“Well, well! If it isn’t Old Codger himself! Granted, you couldn’t dare present your sinful self at St. Peter’s gate. Does it mean even Lucifer didn’t want to see your paltry person? Anyway, buddy, welcome back! Because while you were away, ‘lota’ things happened and, boy, you can’t begin to guess what! Say, remember Mahele?” ALSO READ: The first RPA battle with foreign forces in Gabiro Reader, that’s Sylvester, boorish homeboy of Mt. Muhabura slopes. That’s his way of ‘warmly’ welcoming a brother who’s been ailing for near-two years! What sent me into a tailspin of confusion, though, was connecting that with Commandant Mahele! Oldies of my time, does the name ring a bell? ALSO READ: Why genocide ideology doesn’t dissolve three decades after dispersion of genocidaires Commandant Donatien Mahele Lieko Bokungu (RIP) was the hapless military officer who, at the RPF/A’s liberation struggle launch, October 1990, was dispatched by then-Zaïrois (Congolese) President Mobutu Sese Seko, etc., to hasten to the rescue of the Habyarimana regime. Its self-denigrating army’d anon slunk back, tail between legs, on hearing a gunshot at the border post. ALSO READ: Habyarimana's role in planning, implementing 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi Mahele, already briefed on how these were “an insignificant group of Ugandan invaders” (à la Tshisekedi’s “AFC/M23 being Rwandan”!), came as a chest-thumping gladiator to do a minced job of it. To journalists awaiting tips on his course of action, he confidently proclaimed: “Nous allons les chasser sans relâche jusqu’à la frontière!” Habyarimana’s print and airwaves media bounced off the walls with it: “Mayele bwa bunyenzi ngo arabushushubikana buguru budakora hasi no hakurya y’umupaka ngo dumburi!” The near-translation: Mahele “is going to pursue the ‘cockroaches’ till he summarily tosses them back across the border!” Therein, of course, lay a contradiction. The abusive “cockroaches” term referred to Rwandans confined to statelessness. So, in its eagerness, this media forgot to maintain the foreigner tag! In the end, Commandant Mahele didn’t make good on his threat. In fact, he ended up being captured by those offending “insects” but got to know exactly who they were. They were Rwandans without a quarrel with any outsider, they explained, only with the Rwandan government that oppressed its citizens. Take back your soldiers, they urged, and explain to Mobutu: he has his hands full taking care of his people. Zairois will thank him for it. And Rwandans’ll sort out their mess. And sort it out they did, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Alas, Mahele was to be disappointed again, despite himself. His soldiers, having found the daily Kigali-Gabiro-Barracks’ area battlefront commutes a never-ending game, opted for what served them best. And since their fighting efforts were not paying off, what better way to earn their worth than helping themselves to the barracks’ hotel ‘luxuries’? They looted Gabiro Hotel clean. Their heads laden with booty captured international headlines more than the best of their battles could ever have done! If Habyarimana had been embarrassed by his ‘saviours’’ refusal to stay at the frontline and quit the Kigali Infotech School comfort, now it was misery manyfold. He sheepishly asked Mobutu to withdraw his troops: “Merci, Grand Frère,” said he, “they have secured me victory.” And to a point they had. For, unknown to them, they had found RPA fighters at their depths of despair. RPA had lost its commander and was in disarray, only fighting for survival. When after some days news of this loss leaked to Habyarimana, the whole country exploded into celebration. Only, by this time, the scene at the RPA struggle base had totally transformed. And what a transformation! A new commander had pulled all fighters back onto the drawing board and passed them over a training ‘whetstone’ that turned them into tempered phantoms. Whatever manifested or manifests to-date, militarily or otherwise, wherever it did or does, has left and leaves an indelible imprint on the mind of even the most disinterested, reluctant or hostile observer. Every Rwandan, nay, the world, remembers. Gatuna-Oct-1990, Ruhengeri-Jan-1991; ambush-of-the-French-Zone-Turquoise-soldiers-Jun-1994; halting-the-Genocid-against-the-Tutsi-Jul-1994; the wresting of human-shield-refugees from Ex-FAR/Interahamwe-Nov-1996; the-Kitona-Operation-Oct-1998; CAR, Moz...; to mention but a few. And not to mention socio-politico-economic haul-over. “Quit the soliloquy, brother,” interrupted Sylvester, “You don’t know how deep that Mobutu-Habyarimana bond ran. For it, today FARDC and FDLR are one. So, while your seat was being kicked by Lucifer, we saw a ‘Sadam Hussein mother of all wars’ over our very own Gisenyi town!” Remember, continued Sylvester, what we took for a bluff? Congolese President Tshisekedi averring that, from Goma, he was going to bomb Kigali into a sinkhole? He was dead serious; AFC/M23 was not his concern. In his crosshairs was Kigali and he wasn’t alone. Behind him was a compendium of killer forces, prepared and ready. FARDC/FDLR; Wazalendo plus fellow terrorists; European mercenaries; South Africa/Tanzania/Malawi (as SADC?). Behind them all, MONUSCO and the usually (ill-!) veiled Western hand? None will tell, brother, but Rwandans know. Whatever the case, the earth trembled as ‘Scud missiles’ from across the border rose and then levelled their aim onto Kigali. But what do you know! From scare, residents of Gisenyi burst into jubilation when the bombs overhead popped like champagne cocks. Who would have guessed that Rwanda owned those ‘Patriot missiles’ we thought were a monopoly of Gulf War big powers! (Crooning coups: tail-in-legs “SADC”, Trump talks!) Anyway, the icing on the cake for Rwandans’ celebrations? Nine months later, the 2025 UCI Road World Championships in Kigali, first on the continent, left the world yearning for an encore. Militaro-socio-politico-economic transfor-what? Fundamental change never unfolded its meaning like it has, here.
