The modern, distinct identities of the Banyamulenge, Banyabwisha and Bafumbira are relatively recent constructs. Before colonial borders partitioned the region on October 30, 1911, these communities shared a single, universally recognised identity: the Banyarwanda. Rather than continue identifying as Banyarwanda, they consciously discarded this collective term in favour of place-based identities drawn from Mulenge, Bwisha and Bufumbira.
How did the deeply rooted Banyarwanda identity fragment so rapidly? This article examines the historical catalysts and pivotal turning points that led these communities to adopt distinct identities despite their shared ancestral legacy.
Identity-based tensions involving the Banyarwanda intensified during the 1970s. They faced growing exclusion across the Great Lakes region and official rejection in Masisi, North Kivu, following the Kanyarwanda War (1963–1966), which pitted local Hutu and Tutsi Banyarwanda against the Nande, Hunde and Nyanga. In response, the Congolese army carried out targeted mass killings of Banyarwanda in Masisi.
In Uganda, state hostility towards the Banyarwanda intensified in 1969, when President Milton Obote ordered their registration ahead of a planned deportation. Idi Amin’s 1971 coup halted these plans, but the relief was temporary. After Obote returned to power in 1979, the government systematically expelled members of the community in 1982.
Two main reasons explain why the Banyamulenge, Banyabwisha and Bafumbira rejected the Banyarwanda label in favour of place-based identities. First, this asserted the indigenous Congolese status of the Banyamulenge and Banyabwisha, and the indigenous Ugandan status of the Bafumbira. Second, it allowed them to distance themselves from regional conflicts associated with the Banyarwanda label in Masisi, North Kivu, and Rwanda following the Kanyarwanda War.
In Uganda, the Bafumbira identity gained acceptance, and the community was recognised as part of the indigenous population. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DR Congo), however, recognition of both the Banyamulenge and Banyabwisha faced systematic resistance.
In 1972, President Mobutu Sese Seko granted sweeping citizenship rights to people originating from Rwanda who had settled in the Congo before 1960. In 1981, the Congolese parliament reversed this decision, passing a restrictive law that effectively stripped them of their nationality and left them legally stateless, with no clear path back to citizenship.
From the 1990s to the present, the Congolese government has used this stateless status to label the Banyarwanda as "foreign invaders” or "refugees”, turning the denial of citizenship into a political weapon to justify mass expulsions.
Identity politics transformed Africa’s Great Lakes region in the mid-1970s as local elites began reshaping regional labels. In South Kivu, politician Gisaro Muhoza and leaders from Mwenga, Fizi and Uvira forged a direct connection between their communities and Mulenge. In doing so, they discarded their original designation as the Banyarwanda of South Kivu and adopted the Banyamulenge identity.
At the same time, Hutu elites in Kinshasa, such as Professor Raphaël Nyabirungu, and local leaders in Rutshuru distanced themselves from the Banyarwanda of Masisi. By rejecting the broader Banyarwanda designation, they linked their identity to Bwisha, defining themselves as Banyabwisha.
In Uganda, a movement led by Dr Philemon Budigi Mateke sought official state recognition of the Bafumbira as a distinct ethnic group representing the people of Bufumbira and Kisoro. This effort aimed to legally separate their identity from the broader Banyarwanda classification and anchor it directly to the Ugandan state.
While the Ugandan government recognises the Bafumbira as indigenous citizens, the situation in the DR Congo remains deeply fractured. President Tshisekedi appears to accept the Banyabwisha, whom he identifies as Hutu, yet he continues to deny citizenship rights to South Kivu’s Banyamulenge and other Banyarwanda populations, particularly the Tutsi of North Kivu.
What does this denial mean for President Tshisekedi’s political future? It is too early to tell, but I will examine the long-term consequences in my next piece.
The writer is a media specialist, historian and playwright.