Village a beacon of hope for forgiveness, reconciliation

As Laurence Niyonagira stretches her hand to greet Aloys Mutiribambe with a smile on her face, just before they sit next to each other for a meeting to share their past experiences, one would think they are either relatives or long-term friends.

However, 30 years ago, it was unimaginable that the two would ever see each other face-to-face, let alone shake hands. Niyonagira is a survivor of the 1994 Rwanda genocide against the Tutsi minorities, while Mutiribambe is a perpetrator of the genocide that saw almost 1 million people lose their lives within 100 days.

Indeed, Niyonagira traumatically watched as Mutiribambe brutally attacked and killed her family members. Nevertheless, today they are not only neighbors and friends but Niyonagira's daughter is married to Mutiribambe's son.

Niyonagira and Mutiribambe are neighbors in Mayange Reconciliation Village, about 40 kilometers south of the capital Kigali. Mayange is one of the eight villages that host genocide survivors, former perpetrators and their respective families who chose to go beyond forgiveness and embrace reconciliation.

The villages were established in 2004 by the government in partnership with the Prison Fellowship Rwanda, a nongovernmental organization aimed at facilitating victims and perpetrators of genocide to genuinely embrace forgiveness and reconciliation. They currently consist of more than 800 houses accommodating more than 4,900 people.

The realization of genuine forgiveness and reconciliation is aimed at ensuring that the residual feelings of anger and vengeance will not fester, or be passed on to the next generation only to erupt into another intergeneration cycle of violence.

Community members are also equipped with skills like welding, sewing, tailoring, handicrafts, carpentry and masonry among others to improve their well-being and foster trust, safety, conviviality and hope.

As Rwandans mark the 30th anniversary of the massacre this year, the traces of unimaginable sufferings caused by the genocide are hard to find in a country now characterized by peace and security.

Today, reconciled and revived from the ravage caused by the genocide, Rwanda, a hilly and landlocked country with a population of less than 14 million in Central Africa, has been rated by international institutions such as the World Bank as one of the fastest-growing economies in Africa. It also ranks among the safest countries in the world, according to Numbeo, a leading data and research platform.

Fredrick Kazigwemo, one of the community leaders in Mayange village, which hosts 54 households with about 380 people, said the reconciliation has been a long journey, initially characterized by fear and misunderstanding between the survivors and perpetrators but today, a lot has been achieved, and the community members live in peace and harmony.

He said the farming cooperatives, established in 2005 as social saving groups, have played a critical role in the forgiveness and reconciliation journey.

Mutiribambe said he regrets the genocidal crimes that he committed but expresses gratitude that the survivors have forgiven him.

Colonialists blamed

Mutiribambe, 72, blames the colonialists — Germany and later Belgium — for the genocide and for bringing differences among the Tutsi, Hutu and Twa tribes despite the fact that the entire country has had a common ethnic language — Kinyarwanda.

The identification was based on physical appearance — the Hutu were presumed to be dark-skinned and short, while the Tutsi were light-skinned and tall.

The colonialists, said Mutiribambe, radicalized the Hutu extremists for long, to hate the Tutsi.

In 1990, Tutsi-led Rwandan Patriotic Front invaded Rwanda from Uganda, leading to a violence outbreak. An agreement was signed in 1993 in Tanzania calling for the creation of a broad-based transition government that would include the Rwandan Patriotic Front.

The Hutu extremists opposed the plan. The then president of Rwanda Juvenal Habyarimana fueled an anti-Tutsi campaign through the media.

"The government instructed Hutu extremists to kill any Tutsi they came across to ensure they will never ascend to power and that's why we were killing an entire family. We were also told to burn their houses and take their possessions," Mutiribambe said.

When a plane carrying Habyarimana and the then Burundian president Cyprien Ntaryamira was shot down over Kigali on April 6, 1994, it ignited weeks of intense and systematic massacres.

The genocide officially ended in mid-July 1994, when the Rwandan Patriotic Front took military control of the entire country.

Criminals were tried by Gacaca, a participatory justice system that was established to address the enormous backlog of cases. The system was allowed to promote forgiveness and reconciliation.

Mutiribambe, who was imprisoned for eight years, said they were given an opportunity to confess to the survivors of the genocide, the crimes they committed against their families and ask for forgiveness, after which they were released and sent back to their communities.

While the release from prison came with joy, Mutiribambe dreaded how he would face the survivors but eventually, they reconciled and built trust.

"I would advise countries to learn from the Rwanda genocide to never radicalize young people to hate each other based on tribal lines."

Niyonagira said she has genuinely forgiven Mutiribambe and all those who killed her relatives but said it wasn't an easy journey.

The 51-year-old mother of 10 and a grandmother of five, said the genocide left so many scars both on her heart and her body.

Niyonagira is grateful she was able to overcome her grief through several sessions of counseling and that she can sleep comfortably without any medication.

James Higiro, a village leader, said Rwandans owe the success of the reconciliation to the government which thought of establishing such villages.

"We believe that if it wasn't for the role of the government to promote forgiveness and reconciliation as well as bridging the Hutu and Tutsi divisions, the revenge was inevitable because people were angry, sad and traumatized," he said.

The government of Rwanda also established the Ministry of National Unity and Civic Engagement, mandated to preserve historical memory, reinforce national unity, and promote citizenship education and culture. The country has guarded its political stability since the 1994 genocide.

Jean Chrysostome Ngabitsinze, Rwanda's minister of trade and industry, said it was hard to attract direct investment after the genocide, but with the political will and the leadership vision, the country has managed to recover.

"People now believe in Rwanda and many are investing in the country," he said.