“It was on the night of April 14th, at around 9p.m when we heard people outside. They knocked on the door of the third room, gently. But no one opened. And then we heard a man knock on ours. He said ‘we have come to rescue you, open the door’”. “But we wondered who would say that. Our door had no glass because it had been shattered by the Interahamwe militia. We would only insert in sheets and push the bed against the door.” Judith Mukasano was 30 years old when the Genocide against the Tutsi started in 1994. She had two children; a girl who was four years old, and a boy who was turning three. She was also living with her brother and sister, and her babies’ nanny who she treated as her own child. They lived at Mumena in Nyamirambo, a suburb in the City of Kigali. Genocide survivors known as ‘Intwarane’ pose in group photo with GAERG member in Nyanza District. Their home was chillingly standing opposite an Interahamwe road block during the slaughter. However, Mukasano and family found a way to sneak into Karoli Lwanga church on April 7 but there were so many people they could hardly get space to stand in. They then decided to go to the chapel at Saint Andre school. “I can’t tell the number of people that were at Saint Andre, because I never went out of the room. But there were people who had come from Gikondo, Biryogo, and other places. There were also young men who had refused to stay in the rooms. They were scattered around the area, some in kraals, and others in water tanks, forests, and other places.” There they were, terrified, hungry and hopeless. So, on the night someone walked over to their room and knocked on the door, they feared the worst. “We completely refused to open until a young man I knew who was hiding outside said ‘It’s Jean Paul, please open.’ When I checked, it was really him, so we opened”. Rwanda Patriotic Army (RPA) soldiers had come to their rescue. Escape from killers’ jaws “We were told to take what we could because we could walk a long distance. I was always in a trouser, a dress, a kitenge and a sweater, and that was all I had. I just got sweaters for my two children and one bed sheet. “The boys outside knew where each and every one was hiding. No one was left behind, and we were really many. It was really quiet, not even babies were crying. A miracle was happening. “We were told to make a line, and because it was dark, you could only see a few people in front or behind you. Rumour had it that there were other people from the church, but we minded our own business. “We started walking towards Mumena, but on the way, the RPA soldiers would rescue other people who hid in their homes. A section of the Campaign Against Genocide Museum at Parliamentary Buildings in Kimihurura, Kigali depicting RPA soldiers on duty during the liberation war in 1994. Sam Ngendahimana. “When we reached Gikondo, the Interahamwe had not slept. They threw grenades in the line, no one died but we later heard that an RPA soldier was hurt. “We were told ‘everyone lie on your belly and don’t go out of line.’ I took my baby from the back and lay down. “The RPA soldiers then went on to fight the Interahamwe and we would hear guns and grenades blasting. The fighting lasted like half an hour. “After the fight, the RPA told us to get up and start moving again.” Mukasano and other women had survived a deadly Interahamwe attack on Saint Andre on April 13 during which almost all the male people who were found there were killed. The attackers spared the women to rape them in the days ahead, she recollected. “On that fateful night, the Interahamwe ordered us to open the door. One of the girls inside was afraid and had hid the key somewhere we all didn’t know. We were like ten of us in the room. So one of the attackers shot in the glass and looked in my eyes. “‘Woman, can you open the door’? But I failed to find the key. He then shot many bullets in the door and broke it open, one of the bullets landing in a girl’s thigh whose flesh opened up.” They were then ordered to get out. Mukasano had no shoes on but hardly felt pain when she stepped on the broken pieces of glass, she recalled. Fortunately, the Interahamwe left apparently because they had spent the whole day killing people and were exhausted. But Mukasano sustained injuries on the foot. “The wound was big and hurting so much when the RPA soldiers came to rescue use the following day,” she said. “When we were asked to stand up and continue walking (after the RPA had fended off the Interahamwe attack) I stood up but failed to walk completely with the baby on my back. I told a soldier that I can’t carry the baby anymore. He asked me, ‘Isn’t the baby yours’? I said he is mine but I couldn’t walk with him on my back anymore.” The RPA soldier told a man that was close to her in the line to carry the baby. “The Inkotanyi (RPA) wore Kitenge scarves, so he took it off and told the man to tighten so the baby wouldn’t fall. The man failed to carry the baby on his back and put him on the shoulders and we continued the journey.” “We passed at MAGERWA to RWANDEX, and we could now see the long, winding line because there was some light. The Inkotanyi soldiers who had come to save us were not many, but they would speak to each other on radios. “We walked past Sonatubes and then were told to stop. I was among the last, because I was limping. The RPA soldiers had a brief chat, and then told us to make an about-turn. I suddenly became one of those at the front. “We then went back and passed by a garage, Buzizi’s, I think it is still there, and then to a swamp. To reach the swamp, one had to jump a slope of around one and a half metres. The young men first went down and would carry each one of us. “It was around 5a.m, and we could hear on the news that ‘Inkotanyi have stolen people’. Some people had their radios with them. Night trek from Gishushu-Kabuye “We were taken to CND (present-day Parliamentary Buildings, which at the time served as the base of the famous ‘600’ men and women of the RPA-Inkotanyi who had come to the capital Kigali as part of efforts to create a power-sharing transitional government), specifically to a big house that used to belong to a minister. “Some went to the rooms, others in the sitting room, what I remember well is that I instantly slept on the floor in the corridor, one child on my right and the other on my left. “We didn’t spend the night there though. Inkotanyi looked for us some houses in the Gishushu area where we could stay for a short while. They gave us food and would check in on us in case anyone was wounded or sick.” “Around April 25, the ex-FAR started shooting on us and some people died. We were advised not to do anything so that they wouldn’t know that we were around. “The RPA then informed us that we had to leave the place, and that no one had to carry what they couldn’t because we didn’t know how long we were going to walk. “I got some sugar and put some tea in a bottle. At around 8p.m, we were told it was time to leave. We made a single file again, and off we went. “This time round, there were many RPA soldiers with us, not just a few like when we left Nyamirambo. I honestly didn’t know any direction or what place we were going to. At least during the first trek, I could tell that this was Gikondo, or whatever other place.” “Some people even had cars. They would put their families and friends in, and whatever else they needed. But they had to drive really slow, and without turning the lights on. “When my children said they were hungry, I would give them sugar to lick, so they always forgot about hunger. The elder child cried for the tea bottle, but when I gave it to her, she broke it. So sugar was the only option. “We walked for the whole night, and when the sun rose, we found ourselves in Kabuye. I remember we reached Kabuye on April 28. “There, we found many chicken, pigs, and other animals. So, people started looking for food and cooking…unfortunately all those who ate pigs had diarrhoea later. Trip to safer Byumba…and back to a city in ruins “The RPA then told us that we are so many, so we needed to go to Byumba (present-day Gicumbi District where RPA had their liberation war headquarters). They promised us that it was safer there and that we would get places to stay. “So in the night, they brought Lorries (trucks) and we all went in. You couldn’t get a place to sit because we were so packed. We couldn’t even see anything outside except the sky, because the trucks were covered. “When we reached Byumba town there were many empty school blocks. We sat in a primary school class, we found desks and books in it. But we felt safe at last. “They gave us firewood, maize flour, rice, beans and cooking oil. There is nothing that the RPA were able to get that they didn’t give us. “In the following days all the males among us joined the RPA. “We lived there with full security, no hunger, until Kigali was liberated. “In mid-July, they brought cars and told us that the Genocide was over. I left because others did, but I was initially sceptical of the news. But then I thought that people who had saved us couldn’t take us back to a dangerous place. “People had told us that Nyamirambo had been demolished. I was wondering where we would go with the children. They told us to take water because there wasn’t any in Kigali. We also bought firewood with us. Kigali looked like the wilderness, our house had very many bullet holes, ex-FAR clothes and shoes, and calibres. It was a mess. “We saw some people, others had been killed, and people were very few in a shocking way. “Inkotanyi would tell us that there is hope and that schools would open, I wasn’t even thinking about it.” Mukasano’s husband died during the Genocide against the Tutsi; he was killed in Bugesera, where he was working, she would later learn. She and her children figured life out after all the mess. All her children graduated from University, thanks to the government Fund for Assistance of Genocide Survivors (FARG). Although her son, who was a baby had a hearing impairment from the noise of bullets and grenades during the Genocide, it never stopped him from embracing opportunities that came his way. Now a grownup, he uses hearing impairment aid. By the time the Genocide against the Tutsi was stopped by the then Paul Kagame-led RPA (the military wing of the Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF)-Inkotanyi) in July 1994, more than a million people, including Mukasano’s husband, had been killed by the then government army and regime-backed Interahamwe militia. “Now you can walk on the streets, knowing that no one is hunting you down. You see people in the same way. The RPF gave us everything, we have peace, and we are well. The future is so bright.”
