Youth preparing for the Kwibuka20 flame tour around the country: Some young people who were born after the 1994 genocide are a result of the 1994 genocide rapes
Somewhere on the outskirts of Butare town, Southern Rwanda, is a paved floor, iron sheet-roofed, electricity- and clean water-supplied house, a description of somewhat a house of a well-off family.
However, the occupants of the house – a woman, her daughter and a son – have all, in different ways, lived and survived one of the worst atrocities of Rwanda’s 1994 Genocide against Tutsi, which is rape.
“Everybody is the architect of his future. And for me, unless for the unexpected, my future will be bright”, said Robert – not his real name – with a broad smile.
19-year-old Robert, now a senior six high school student, was born out of his mother’s gang rape during the 1994 Genocide against Tutsi. And as he grew up, he has known only one parent − his mother.
“There has been considerable development in our country [Rwanda] since the Genocide. Now, one can go with a panctual bus traveling agency while heading to Kigali [the capital], whereas many years ago, during my mother’s time, I hear people used to trek all the way up to Kigali”, added Robert, smile still on his face.
As a bitter legacy of the Genocide as Robert is, he ironically knows little about it − apparently he has no fresh memory, that is – and possibly this accounts for who he is now: a humorous, straight-thinking, hopeful and determined young boy.
“As I grew up, I kept asking about my father. Mom promised me to tell me about my father when I reach primary six [about 12 years]. And when that time came, she told me her horrendous gang rape story. As a result, I couldn’t know who my real father is. And mom’s openness to me and her awful accounts instilled in me even much love for her”, said Robert, now at home and also on an internship programme nearby.
“At school, we learn about the Genocide. And during the Genocide commemoration period, I learn even more from different first-hand testimonies of what happened in 1994”, said the youthful Robert whose dream is to become a leader one day.
Robert’s step-sister, 25-year-old Nancy – not her real name either −, is also upbeat. She is now a third year university student – roughly one year shy of her degree.
During the Genocide, Nancy was just five years old. Raped alongside her mother in exchange for their lives, they, one after another, unbelievably escaped from their rapists.
The mother, lived in hiding for weeks before making it to an RPA (Rwanda Patriotic Army)-held territory in 1994.
Nancy, her mother said, escaped from her rapist as well days later, got picked up by a Good Samaritan family with whom she fled to Burundi, before being re-united with her mother in 1995 thanks to the Red Cross.
“I was kept in one house being raped as I heard my daughter [Nancy] screaming while being raped in another house in the same compound. It went on for days until it became too much for me to bear. And then I said to myself, ‘this is death already and I don’t want to see my daughter die’”, said the mother of the family.
“I decided to escape and die elsewhere instead of dying while hearing my daughter die as well”, she added – something that, instead, turned to be her way of surviving the Genocide and sparked courage to escape for her daughter.
Nancy declined to talk about her rape, but she offered to talk a little bit about her deceased father – killed in the early days of the Genocide.
“My father was a very rich businessman”, recalls Nancy. “He even had a car”.
Neither Nancy nor her mother knows the whereabouts of her rapist(s). Not even for the one(s) who killed Nancy’s father, Margaret’s true husband. But Nancy has a message to any of them.
“If ever they are still alive, I don’t feel like I can do them any harm now. Maybe if it were like some years back, when I was still grief-stricken, I could make sure they were put in prison. But now, I can even forgive them if they come to me and ask for forgiveness”, said Nancy.
“What else can I do for them really? They cannot bring back my father”, she added.
The mother of the family is now a member of a local women’s association for Genocide survivors, dealing with agriculture and bee-rearing. And with this, she is able to sustain her family – of course, up until recently at least, with some support – provided to Genocide survivors − from the Rwandan government through the survivors fund FARG.
“We aim to have an even better life. We have gone through terrible moments, granted, but we have now made a laudable step forward. We even try to help those few among us who are still weak”, she narrated, seated on a traditional made carpet as she carefully sorted out beans seeds for the upcoming farming season.
Twenty years on after the Genocide claimed over a million innocent lives – according to Rwanda’s official records −, many families like this one are still searching for the remains of their dead relatives for a decent burial in vain.
Also, young people like Robert are − everyday of their life living with one main, troubling question that will never ever be answered: “Who is my father?”
But in this family on the outskirts of Butare town, there is also another picture – of people who know well that they cannot change anything about their bitter past, but are very sure that there is one thing they can make even brighter: their future.