On This Day in History: April 6
The Rwandan Genocide
The hatred fueling the Rwandan genocide wasn’t based on differences of religion or culture, but wealth. In simple terms: rich vs. poor, exacerbated by colonialism. The land was dry grass just awaiting a spark; the match struck when the plane carrying Rwanda’s president was shot down.
--On This Day in History Shit Went Down: April 6, 1994--
Hutus arrived in the Great Lakes region of Central Africa a few thousand years ago; they were mostly farmers. About 400 years ago, the more nomadic Tutsis arrived, and settled amongst the Hutus. Before long, however, economic differences arose. The Tutsis mostly herded cattle, while Hutus tilled soil. Cattle were more profitable, and over time the minority Tutsis attained positions of power over the Hutus. Other than that, they were the same people.
Then the Belgians, who have much to atone for regarding how they fucked over large regions of Africa, showed up and made things worse. Although it should be noted Germans invaded the region first in 1884, and the Belgians took it from them in 1917. Anyway, they separated the two groups further, making them carry identity cards, and only permitted Tutsis access to higher education and positions of power. Classic divide-and-conquer dick move.
Independence from Belgium came in 1962, and the region was split into new nations, and there was much fighting for control between the two artificially created groups in Burundi, Uganda, and Rwanda. In Rwanda, the Hutus were a significant majority and won power handily. Violence existed between the Hutu and Tutsi in the region for the subsequent three decades, but it was the events of April 6, 1994, that transformed it into genocide.
On that day, a plane carrying Rwandan President Habyarimana, a Hutu, was shot down. (The plane also carried the Hutu president of Burundi.) Violence had been escalating in the three years leading up to this, with the Hutu government fighting Tutsi rebels called the Rwandan Patriotic Front. President Habyarimana agreed to a peace agreement with the RPF, but then he got blown out of the sky, taking the peace along with it. It’s uncertain who shot down the aircraft, but what is not debated is who got the blame and what resulted.
Rwandan Hutu extremists saw this as a green light to commit the genocide against Tutsis they’d been longing for. The killings began the next day. It was brutal in its organization and efficiency, and in a mere three months nearly a million Tutsis were murdered. With Hutu forces focused on massacres, by mid-July the Tutsi-led RPF seized control of the government, and the revenge killing of approximately 100,000 Hutus followed. Canadian General Romeo Dallaire, commander of a small UN observer force in Rwanda, saw the genocide coming months earlier and warned his superiors, but was told to stand down. The international community could have intervened and saved hundreds of thousands, but instead did nothing.
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Romeo Dallaire says he still has PTSD from the event.
I actually wasn't aware that Belgium had other African territories! The only thing I know is how Leopold II (there were three Leopolds, BTW, for anyone out to hang any King Leopold) acquired the DRC in the late 19th century.