Human Rights Watch (HRW) has come under fire for the umpteenth time, for falsifying reports aimed at tarnishing Rwanda, with this year’s report targeting the country’s hospitality sector growth strategy and inclusivity. The latest comments by the organisation have been disparaged by multiple commentators with many noting that its part of the hatchet job against Rwanda that HRW has pursued for years. For instance, in their latest report issued on Monday, HRW makes sweeping allegations of ‘cleaned streets’ in preparation for the Commonwealth Heads of States and Government Meeting (CHOGM), claiming that some ‘undesired’ citizens were rounded up and taken off the streets. Among those targeted according to the report, are gay and transgender people, sex workers, street children, quoting anonymous sources, who were “interviewed by telephone” by one of their researchers from New York. However, this is debunked by the fact that Rwanda has a clearly defined holistic rehabilitation and reintegration programmes for vulnerable young people and others affected. Without evidence, proof or verifiable facts, HRW alleged that vulnerable young people had been rounded up and taken into detention centre, apparently run by National Rehabilitation Service. This, many commentators said, was bordering on racism, with the authors of the report insinuating that these poor children should be left to lead deplorable lives sleeping in trenches and feeding from the dumpster. By implication, HRW suggests that being on the streets is okay, provided one is poor, vulnerable, marginalized citizens, which is a cynical viewpoint that borders on the racism, according to observers. The government, in collaboration with its partners has invested billions of francs in the National Rehabilitation Service that works to provide holistic rehabilitation and reintegration programmes for vulnerable young people and others affected. Reacting to allegations in the report, Government Spokesperson Yolande Makolo in a tweet termed the report as a calculated attempt to harm a strategic (MICE) sector of the economy through fabrications. “The sabotage won’t work as the allegations are not true. Rwanda does not discriminate, in law, policy or practice, against sexual or gender orientation,” Makolo’s tweet read. This is not the first time that Human Rights Watch has been called out for their falsified, sensationalized reports that serve to pursue the organization’s malicious vendetta against Rwanda. For instance, in 2017, HRW released a report on supposed extrajudicial killings in Rwanda which was later found to be grossly inaccurate. Following the report, a counter investigation carried out by the Rwanda National Human Rights Commission discovered many of the alleged victims – seven of them - turned out to be alive. They turned up at the commission’s offices with their identifications – the same that had been published in the HRW report claiming they had been kidnapped and later executed. Other supposed victims could not be traced and were found unknown in the villages they reportedly came from, while the rest were found to have died of various natural causes – all accounted for by their families.
