Rwandan basketball suffered a huge setback during the Genocide against the Tutsi, as it claimed lives of many players and administrators. The tragedy also made it hard for some local clubs to make a comeback. Teams like Tigers, ESM, Indahangarwa, Ocapi, Terror, and Minijust that existed before the Genocide did not come back after the Genocide. Emmanuel Ntarugera known as Gisembe, Aimable Rutagengwa, Emmanuel Rubingisa, Auguste Kabeho who played for Espoir; Tharcisse Nzamwita and Siboyintore of Minijust as well as Esdras Nshimayezu and Emma Gasengayire of UNR are among the many people who lost their lives. Minitrape, Okapi and Nyarugenge are among the basketball clubs that lost players. The Genocide also led to the death of officials like Gustave Rugamba who was a treasurer for Espoir, Damien Nyirinkwaya, a coach at the same club and Raymond Kabaija, a founding member. After the Genocide, as life started to get back to normal, new basketball teams were established and new players got interested in the game. Today, twenty-eight years on, the game looks to have bounced back, and a number of achievements have been achieved, on and off the court, by the country and the clubs. The most important element is that basketball, and sports in general, have been used as tools for unity and reconciliation, for instance through tournaments that are hosted for such specific purposes. Besides this, today, Rwanda is looked at as one of the countries that are very capable of hosting major tournaments on the African continent, a great milestone as far as basketball is concerned. The country that was in ruins 28 years ago now boasts of having hosted the very inaugural edition of the Basketball Africa League (BAL), a prestigious continental competition sponsored by the National Basketball Association (NBA). Since the BALs launch in 2021, Rwandan clubs have, on a consecutive basis, been among the 12 African clubs that have made it to the highly esteemed competition, in addition to the fact that they have performed well in the continental tournaments. In 2021, Patriots Basketball Club was a semifinalist in the competition, and currently, Rwanda Energy Group (REG) qualified for the playoffs of the same competition. Last year, the country also hosted Afrobasket, a tournament that attracts the op national teams across the continent. The strides are set to continue as this year, Rwanda will host the playoffs of the BAL in May, as well as FIBA World Cup qualifiers, Group A and B from July 1-3. Although all that has been achieved, the struggle continues in a number of aspects, for example: building the national team so that it can be able to rub shoulders with the big boys on the continent like Nigeria, Tunisia, Senegal, among others. In an interview with Times Sport, Desire Mugwiza, the President of Rwanda Basketball Federation (Ferwaba) said that after the genocide, it was a ‘slow but sure’ journey. Today, the National Basketball League has14 teams in the mens category and 8 in the womens fray. This year, Ferwaba introduced the inaugural second division league, and it will comprise 17 clubs, as the country seeks to promote the game even more. “Basketball (and other sports) played a crucial role to reshape the Rwandan society – especially the youth – after 1994,” Mugwiza said. “It also was – and still is – an essential vehicle to build the country’s image beyond borders.” he added. The local basketball governing body was one of the earliest federations to organise Genocide Memorial Tournaments (GMT), and that, Mugwiza says, helped to bring people together and build social cohesion that was lost because of the Genocide. “We used the tournament as a platform to pass messages of ‘Never Again’, unity, reconciliation and the importance of remembering,” said Mugwiza. “Sport is a powerful tool.”
