arrived here full of enthusiasm were frustrated to find themselves in charge of blatantly ineffectual but costly projects. And aid workers, however admirable as individuals, are constrained (like the UN!) by their mandates. Most of the local staffs are also admirable (certainly all my minders were) but in many cases are being insidiously corrupted by the futility of their well-paid jobs. To earn so much for doing so little is not good for anyone’s morale.

Aid agencies that successfully fund-raised when Rwanda was the humanitarian flavour of the month can find themselves with ear-marked money – not to be spent elsewhere – but without knowing how to use it sensibly. Then hair-brained projects are hastily devised, like giving goats to parentless families and paying for the construction of individual houses on scattered hills. Given the vulnerability of orphens to predatory neighbours, and the children’s ignorance of goat husbandry, the creatures’ welfare must be monitored. Therefore a massive, petrol-guzzling vehicle, complete with driver, sets off to spend two days checking twelve goats on widely separated hills.

As we drove round and round those hills, I fumed inwardly at the spending of so much on transport to inspect projects which themselves cost very little. A four-roomed, tin-roofed mud shack which will last about twenty-five years goes up for $350, most of that being spent on the imported roof. You don’t buy much petrol in Rwanda for $350. One man or woman on a small motor-bike, such as the umuganda overseers were using, could have done our tours of the goat-owners and house-builders at a fraction of the cost. Unfortunately when vehicles are available people look for opportunities to use them. And for some young male aid workers part of the job’s attraction is access to these powerful and vastly expensive four-wheel-drive Rovers and Cruisers. (What percentage of the aid industry’s hard-raised funds is squandered annually, world-wide, on vehicles and fuel for needless journeys? Not to mention the drivers’ wages. It bothers me that most aid workers think nothing of offering me – a tourist! – the use of their vehicles to go on round trips of perhaps twenty miles. They think I’m mad to walk when there are vehicles parked outside with idle drivers relaxing behind them.)

One hears acid comments about the ineptitude of small NGOs – ‘Really they just get in the way, they don’t know what they’re doing.’ Yet in crises some of these – too tiny to have far-away controlling bureaucracies – can achieve remarkable things on a shoe-string in a very short time. For instance, when the refugees flooded home the mini-agencies simply acted, fast, while the Biggies were contentiously communicating with their head offices and consulting outside ‘experts’. (Is it not strange that towards the end of the twentieth century ‘experts’ are still being taken seriously?) However, the Biggies have the funding to stick with it in a particular situation, whether wanted or not and whether ‘doing good’ or not. Whereas the minnows sometimes have to pull out abruptly (like Melchior’s NGO) when they waken up one morning to an empty kitty.

14 FEBRUARY

Last night, in the small hours, I heard someone being murdered – nearby, beyond the wall of my hostess’s small garden. The killing took what felt like a long time. It wasn’t a shooting. I won’t soon (or ever?) forget those sounds.

Pius and I were invited to dine this evening with a rare creature, a Belgian born in Rwanda in 1929 who has lived here ever since, come hell or high water, refusing to be ‘rescued’ when the genocide started. Nowadays, because of the curfew, being invited to dinner means staying the night so I brought my sleeping-bag and had thoughts about sleeping on the verandah, as in Bukavu. But Hector firmly said ‘No’.

We sat with our beers in a very beautiful garden while the sun set fire to a cloud mass above Mount Kigali, then slipped behind the mountain’s purple bulk. Yesterday morning Hector’s gardener found four strangled male bodies beside the footpath he uses on the way to work. Said Hector, ‘It’s only to be expected, it’s happening all over the country all the time. We only hear about some incidents by chance. Genocide is like a comet, it has a tail.’

‘It might have a shorter tail’, said Pius, ‘if justice wasn’t now a DIY job for Rwandans.’

Hector concurred. He believes demands for fair trials, for every sort of ‘human rights’ safeguard, should be seen as irrelevant in post-genocide Rwanda. He asserted, vehemently, that no one is entitled to inhibit the authorities from dealing with the accused in a way that would be good for the mental and emotional health of the whole population.

With that I couldn’t disagree. It seems outrageously impertinent for us to insist on Rwanda adhering to those standards of justice ostensibly upheld by the international community. How dare we hypocritically interfere now when we refused to interfere pre-genocide!

Hector observed that ‘the survivors’ are not only the Tutsi and moderate Hutu who escaped with their lives. Every Rwandan is a survivor – deeply affected, in a variety of ways, by the genocide. Without a public placing of responsibility where it belongs, and appropriate punishments being meted out, both those who killed under duress and the passive witnesses will continue to feel – and will be – at risk. And the bereaved will become more bitter, more angry – and more vengeful.

15 FEBRUARY

This morning I had an odd encounter with a senior civil servant who belongs to that powerful group sometimes described as ‘the Ugandan Mafia’. We met in the canteen of his government department, a large rondeval across the street from a skyscraper housing several ministries. Here, at 9.00a.m., I was drinking a litre of amasi (fermented milk) from a glass beer-tankard while around me half a dozen civil servants enjoyed their first (I presume) Primus of the day. I had an appointment with Gaspard, a young Tutsi who hoped I could help him, and he arrived accompanied by his uncle, Mr B–––. A tall slender gentleman, Mr B––– wore an immaculate khaki safari-suit and his shaven head accentuated his Tutsi features.

Twenty minutes later Mr B––– was offering me a twelve-month, multiple entry visa, to enable me to write a travel book to increase Rwanda’s revenue from tourism – an offer both touching and absurd. How could Mr B––– think it possible for anyone to collect travel book material at present? How could he imagine that a description of my experiences in Rwanda ’97 would encourage tourism? How could I accept this privilege – a considerable privilege – under false pretences? Yet Mr B––– is a highly intelligent man; he graduated (Gaspard told me) from Makerere University with an honours degree in economics and political science. This incident illustrates the limitations of many African leaders, people with talent but unaware of how things tick in the outside world – one reason why they so easily fall prey to corporate predators.

Gaspard is in the sort of trap only too familiar to many of the Poor World’s educated young. When Mr B––– had returned to his office this was explained: the BBC’s World Service have offered Gaspard a job (he showed me the letter) but it is conditional on him having a telephone. To obtain a telephone in Kigali takes months beyond reckoning and even then costs considerably more than the official installation fee. He cannot get a ’phone until he gets a steady, comparatively well-paid job that will enable him to borrow enough money to get a ’phone … It puzzled me that the nephew of a senior civil servant has this problem – perhaps Mr B––– is not Mafia-tainted?

With an Irish friend I spend a boozy afternoon on the rooftop of the Skyview Hotel, an open-air bar and simple restaurant where I have never seen other muzungus. The ascent from the street is daunting: three long, steep and very unsteady flights of metal steps, a Heath Robinson construction with a temporary air though I’m told it’s been in place for years.

While waiting for Dee I stood looking over the chest-high parapet, then decided it would be safe – I was alone – to take a few photographs of the city centre roofscape and the street far below. I had taken two shots when it seemed a riot was starting on the pavement opposite; a group of young men were gesturing violently while shouting angrily. It took me a moment to realize that all this was directed against me and my camera. Hastily I stepped back, out of sight. No doubt they were ex-Interahamwe who suspected me of trying to trace killers surreptitiously. I hoped they wouldn’t attack me, seize the camera, as we left; but our session was a long one – so long that neither of us dared to descend that ladder-like stairs. An amused waitress showed us a safer way down, through the building, and we emerged onto another street.

Normally Kigali’s climate is blissful; even at noon a cool breeze blows and the mornings and late afternoons are perfect for walking. But today was different: very hot an oppressive, not a breath of wind, slightly overcast. Then, towards sunset, came forty minutes of torrential tropical rain, blotting out the view across the valley from John’s bungalow and so loud on the tin roof I had difficulty hearing the friend who rang to ask if we would like to eat tapia from Lake Victoria. We decided that we would – though some of the more sensitive souls here eschew this delicacy, remembering how long tapia live and what their diet might have been less than three years ago. Crisp-fried with chilli sauce, tapia is food for the gods. The fish, served alone, is some eighteen inches long – you don’t need another meal for a week.

The Novotel restaurant, popular with ex-pats, is half open-air but now everyone eats inside; this evening w were the only curfew-defying muzungus present. A fine building – the interior walls pleasantly blending wood and brick – it was originally owned by a leading Tutsi businessman, Landwald Ndasingwa, who was killed, together with his Canadian wife and two children, on the first day of the genocide. We were almost finished our meal when we heard that a Hutu Kigali High Court judge, and three visiting friends, were murdered this evening as they sat drinking beer on the judge’s verandah. As his wife’s car was being admitted to the forecourt of their home by an askari, three armed men wearing military uniforms followed it, overpowered the askari, killed the four men and vanished. Later the World Service reported that this judge was not involved in the genocide trials – but in fact, as Public Prosecutor, he was deeply involved. He is to be buried in his home commune twenty miles from Kigali.

16 FEBRUARY

Yesterday the institution in charge of John’s project gave him permission, after days of dithering about security, to drive to Mulindi. I went along for the ride; one can safely bird-watch around the tea estate. But somehow my mood today was not ornithological. For hours I walked the nearby ills re-thinking one of my most cherished principles.

All my life I have passionately opposed captial punishment yet now I see the execution by the State of the organizers of the genocide as necessary – though the notion of ‘healing through execution’ so offends our recently acquired Western sensibilities. I am convinced that the creation of an atmosphere in which reconciliation will be possible requires the judicial killing of the organizers. If the government cannot or will not formally, ceremonially, execute those criminals, then ordinary Rwandans will kill (are killing) the people within reach – most of whom are other ordinary Rwandans, the manipulated ones. After genocide, there has to be retribution in kind. To me it is not immoral or uncivilized for the survivors to seek vengeance but a world which allows the organizers to get away with it is frighteningly uncivilized. And it signals to others that if any minority gets to be too much of a nuisance there are ways of dealing with the problem while the international community averts its eyes. Most of my friends won’t be able to understand why one particular set of circumstances, ‘Genocide in Rwanda’, should have compelled me to abandon such an important principle – ‘Killing is Wrong’. I’ll find it impossible to argue coherently about this, to justify making an exception for criminals who may never, personally, have murdered anyone. No doubt my friends will accuse me of a sort of blood-lust, an impulse coming more from the heart than the head. Yet there is one practical argument in favour of execution; even if tried and sentenced to life-imprisonment, the organizers’ influential friends, and their own power and wealth would soon bring about their release – or ‘escape’. Thus the culture of impunity would be seen, by all, to continue to flourish.

17 FEBRUARY

News has just come of the bombing of Bukavu by Zairean government planes – or at least planes operating on behalf of the Zairean government, which isn’t quite the same thing. Three bombs were dropped, one falling on the main market, and nine people died; forty are reported seriously wounded. This rather feeble air-raid is surely a sign of desperation; Mobutu can have no hope of defeating the so-called ‘rebels’ on the ground as Kabila gains more and more volunteer recruits. Had my plans not gone agley, I would have been arriving in Bukavu this evening.

In this death-shadowed country my dreams have been extraordinary. According to the experts, we all dream every night but I am rarely aware of having dreamed – which perhaps indicates that I’m sufficiently in touch with my subconscious. However, within a few days of arriving in Rwanda I began to have a remarkable series of vivid dreams, never unpleasant or frightening but always emotionally intensely moving – the emotion still with me on awakening. These detailed dreams are about the individual now dead – the majority long dead – who were the most important, the most beloved people in my life. I am simply recording this experience, I have made no effort to understand it.

Tomorrow morning, very conveniently for me, John is returning to Mulindi and a colleague has kindly offered to drive me to the border crossing.

18 FEBRUARY, KABALE, UGANDA

Only on stepping out of Rwanda, back into the easy-going friendliness of Uganda, did I realize how unrelaxed I had become among those Thousand Hills. Rwanda has been a scary experience. Not because of the tiresome security problems but because it forces one to confront the even inherent in us all, as human beings – however humane and compassionate we may seem as untested individuals. The deeds done there I have described as ‘inhuman’. But that’s escapist talk. Nothing done by humans is inhuman.

At Gatuna I felt liberated – was liberated, free to crack on without interference, military or otherwise. John’s thoughtfulness enabled me to walk to Kabale; he is homeward bound next week and volunteered to take my mysterious accumulation of books. Mysterious because Kigali is not renowned for its bookshops –yet there, as everywhere, I gradually acquired a heavy load of relevant volumes.

The waiters at the Visitours Hotel welcomed me back warmly and were eager to hear my impressions of Rwanda; all three look at least part-Tutsi. At sunset two young German women arrived, back from four days in Rwanda on the ‘gorilla trip’. They had entered via Kisoro, glimpsed gorillas in the distance at a cost of $500, then taken minibus taxis from Ruhengeri to Kabale via Kigali. They were unaware of any security problem anywhere in Rwanda – having just been through what is allegedly the most insecure corner of all for muzungus! No ex-pat crossed their path, no Rwandans issued warnings, they had done nothing to attract the attention of the military and were very puzzled to hear about my frustrated plans. It’s easy to see, in retrospect, how I could have played my cards differently.

london, 26 february

During my last few days in Kigali I became strangely afflicted by large, itchy, sore bumps. My hands swelled perceptibly, the knuckles disappearing, and my ears, forehead, legs, buttocks and adjacent areas were similarly tormented. At first I vaguely diagnosed ‘mosquito bites’; I am fatalistic about mosquitos and don’t take all the proper precautions. Then I realized in cool Kigali, where one sleeps under a sheet and blanket, mosquitos don’t in fact get to the buttocks – and in no circumstances do they burrow through one’s pubic hair. John it was who made the correct diagnosis. Viewing my swollen hands one evening he exclaimed, ‘Bed bugs! It’s well known that they like knuckles.’ Without going into details, I complained that my attackers, whatever their species, liked all parts of my anatomy. Then, thinking far back to Dharamsala and Ethiopia – scenes of my closest encounters with bed bugs in the past – I reckoned John was right. (On my left thigh I still have the scar of a bed bug bite that went septic thirty-four years ago.) But how, in Rwanda – where I had been mostly confined to the hygienic homes of John and aid workers – had I become bed bug bitten?

It took time for the penny to drop. On my way to Rwanda, in that hotel in Mbarara, I had used my sleeping-bag because the sheets were damp … On the following day I did notice a few sore itchy spots but thought nothing of them. Obviously the bugs had invaded my sleeping-bag then, in a small way, and subsequently proliferated as bugs are wont to do. And by the time I used the sleeping-bag again, staying overnight with Hector, the Mbarara platoon had become a battalion.

Adult bed bug are relatively easily dealt with though the corpses give off a singularly disagreeable smell. Bed bug eggs, however, are indestructible my normal means; on my return from Ethiopia I had to have my sleeping-bag fumigated by specialists at vast expense. So I left Kigali with bugs and a mega-problem: very likely my garments and rucksack also harboured eggs. And I didn’t want Rose (forget Rachel and Andrew) to be condemned to life in a bug-infested flat.

This morning, therefore, Rose found her reunion with Nyanya rather puzzling … Because Nyanya didn’t, on arrival at the flat, behave normally. Instead she unpacked on the doorstep before stripping naked inside the communal hall-door. Then her clothes, sleeping-bag and rucksack were quarantined in the back garden by Mummy – of course not faxed, accustomed to travellers’ crises. Suddenly Rose saw the funny side of a naked Nyanya – the backside – and repeatedly pinched it, chortling loudly, as we went upstairs.