Ibuka France and the CRF (Rwandan community living France) have demanded a public, on-air apology from a major French public radio channel which recently aired a revisionist chronicle about the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi as Rwanda marks the 26th commemoration. France Inter, also, part of the government-owned Radio France International, is accused of translating the worst Genocide of the 20th century - during which, in a hundred days, over a million people were murdered - into an object of derision and a stock of humor. Ibuka France, a branch of Rwandan umbrella body of Genocide survivors, and the CRF, condemn the station for playing down the Genocide victims and survivors. Ibuka France and CRF are indignant at the offense made in memory of more than a million victims as well as to the survivors of this genocide, reads a press brief issued Friday by the two Rwandan organizations. According to the statement, the French radios program whose author is ignorant and poor of empathy was intentionally humoristic and derisive. Entitled Journée mondial de réflexion sur le genocide au Rwanda, the chronicle in question aired on April 7th, a particular day when Rwandans enter a week-long commemoration period to remember over a million of victims killed in the 1994 genocide. In a three-minute broadcast, the author saw entertainingly fit to evoke people who had lived together for years and began to cut one another with machetes, before establishing a comparison between the genocide and a pillow fight. To conclude the ill show, bursting out with a general laughter, the author said: pillow or machete, it is played out little by little so that it turns into drama. Except only her words disguised behind the convenient screen of humor, all along the program, according to the statement, the French channel never mentioned anything, nor aired a report, relatable to the reflection of the Genocide against the Tutsi. These words rub the wounds still alive of the survivors for whom this particular day is that of the memory of the murdered and the sufferings endured from April to July 1994, the statement further states. Despite the French stations ill broadcast, April 7 is recognized both by the United Nations and the Republic of France as a day of remembrance and reflection on the Genocide against the Tutsi. Emmanuel Macron, the French President on Tuesday April 7 declared: “This date is from now on part of the Republican calendar, which means the Genocide against the Tutsi will be commemorated each year on the whole territory. Yet, the genocide perpetrators and deniers continue to have a worldwide stage to act out their revisionist scenes, toying with respect for the dignity of the victims and survivors.
