PROFILE: Paul Kagame, rare man at the right time

mchambawima1 · 2015-05-23T15:57:04+00:00

President Kagame informs a gathering of local and international journalists, during a recent presidential press conference, that he is not asking anyone for a job. The President seems irked that the issue of whether he "intends to stand for another term in office" keeps cropping up, something that has been happening well before 2017 was even around the corner. "What is all this agitation; all this speculation about? Have I asked anyone for a job? I haven't!" he exclaims. But many want him to carry on and they keep pressing the President on the issue, as amply demonstrated by opinions in the local media, in public places, and more recently on social media in the form of signed petitions. "Continuity" is the buzzword among the "pro-third term" camp, which camp President Kagame declares he doesn't belong to. The President's detractors may scoff at assertions that he has asked no one for a job, saying that in fact he is bent on retaining his current one beyond 2017. According to the critics, support for another tenure in office for Kagame is either coerced, or motivated by the personal gain of the most vocal in calling him to carry on. Yet the critics overlook or have forgotten one salient fact – Kagame never asked to be president in the first place. Unlike most leaders of victorious armies of revolution, he wasn't hankering to occupy the big seat. Kagame the leader of an army of liberation had succeeded in his mission. He and his army and the political party he headed had led home a section of Rwandans whose very fundamental right, the right to a citizenship, to a country, had been cruelly denied them either for a generation or right from birth. Kagame (here pictured when, as RPA commander, he toured RPF-controlled territory in 93) saw himself only as a liberation fighter, and as one of the multitude of formerly exiled Rwandans grateful to finally have a place to call home. He saw no problem occupying the newly created post of vice president. Kagame saw himself only as a liberation fighter, and as one of the multitude of formerly exiled Rwandans grateful to finally have a place to call home. He saw no problem occupying the newly created post of vice president. As a 36 year old (going on to 37) he may wisely have seen it as not suitable to be head of state. Pasteur Bizimungu, a much older man, was entrusted with that post. And quickly proceeded to demonstrate what a disastrous choice he was. Bizimungu was a man of erratic actions and off-the cuff decisions that often times, coming from a head of state, caused embarrassment and sometimes uncomfortable situations for the government of Rwanda. Rwandans may remember one time in Kibeho in 98 during commemoration of the Genocide against the Tutsis when President Bizimungu lambasted a powerful Roman Catholic cleric, Monsignor Augustin Misago, denouncing him for alleged participation in, and enabling of the Genocide in the Gikongoro area. Bizimungu was speaking after a man who lived in Gikongoro had stood up to roundly accuse Bishop Misago of a litany of atrocities. "If Misago has done all these things, and committed all these crimes we don't want him here!" said Bizimungu. Here was a head of state acting as public prosecutor, judge and even jailor of the cleric. No court had tried Misago for the crimes the Gikongoro people accused him of. Not long after Bizimungu's denunciation of the bishop the latter was apprehended and jailed. That incident was a stunning, public demonstration of how unfit for high office Pasteur Bizimungu was. The courts didn't find Misago guilty of anything, probably because as a result of Bizimungu's public outburst everything about the trial was conducted hurriedly, with no time to make a proper case against the bishop. That incident created further unnecessary animosity between the Vatican and Kigali. Also, that incident was only a public example of the kind of unhinged acts that characterized Bizimungu's 5-year tenure in office and that would leave Parliament no choice but to relieve him of his duties in early 2000. Early leadership challenges Right from the word go Vice President Kagame had his hands very full, beginning with the fact that as defense minister and commander of the army he and his men had to contend with a mortal threat to Rwanda, namely the goings on in enormous refugee camps just across the border in the DRC, then Zaire. This sizable Hutu population was held hostage in refugee camps, amidst squalor and pestilential disease, such as Mugunga. The biggest of these, the giant Mugunga refugee camp had more than a million inhabitants, many of them Hutu civilians who had been herded there by fleeing Interahamwe militias and Habyarimana's defeated army the FAR, in their determination to fulfill a chilling vow. They had always maintained that even if the RPF managed to take power in Rwanda they (RPF) would only rule over trees and grass. Having been defeated they tried to ensure not a single Hutu remained in Rwanda but failed in that as well, however managing to take with them hundreds of thousands into exile. This sizable Hutu population was held hostage in refugee camps – amidst squalor and pestilential disease – with the complicity of Mobutu Sese Seko's Zaire as the Interahamwe and FAR extremists plotted a forceful return, defeat the weakened (in their calculations) RPF and its government, and re-establish "eternal Hutu rule". This plan, didn't seem to matter to some how diabolical it was, was being carried out with the complicity of elements of "the international community" even as early as only a year after the Genocide. The UN agency for refugees, UNHCR, was daily sending into the Mugunga camp alone about a million US dollars worth of "humanitarian" assistance". But no one was using these supplies of thousands of sacks of foodstuffs, cartons of cooking oils, blankets, soaps et cetera to alleviate any refugee's suffering. Interahamwe and ex FAR senior officials who controlled the camps stocked the supplies, sold them to neighboring Congolese communities and used the proceeds to buy guns and other war materiel. The biggest provider of the weapons was none other than France, keen to see the return of a client regime in Kigali while getting rid of the new dangerous "Anglo Saxon" threat "posed by Kagame and his government". The French (at least the branch of their government that is in charge of African politics) hated Paul Kagame with a vengeance. France has a strange fixation with its former African colonies; an infuriating sense of entitlement that – even after more than five decades of independence – "Francophone" Africa should continue to be subservient, to pay allegiance to Paris. Here was Paul Kagame in Rwanda, a perceived Francophone country, telling the French in no uncertain terms that he wouldn't tolerate their insolence let alone take a single order from Paris, and that he would act strictly in accordance with Rwanda's interests. Decades after the British and other colonizers let go and moved on, France very much retains its colonial hang-ups. Political scientists explain the phenomenon saying France won't let go because influence in its former African colonies gives it heft in geopolitical affairs of the world. "It enables France to punch above its weight and any perceived threat to this status quo is to be fought with all means possible," says Franco-Canadian scholar Gerald Prunier in his book The Rwanda Crisis. But here was Paul Kagame in Rwanda, a perceived Francophone country, telling the French in no uncertain terms that he wouldn't tolerate their insolence let alone take a single order from Paris, and that he would act strictly in accordance with Rwanda's interests. Kagame warned the world, including the French who were propping up the Interahamwe in Mugunga, that he would act if they didn't do something quick to bring an end to the activities there, disband the camp and let the refugees go back to their home villages. The French and their allies in the UN were used to cowering Africans who did whatever the bidding of the French master was, not Africans asserting their rights or taking action in their own interests. What hit them next was totally unexpected. The Rwandese Patriotic Army launched a stealth attack on Mugunga in 97 and struck the Interahamwe and ex FAR positions hard, guns blazing. The RPA thoroughly wiped out their training areas and flattened their buildings and sent those lucky not to lose their lives fleeing in disarray. Frightened civilian refugees collected whatever pitiful property they had, sleeping mats, cooking utensils, meager foodstuffs, anything they could carry on their heads and began trooping out of eastern Congo back to Rwanda, forming the biggest mass of human foot traffic since Pakistan was partitioned from India. That alone should have made Kagame a modern African hero, except that with Africa always confused and divided on so many things what Kagame did that time – show that an African people could successfully defy powerful Western governments by taking measures primarily beneficial to themselves – will likely be lost in time. The unfortunate fact is that no African will likely be teaching the lessons of Mugunga in their universities, or make their military officers write course notes on them. International intrigue On the other hand one wrong conclusion to draw in all this would be that President Kagame is bent only on confrontation with powerful western governments or institutions. He has proven time and again that he is far too smart than that. He is cognizant of the fact "the West" is not some monolithic entity, plotting and moving in tandem to inflict harm on the rest of the world. So he has gone on charm offensives, in America and the UK and elsewhere. Through clever lobbying he has steered Rwanda into the British Commonwealth grouping, while retaining its contacts with the Francophonie, more than anything else a signal to France that the door is still open for cooperation and friendship if France is willing to deal with Rwanda if not on equal terms at least with respect. In short this administration is as adept at fighting wars of self-defense as it is in the much more deft workings of diplomacy, the give and take of international relationships and the ability to divine events ahead of time to accordingly position oneself for eventual advantage. Yet the critics overlook or have forgotten one salient fact – Kagame never asked to be president in the first place. The sum total of all the behind the scenes work has been to blunt the attacks of the French political establishment and a phalanx of fellow travelers – deniers, negationists or trivializers of the Genocide of the Tutsis, pretend human rights activists, pretend free speech activists, Congolese "mapping report" writers, and many, many others – relentlessly fighting to undermine, undercut and eventually bring down the Kagame government. Kagame has outthought and outmaneuvered them at every turn. French "anti-terrorism" judge, Jean Louis Bruguière's arrest warrants in 2006 targeting nine top members of the Rwandan military – allegedly for shooting down Habyarimana's plane – was to have been the decisive battle in the war conducted through international intrigue that Kagame's enemies had been relentlessly waging against him. Had those warrants stuck his administration would have been mortally wounded. It would have gone downhill all the way from there. Any Rwandan military official that traveled out of the country would risk arrest. Kagame and the entire establishment would lose credibility. Attacks from the Congo would increase. Pretty soon the whole government structure would be rendered inoperable. Down the years, as a journalist I have viewed with awe and admiration how President Kagame has handled issues that would surely have sunk even a slightly lesser man. The series of retaliatory measures that Kagame took in the wake of the Bruguière warrants ought to have cemented a reputation as a living legend. First Kigali expelled the French ambassador to express its anger and to send the message Kigali knew very well Bruguière's activities were purely political in nature. This after all was an individual that had never set foot in Kigali to investigate a thing, and who relied on third party witnesses and only known enemies of Kagame to build his "case". Next Kagame did something that thoroughly blindsided his enemies. He commissioned an unprecedented public inquiry into France's role in the Genocide against Tutsis, specifically the role of the French military in training and arming the FAR and the Interahamwe militias. The inquiry was exhaustive and included many Rwandan eyewitnesses as well as former members of the Belgian military who had been in Rwanda at the time and who witnessed activities of members of the French military contingent. The report left many in the French political establishment reeling. French investigative judges Nathalie Poux and Marc Trévidic (here during investigations in Rwanda) debunked the Bruguière allegations. Next was a thorough investigation of the downing of Habyarimana's plane commissioned by Kigali. The Mutsinzi Report did not rely only on Rwandan witnesses or experts, but also included the forensic findings of ballistic experts from the UK. It roundly debunked allegations of RPF responsibility for Habyarimana's death. Any who thought that report was "rigged" in favor of Kigali were disabused of that notion when a couple years later another one came out, this time the work of two independent French investigative judges, Marc Trévidic and Nathalie Poux. They further debunked the Bruguière allegations and confirmed most of what was in the Mutsinzi Report. France had no choice but to lift its warrants. Kagame had dealt the largely behind-the-scenes cabal of Africa policy makers in Paris a decisive blow. A unique man It takes a very rare kind of person to possess all the tools Rwanda required in its leadership after the devastation of the war and the Genocide. It has been the country's singular stroke of good fortune that it had that very person in Paul Kagame. Incubated in early years of hardship and misery as a refugee child in western Uganda; marinated in the hardships of a guerrilla war – as one of the very first fighters of Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni's National Resistance Army – and facing the hellish baptism of fire that followed abrupt assumption of leadership of Rwanda's army of liberation after the death of its hero Fred Rwigema, Kagame was a man upon whom greatness was thrust. He proved more than equal to the challenge. The main personality trait of Kagame – the one that he has imparted upon the entire military and civilian leaderships of the country – is that he is a fiercely disciplined individual, totally intolerant of any form of excesses that might lead to abuse of power or loss of trust in the population he leads. Those that can't access him only have to take a look at the convoy of vehicles that escorts the President in his movements to divine his character. On average it's about seven cars in total, including the President's. Not for Kagame the blatant flaunting of misuse of taxpayer money seen elsewhere in processions of luxury vehicles that may number up to 50, with the wailing multitudes of motorcycles that move ahead of them. Not for him inconveniencing ordinary Rwandan road users because the head of state is passing. We've seen ordinary Rwandans cheer on after President Kagame took on groups of generals and other senior military officials as well as cabinet ministers who owned large tracts of land in the Mutara and Gishwati areas and divided up the land to benefit the common man, the muturage. We have seen Kagame sack even the closest former comrades, for one form or other of abuse of offices. We have seen high-ranking officials doing real jail time for corrupt dealings, something not usual in this part of the world. We've seen ordinary Rwandans cheer on after President Kagame took on groups of generals and other senior military officials as well as cabinet ministers who owned large tracts of land in the Mutara and Gishwati areas and divided up the land to benefit the common man, the muturage. That task had looked next to impossible. We have seen him do so many things that inspire ever more confidence in his leadership. Another thing that sets Kagame's Rwanda apart from most Sub-Saharan African governments is that Rwanda actually has earned the respect of most of the World. Policymakers in European or North American governments that are used to African officials coming – with the proverbial begging bowl – for aid only to see that aid used less to benefit the poor in their countries and more to fatten private Swiss accounts have watched in growing respect as year after year Rwanda put every coin to agreed upon use. That respect is bolstered by the fact while Kigali takes aid, and accounts for every cent or penny of it, the mantra in the Rwandan capital is: aid today, self-reliance tomorrow. Kagame has said he is not asking anyone to stay on after his second term is up. That is in the hands of Rwandans right now. This is a uniquely talented man that at only 57 still is in the prime of his years, yet who has amassed a vast treasure trove of leadership experiences. This is a uniquely positioned man to oversee the strengthening of our still very shaky institutions, including political institutions that even now wouldn't withstand many shocks in the hands of less able leadership. The country still needs Kagame in so many ways, regardless of what anyone will say. Source: focus.rw

Thread starter mchambawima1
Start date May 23, 2015

mchambawima1

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PROFILE: Paul Kagame, rare man at the right time

mchambawima1

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