Rwanda: " So how did it come to this bitter end? "

New Times Rwanda reports

Kagame awarded for promoting peace, justice

President Paul Kagame was over the weekend awarded for his contribution to peace and justice not only in his country but around the world.
The award was presented by the African Television (AFTV) in the City of Rotterdam in Netherlands on Saturday at an event to honour the President.

His contribution has been outstanding in South Africa, particularly his recent efforts in Johannesburg

" It is not new. It is not the first time and it is not the last. Most of President Kagame's political opposition are in exile or in prison or are dead."

Chimp reports ( Uganda ) gives us Kagame's thoughts on the subject.

" Rwanda President Paul Kagame has spoken out for the first time on the recent murder of dissident Patrick Karegeya in South Africa, saying “anyone who plots against his country will turn out to be the loser.”

" A visibly angry Kagame told a huge gathering at the Rwanda Leaders Fellowship Prayer Breakfast on Sunday in Kigali that “those who were made who they are by Rwanda and then turn their backs on the country can be dealt with. We can fight back.”

And for that matter the thoughts of his cabinet ministers are revealing. The Mail & Guardian reports.

" Kagame's remarks follow some equally controversial statements by his cabinet ministers.

On Saturday, Rwanda Defence Minister General James Kabarebe reportedly said of Karegeya: "When you choose to live like a dog, you die like a dog."

He was quoted as saying, "Do not waste your time on reports that so and so was strangled with a rope on flat seven in whatever country. When you choose to be a dog, you die like a dog, and the cleaners will wipe away the trash so that it does not stink for them.

"Actually, such consequences are faced by those who have chosen such a path. There is nothing we can do about it, and we should not be interrogated over it."

There is very little peace and no justice available to those who disagree with Kagame.

" Paul Kagame will brook no opposition, he is a dictator who despite his attempts to compare himself with Mandela over the past week should be compared to Stalin. This blog is not hostile to the people of Rwanda, it is very hostile to the government of Rwanda, I make no apology for that. Rwanda has been the cause of the vast majority of the ongoing instability in the DR Congo, the evidence is overwhelming and the denials and lies of the junta in Kigali have been nothing short of astonishing in their total lack of any credibility. It is worth keeping that in mind when it comes to situation Victoire Ingabire has found herself in. Hungry for Truth blog has a transcript if Ingabire's speech made on her return to Rwanda in 2010."

AFTV is the first African television in the Netherlands and is based in The Hague.

AFTV has set itself some very high standards and it would seem have fallen over at the first hurdle.

" The station idea originated from the fact that CNN promotes American ideology, BBC does the-same for Europe, Aljazeera has been successfully re-branding the image of the Middle East. AFTV-African Television has taken on the mantle of showing the beauty of Africa."

I think perhaps AFTV should set itself targets that are doable Fox News springs to mind. 

The TV network content is mostly aimed at promoting Africa by depicting a positive side to the continent and countering content which focuses on negative aspects of Africa such as war, illness and poverty.

To ironic to be true. Six million people have died in the DR Congo over the past 20 years a period that coincides with the reign of Kagame in Rwanda yet is no coincidence.  

Present to receive the award on behalf of the President was the Rwandan envoy to Netherlands, Jean Pierre Karabaranga.

Amb. Karabaranga emphasised the role of the Rwanda Patriotic Front in stopping the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, and consequently stopping the injustice in the country.

He reiterated the role of peace and justice which he said precedes and enhances growth and development.

Hypocrisy doesn't come much better than this.

Rwanda: " But to stand up and fight I know we have six million reasons "

The Washington Post opines

Another Rwandan dissident assassinated

By Lara Santoro, Published: January 25

Patrick Karegeya’s murder did not come as a surprise. The former Rwandan spymaster, whose network of spooks at one point spanned half a continent, had fallen foul of President Paul Kagame in 2007 and went on to help found the opposition, headquartered in South Africa. But as human rights organizations keep noting, the survival rate among Rwanda’s dissidents is not high .

Kagame will not tolerate any opposition. Victoire Ingabire is in effect the leader of the opposition currently she is serving 15 years in gaol, in her situation she made the ill advised move of returning to Rwanda to contest the  the presidential elections in 2010, she was barred from running then gaoled for 8 years increased to 15 on appeal.

The country that many in the West associate with brave recovery from genocide in the 1990s has, in the years since, turned into an autocratic state with zero tolerance for dissent. Filip Reynt­jens, a leading academic authority on Rwanda, says the central African country is no longer “a state with an army but an army with a state.” It’s a depressing transformation, although true plurality was unlikely to blossom in that country, with a 15 percent ethnic minority effectively in charge.

".....but an army with a state.” Says it all really. The problem is that Kagame knows no restraint. His crime of killing opposition politicians pales into relative insignificance when his crimes against the people of the Eastern DR Congo are considered. Six million dead and climbing. 

What did come as a surprise was the way Karegeya was murdered. His strangled body was found in a Johannesburg hotel room Jan. 1. The killers didn’t even bother to tidy up: They left the rope and a bloodied towel behind, as well as a “do not disturb” sign on the door. “It’s Kagame’s impunity,”Theogene Rudasingwa, a former Rwandan ambassador to the United States and one of the leaders of the Rwandan opposition in exile, said in an interview. “He doesn’t care anymore, no one has ever held him accountable, so why should he care?”

That is starting to change. The eyes of the world are starting to watch Rwanda. The Eastern DR Congo is slowly being turned around and should Rwanda intervene either directly or indirectly via proxies such as M23 it is going to become increasingly difficult to ignore from the perspective of the west. Already America has been forced to cut aid and impose sanctions.

Kagame has denied involvement in the murder, but at a recent prayer meeting in the Rwandan capital he said, “You cannot expect to betray your country and get away with it.” Aside from a brief statement by the South African police mentioning strangulation, the circumstances of Karegeya’s death remain mysterious. What is clear, however, is that no one had greater interest in seeing Karegeya dead than Kagame. Experts on the region say that Karegeya’s job description under Kagame included eliminating enemies — potential and actual — which left Karegeya with a lot of sensitive information. “It was pretty clear to everyone what Karegeya’s job was,” professor Brian Endless of Loyola University said in an interview just after the murder. “Even he wasn’t terribly shy about it. He took care of dissidents, in however distasteful a fashion was required.”

Kagame has become delusional, his inability separate his administration from the the nation state that is Rwanda. He assures all that he will not alter the constitution to extend his tenure as Rwanda's President but the reality is that he has created a situation where he will be forced to remain in office. Expect an African version of the Putin / Medvedev  tandemocracy . There is very little available in the way of attractive retirement options available for autocratic dictators after they lose power. Ask Gaddafi.    

When someone was deemed a problem outside Rwanda — be it in Kenya, Congo or other countries — it was Karegeya’s job to get rid of them. (Internally, the job fell to Jack Nziza, whom Rudasingwa called “the most feared man in Rwanda”).

What is strange is that Karegeya must have been aware that he was in Kagame's sights yet he dispensed with his South African security detail. 

" It was reported in the South African press that Karegeya had agreed to dispense with his South African security detail in 2012. The government of South Africa had provided the protection since Karegeya’s arrival in South Africa in 2007. The decision to provide protection was reportedly influenced by assassination attempts against former army chief of staff Kayumba Nyamwasa, another Rwandan exile in South Africa. "

Whatever “problems” Karegeya allegedly eliminated at Kagame’s behest is unknown, but Endless and others have estimated that the number is in the double digits and includes former interior minister Seth Sendashonga, who was gunned down in traffic in Nairobi in 1998.

Such information is public knowledge in Rwanda. When Nziza walks into a room, Rudasingwa told me, people start to shake. The murder of Karegeya does more than silence a potential squealer. It sends a message to the Rwandan opposition and to ordinary citizens: If someone as powerful, rich, competent and cunning as Karegeya can be dispatched, what can be done to the average citizen? Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch attest that the levels of fear in Rwanda are pathologically high: Too many people have vanished and later turned up dead. Karegeya’s death is certain to make the situation worse.

By the same token there is a growing awareness in the West about the realities of Kagame's regime. The European Parliament has made its opinion on the Victoire Ingabire situation fairly clear.

Despite a clear pattern of stifled dissent during his tenure, Kagame is about to receive his latest installment of U.S. bilateral aid. Overall foreign aid to Rwanda — estimated to be about $800 million a year — is roughly 40 percent of its government expenditure, keeping the country afloat. Karegeya’s murder ought to open a debate on whether Rwanda should receive any aid at all.

Cutting aid is problematic and probably would have the effect of increasing the levels of oppression in Rwanda whilst not hurting the country's political elite in any real way, it also puts the most vulnerable Rwandans at risk. Targeted sanctions aimed at the Rwandan civilian and military leadership would make a lot more sense.

Hat Tip: Charly Kasereka 

Rwanda: " Suffer my pretty children and follow me, follow me "

The BBC reports

Patrick Karegeya 'murder': Mozambique holds Rwandan suspects

                                            Patrick Karegeya formed an opposition party in 2010

Four Rwandans have been detained in Mozambique in connection with the apparent murder of Rwanda's ex-intelligence chief Patrick Karegeya, Mozambican police say.

The body of Mr Karegeya was found in a hotel in South Africa on 1 January.

A Mozambican police spokesman confirmed that the four suspects were detained a week ago.

It comes as no surprise that suspects are Rwandan and I think most observers have expected that the Rwandan Government was behind this murder. 

Mr Karegeya was stripped of the rank of colonel after falling out with his ex-ally, Rwanda's President Paul Kagame.

His allies say he was killed by government agents - a charge denied by Rwanda's high commissioner to South Africa.

Rwanda lies, that is the standard response of the Rwandan government even when presented with evidence that would stand up in any jurisdiction in the world. At this point it is worth remembering that the suspects are just that suspects, but should it credibly emerge that they are behind this operation the standard in the west is " beyond reasonable doubt "  then once again Rwanda will have lied to the world and more importantly to the South African government about committing crime on South African territory.  

Mozambique police spokesman Joao Machava told the Associated Press news agency that one of those detained in Mozambique, which neighbours South Africa, was a senior official in the Rwandan army.

Just one ?

South African police say Mr Karegeya, 53, might have been strangled. A rope and bloodied towel were found in the safe of the hotel room where his body was discovered, they said.

Mr Karegeya, who formed a Rwandan opposition party in exile in 2010, had lived for the past six years in South Africa, where he had been granted political asylum.

It is interesting that South Africa had given him a security detail but it was withdrawn in 2012, South Africa obviously has no illusions about the regime in Kigali. 

" It was reported in the South African press that Karegeya had agreed to dispense with his South African security detail in 2012. The government of South Africa had provided the protection since Karegeya’s arrival in South Africa in 2007. The decision to provide protection was reportedly influenced by assassination attempts against former army chief of staff Kayumba Nyamwasa, another Rwandan exile in South Africa. "

Earlier this week, President Kagame warned that those who betrayed Rwanda would face "consequences", without mentioning any names.

Kagame will brook no opposition at all. Ask Victoire Ingabire about the state of democracy in Rwanda.

Rwandan dissidents in several Western countries, including the UK and US, say local security agents have warned them of plots to kill them.

The Rwandan government has denied trying to kill its opponents.

Mr Kagame, who has been accused of not tolerating opposition, maintains that Rwanda needs a strong government to prevent a return to ethnic conflict.

There is a huge difference between political representation and ethnic conflict, it is also worth noting that Patrick Karegeya was part of the Kigali political elite which tends to suggest this has nothing to do with the ethnic conflict red herring. 

Patrick Karegeya was part of the opposition ( in exile ) Rwandan National Congress.