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DB: Where were you in 1993?

 

JCN: In 1993, I was in Rwanda.

 

DB: Where in Rwanda?

 

JCN: Gisenyi, because I was teaching at the Gisenyi High Institute of Management and Computing, called the Institut Saint Fidele in French.  I was working as the chief academic officer. 

 

DB: Can you describe the February offensive of 1993 by the RPF?

 

JCN: Oh, yes, I will never forget that.  I was in Gisenyi at that time.  I heard that the RPF were attacking Ruhengeri.  That’s my town, my hometown.  People said many people were gathered into houses.  Then RPF rebels used grenades and threw them inside the houses.  You had women and kids in those houses that were blown up into pieces.  Nevertheless, I was lucky because, at that time, I had to attend a marriage in Ruhengeri.  A friend of mine, ok?  Laurent Uwimana.

 

DB: Ok.

 

JCN: I was in Ruhengeri the day before the attack, on February 7th, that is why, I cannot forget it.

 

DB: I see.

 

JCN: The family I was celebrating with, all of them got killed.  Laurent’s girlfriend, parents, and relatives were all killed.

 

DB: You lost so many friends there…..

 

JCN: If you want, I can tell you names, ok?  I don’t want to hide anything, it´s about the truth; it’s about Paul Kagame´s cruelties.  Many of my friends and classmates were killed over there.  I knew one friend, Jotham Dusabimana, who graduated at Moscow University where I attended.  He went to see his girlfriend in Ruhengeri on February 8th and he never came back.  Ok.  I went back to Gisenyi the day before because I had to work in the office at the College the next day, but I know how they got killed.  Some of them were even crucified like Jesus Christ.  They killed ordinary people to make everyone afraid so they would flee the region.  The RPF needed people to flee so infiltrators could blend in with the displaced people and gather information.

 

DB: So the RPF put people in different camps around the country and then they hid spys with the refugees?

 

JCN: Yes, the displaced people.

 

DB: I see.

 

JCN: There were thousands who were displaced and killed and there is no report on what happened in the Ruhengeri and Byumba prefectures.  Workers sent to investigate were killed by the RPF.  Unfortunately, there is also no report about that incident.  Thousands were killed there.  The RPF separated men from women and put them in separate houses before burning them all down using grenades and high artillery.  Thousands fled to Nyacyonga Camp.  Shortly after the displaced Rwandans gathered there, Paul Kagame himself arrived at the camp and took a machine gun and shot the kids and women in the neighboring market.  Other RPF soldiers killed hundreds of displaced people from Byumba and Kibungo prefectures.  People were crucified and pregnant women had their stomach cut open.  The fetuses were given to their supposed fathers before they were killed by akandoya.1  Many were killed with an agafuni.2

 

DB: Are you saying Paul Kagame did this personally?  He killed those people?

 

JCN: Yes.  Personally…and when I see him getting a visa, going to the U.S…. it’s shameful!  When I see Americans…..I understand they don’t get the right information from institutions and universities, but, you know… it’s shameful.  I cannot believe that such a criminal would be granted a Doctorate of Law degree by a U.S. university….it’s not possible.  People who were killed that day in February…who knows about that?  Who knows about them?  Nobody.  Americans know nothing about that.  I would like to let Americans know about the extreme cruelty of Paul Kagame.  He killed willingly and tortured people…he is more a criminal than a statesman.  If I can give a kind of a…. it’s serious.  It’s very serious.  If someone doesn’t believe me, let’s go have an independent investigation right now.  It’s very easy to get information.  Have it not be under RPF supervision and then go and tell people that you are part of a team investigating what happened in Rwanda.  Right now, investigators only get information from one source, from one side, from RPF leaders and RPF party members.

 

DB: What was Ruhengeri like after the attack?

 

JCN: After the attack…well, there was only wreckage.  People said the town was destroyed one hundred percent.  The prison was destroyed and, ah, the hospitals were also destroyed.  The hospital was run by a group of French doctors and it was a modern hospital as far as I remember, with modern equipment, experienced workers, you know, and after that everything was destroyed.  Many people fled from the hospital to the university, were many students were killed.  Others fled to Kigali and Butare.  That’s why the university in Ruhengeri shut down.   Then, Paul Kagame announced on Radio Muhabura, “Those who are now displaced, I’m going to find them and all of them are going to be dumped into Lake Kivu.”

 

DB: He announced this on the radio personally?

 

JCN: Yes, he did.  I remember it well.  Many others can confirm what I say because they also heard the broadcast.  He wanted to kill them all.

 

DB: Now, you were still in Gisenyi at the time, correct?

 

JCN: Yes.

 

DB: You left Ruhengeri the day before the RPF came?

 

JCN: You mean Ruhengeri?  I left the evening they attacked!  4:00 P.M…ok.  I went back to Gisenyi because I had to work at the university the next day.  That evening at 9:00, the same night I left to go home, the Byumba Prefecture was attacked by the RPF.  The next day, they arrived in Ruhengeri Prefecture.

 

DB: Can you describe what happened to you after the attack on Ruhengeri?

 

JCN: After the attack, I was really shaken up and I couldn’t sleep.  I couldn’t go there and my people, my friend who I mentioned, Jotham and his girlfriend were reported killed.  Laurent’s girlfriend told me that her parents were killed that same night.  I could not believe I was there.  I knew that Jotham would never be back.  Those images still cause me to hallucinate sometimes.

 

DB: He was from Gisenyi also?

 

JCN: No.  He was from Ruhengeri, from Jenda, from the countryside just like me.  The RPF also killed Philippe Gakwerere, the Inspector of Mining along with his family during these attacks.  They killed a classroom full of students in Musanze School.  Women and children were killed in Nyamagumba.  In Nyarutovu Commune, over several days, hundreds were killed.  They even killed patients at the hospital in Kinigi Commune.  Many died in Ngarama in Byumba Prefecture. 

 

There was another guy, Barengayabo, President of the Appeals Court; he was killed with his wife and children on February 8th.  One time before that, he escaped death because he spent the night in another town.  That’s why he was able to survive.  Then he went back home, I don’t exactly know the details, but I had information from Seth Sendashonga about it because he was a friend of mine after he fled to Kenya.  He called me and asked me to work with him.  The day he was killed by the RPF, when I learned he was killed by RPF in Nairobi, I had told him that I was not comfortable to go out of the country.  After that, when he got killed, I couldn’t sleep.  I learned so much from him.  I still have some of his documents here.

 

DB: Why did Mr. Sendashonga leave the RPF?  I mean, he had been with them for quite some time….

 

JCN: First of all, Seth Sendashonga was a Hutu who was believed to be one of the main RPF figures before and after the RPF seized power.  I asked him the same question.

 

DB: Right.  He was a Hutu.

 

JCN: Yes, and it was very difficult for me to trust him.  When he first called me, I told him, “I heard about what you said all the time when I was in the refugee camps near Goma, so I don’t want to get involved with you.  I cannot trust you.”  He told me, “Jean-Christophe, I understand your position, but you cannot say that what I said and what I have done was really wrong.  I really believed we (RPF) were bringing democracy to Rwanda, but I found out that it’s not possible under Kagame’s rule.  That’s why I left and I tried to save myself after I found out I was tricked.  It is not possible to implement democratic objectives so I decided to find another way to liberate our country.”  That’s what he told me.  He was a brilliant mind.  He prefaced the RPF membership’s Umuryango.  Before he died, we met every day in Nairobi in different places and worked on ways to bring democratic values to Rwanda.  To reach this goal, we have to first inform the international community about what happened.  He even told me he was originally supposed to be the president of Rwanda.  That’s what he wanted me to understand.

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