In his column “The Riddle” (Saturday Monitor, July 19th, 2008), Mr. Timothy Kalyegira,in an attempt to examine the international justice system “Can the ICC deliver true justice across the world?” Mixes up entirely unrelated issues and leaves his readers with an incoherent presentation. By seeking to compare the current political crisis in Zimbabwe and the situation in Darfur to the 1994 genocide against Tutsi in Rwanda, as well as trying to ride the “double genocide” revisionist bandwagon, the author betrays either an unprecedented level of ignorance with regard to matters pertaining to his own neighborhood, or an outright revisionist position, which would be sad to say the least. By suggesting that “the Tutsi might have taken part in the genocide”, Mr. Kalyegira demonstrates such level of cruel cynicism, he ends up defeating his own argument. For the Tutsi to have “taken part” in the 1994 genocide, it meant that they would have participated in their own extermination! The genocide in Rwanda was carefully planned and well organized with the Tutsi population as the sole target of extermination. Naturally, therefore, the Tutsi could not have taken part in their own slaughter. If the Tutsi had participated in their own extermination, as Mr. Kalyegira would want the world to believe, the international community and the United Nations in particular would come up with a different description rather than genocide. Like other revisionists before him, Mr. Kalyegira attempts to smuggle the issue of possible reprisals by the Rwandese Patriotic Front (RPF) in the history of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi. On this particular question, there was no such activity as “RPF reprisals”; if anything the RPF is credited not only with putting an end to the genocide, but also for prevailing over individual Rwandans who were bent on taking revenge in the aftermath of the mass slaughter. Timothy Kalyegira’s speculation and innuendos have no basis. That those who planned and organized the genocide against the Tutsi mobilized a section of the Rwandan population to exterminate their compatriots is a matter of public record. For Mr. Kalyegira, therefore, to expect either the victims or indeed those who put an end to the genocide to account for the crime, is simply turning justice on its head. Indeed, there have been efforts to do exactly that by certain European Judges who have attempted to indict Rwandan military leaders, as punishment to stopping the genocide in 1994, a political project fully supported by certain western governments, particularly François Mitterand’s France. By referring to what has been labelled investigations by the French and Spanish Judges who have indicted some of the Rwandan military leaders, and describing the judges as “independent”, Mr. Kalyegira demonstrates a rather high level of naivety, as well as lack of understanding of the role played by certain Western governments in the 1994 genocide and how far they are prepared to go to cover their tracks. If the European judges Mr. Kalyegira describes as “independent” had been truly motivated by a sense of justice, they would certainly have indicted the legions of Rwandan genocide perpetrators, including many of their witnesses, who have found refuge from justice in Europe. If the author had kept abreast with events in his own backyard he would by now be aware that the political nature and vengeful motivation of these indictments were not only exposed but also condemned worldwide, and specifically by the Pan-African Parliament, as well as the African Union Heads of State Summit in Sharm El Sheik, Egypt early this month. Mr. Kalyegira should equally be aware of the fact that Interpol has chosen to ignore the indictments on account that they are nothing but neo-colonialism masquerading as justice. Ends
