Rwanda Inhumanness

By Lewis Sano

The author talks about the testimony of two boys who successively lost their parents during the massacres in the Republic Democratic of Congo, DRC (former Mobutu’s Zaire). The older is an eleven-year-old boy and his little brother is four. I have been orphaned for four years. Upon their return to Rwanda from exile, they had to flee again from their village where their lands and houses have been seized by new settlers who accused them as Genocide perpetrators. They have to live in the street with other kids they consider their brothers and sisters. In his own words, the elder boy says: “I have never had much opportunity in life. You will be able to guess why later. I am a street kid, a mayibobo in my native language. My address, as well as my cell phone number—because everyone needs a cell phone number—is zero, definitely zero. I spend my nights under the bridges of Kigali or under the canopy of high-rises when the police aren’t mean and chase me away. I live perched like a bird! My street companions aren’t friends in the sense that I would share my food with them, but they are my comrades. We were fleeing Death without realizing that he moved with us or behind us, dressed in denim pants, plastic boots, and kepis and speaking Kinyarwanda, Swahili, or English. These soldiers were so cruel! Instead of attacking the people who had the strength to run away, they usually started with the weak who lagged behind. This would include pregnant mothers, children separated from their parents, the old, and the sick.”

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Sep 20, 2019
• ISBN: 9781796060799

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Copyright © 2019 by Lewis Sano.

Library of Congress Control Number:   2019914660

ISBN:       Hardcover                     978-1-7960-6081-2

                 Softcover                        978-1-7960-6080-5

                 eBook                             978-1-7960-6079-9

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Some names and identifying details have been changed to protect the privacy of individuals. Any resemblance to locales or people, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Rev. date: 09/20/2019

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CONTENTS

Life Expectancy: One Second

The Downfall Of Humanity—The Destruction Of Tingi-Tingi

Mayibobo, Mirror Of The Rwandan Society

An Aggravation Situation

Epilogue

Conclusion

To you who are impassioned for justice, peace, and reconciliation in Rwanda.

To all victims of Rwandan heinous crimes inside and out of Rwanda

Human, human, human, human being is everywhere.

Humanness is less but human being is everywhere.

Smile is in everyone’s face but no matter how much it’s fake.

—Gagan Madaan

LIFE EXPECTANCY: ONE SECOND

My mother was assassinated in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), formerly Mobutu’s Zaire, shortly after my birth. My name is Ntazina (no-name). I was born in Zaire, of a mother I never knew. I am four years old (this was in 2000). If my mother had not died so shortly after giving birth to me, she would have undoubtedly named me Birame (miraculous one) because of the conditions under which I was born. Since I am not old enough to recount everything that I’ve seen and lived through, please allow my big brother, who actually became both father and mother to me from the moment of my birth, to relate the story of my life.

At this point, the big brother began his presentation, but stipulated that his story must be heard under these terms: Do not be surprised that I am not an adult. My age has no bearing on my experience. I have many, many years of experience even if, in reality, I am only eleven years old. In my short life, I have been confronted with human wickedness. I ask but one thing of you—that is to be patient with me and tolerant of what I am relating. I may seem too talkative, but please excuse me. Don’t forget, I am old! Allow me a short introduction, but I must warn you—it won’t be as short as you think. I will not give you too many details, but I will stick to the essentials. Improvisation will be my style, and whatever pops into my head, I will share with you. Now that you’ve already forgiven me, I will begin. Believe me, whatever I’m going to tell you will not be a day-to-day replay. No, but I will try to tell you everything that I remember. Even though it was a long time ago, I remember almost everything like it was just yesterday. Please don’t expect a systematic exposé from me or a child’s make-believe story. I promise that I am serious. My name is Mbazende (which translates as ‘upon whom we repute all that has befallen us’).

The following account will be that of Mbazende’s, but often interspersed with comments from the author. I invoke your patience and understanding. The child has given his testimony in the local language, Kinyarwanda; and a liberal translation has been made by the writer. In this chapter, he frequently uses the collective we, which, at times, refers to the two children, at other times to the mayibobos in general. It may also refer to those suffering hardships, for whom Mbazende is a spokesperson and whose story echoes that of all refugees. He has appointed himself as a voice for those who have no voice. The analyses and comments in this section serve to describe the miserable state of life in Rwanda and the social inequity that ravages Rwanda today.

I’m an eleven-year-old orphan. I have been orphaned for four years. I have never had much opportunity in life. You will be able to guess why later. I am a street kid, a mayibobo in my native language. My address, as well as my cell phone number—because everyone needs a cell phone number—is zero, definitely zero. I spend my nights under the bridges of Kigali or under the canopy of high-rises when the police aren’t mean and chase me away. I live perched like a bird! My street companions aren’t friends in the sense that I would share my food with them, but they are my comrades.

In the Rwandan culture, a name can designate a wish by the parents for that child. It can also shed light on the situation into which the child is born. So the name Mbazende also means the child born during the time of a war that interrupted a period of peace. This name raised questions by many Rwandans at the beginning of the so-called Dirty War of October 1, 1990. Ntazina’s name signifies that there was no one there to name him. Normally, it is the father who names the child, and in his absence, the mother. Both of Ntazina’s parents were already dead. Though Birame was the name that his mother had whispered, it did not hold up legally because his older brother had uttered it publicly, and children do not have the right to name their younger siblings. So the name Ntazina, which was a nickname given to him by others, became accepted as his real name.

This testimony was given in the year 2000, when Mbazende was eleven. Since it was not possible to make it public then, I prudently decided to wait for the opportune time to publish this book. I was still in Rwanda, where freedom of speech does not exist, except in official documents presented to the international community in order to win awards for good governance. Since I have recorded here not only testimony but also comments and analyses, there will be many things that will seem anachronistic. We need to understand them in today’s light. Although the child’s recounting of his story was not ongoing or sequential, we should respect his testimony. He recalls information as he remembers events, and I have decided to put them into chronological order.

In order to be a good Rwandan citizen, one must own a very nice vehicle (preferably a jeep), a nice villa (preferably in Nyarutarama or Remera village), and a cell phone for the management of one’s affairs. Our companions are either mayibobo like us, or bandits, or brothers, or prostitutes, who we call our sisters, when they are too drunk to make their way home from the nightclubs and join us in the streets.

Consequently, I am a townsman—not because I was born in the capital city of Kigali, but because here, I find all that I need to live. The rubbish cans provide me with food. To fall asleep, I rely on drugs; I have to find a little bit of gasoline that I suck up from a soaked cloth, or I need to drink a little specialized glue, as if I were a pair of shoes. Thanks to the glue—if I’m out of hemp—I sleep under the stars like a baby, with not a care in the world. I don’t have any blankets, and I have only one pair of pants and the short- sleeved shirt I’m wearing. I would never have been able to get any sleep without these drugs. Head lice and fleas are my daily companions. They never leave me alone. They suck my blood mercilessly, but I understand them very well. Where can they find nourishment? They were created parasites to live on humans and animals. These lice are also an unimaginable asset to us. They keep us busy during lonely and sometimes terrifying nights, when it is raining or when the electricity goes out, as it often has lately in Kigali. I love these parasites because at least they have the human heart to accompany us wherever we go. They crawl all over our bodies and clothes, reminding us that we are forsaken and abandoned children.

The bandits are our other inseparable companions, but we see them mostly at night. They send us to watch over their hit targets. Unfortunately, once they’ve robbed the place, they abandon us without paying us our commission. They are robbers even to that extent.

The prostitutes of Kigali are also our nightly companions. Often, they’ll spend the night with us in the streets or under the bridges of Kigali, when they are dead drunk and not able to get home. We know how to select the prettiest and the youngest. It’s those who are our age or a little older who attract us the most. Those as old as the sky don’t interest us much, even if they pay us to allow them to cuddle up next to us for the night. I can put up with anything—days without eating, surviving the nights, the fatigue, and walking many kilometers.

One time, the police sent us, by force, to Gikongoro in big trucks. They wanted us to live there a life controlled by the rhythm of drums and whistles like the soldiers or recruits did. I didn’t like this lifestyle where you had to eat when you weren’t hungry and sleep when you weren’t tired or drugged, sleep for the sheer pleasure of sleeping. After three days, I was back in Kigali with most of my buddies. It was the same scenario when the police drove us out of the country to the island of Iwawa, situated in Lake Kivu, far from Kigali. I was back in Kigali in two weeks. I was afraid that I would have to relive the same scenario as beforehand in Zaire. Besides, we were not far from the country (Zaire) that took away all of my family, including my dear cousin Kayirangwa.

Consequently, I crossed over on foot, pursued by the compatriots. I hated living where one guy—umuginga ufata ibyemezo wenyine akagutegeka kuryama utabishaka—thinks for everyone. They considered us immature and crazy. They ignored the fact that we were very resourceful! I hated what they called dormitory. The first night sleeping between sheets was funny, believe me! I’m used to sleeping on a cardboard box or rolled up in a bag. In no way could I sleep there, where the lice couldn’t get in and where I couldn’t look at the sky to count the stars and thank God for the shiny things.

Forgive me for being so long-winded in my presentation and allow me to present my younger brother—or my child, if you will, since he calls me Dad. I believe that he has reason to. I’m seven years older than he is, and he never knew our dad. It’s too bad! My mom named him Birame. This name means a survivor of so many evils that attacked him. This explanation does not come from me. It came from my mother. Actually, before succumbing to savage gunfire, she explained everything to me. "Birame, she said, means ‘one who has miraculously survived.’ This name that I’m giving to your baby brother, my child—it carries with it my wish. I want him to have a life so that he will grow up and return to the land of our ancestors."

As she lay dying, before taking her last breath, she told me that I must always carry my little brother on my back, never in my arms or on my head. She insisted that I must not seek revenge, even in my adult years, because God does not love those who seek vengeance. I’ve always kept that thought in my mind. But believe me or not, it is difficult to remain faithful to her wishes. What really happened? This is the story.

AN ARDUOUS ODYSSEY

Before speaking of this way of the cross, I just remembered something that will never be erased from my memory: the attack on the refugee camp in Kibumba. We were living in that refugee camp with all of my family, including many cousins with whom we had lived in the camps for displaced persons, from the moment the Rwandan Patriotic Army (RPA) had chased us from our villages and our homes in 1990. During our exile in Zaire, we lived here in the camp at Kibumba. I could see volcanoes overhead. I didn’t like to look at them; they terrified me. I knew that therein lived Akavumburamashyiga kavumbura abana banga kuryama ntacyo bariye (those flame-spitting eaters of children who cry in the night and refuse to go to bed when they haven’t had anything to eat), or so my mom used to tell me. These children refused to go to sleep until the parents would find something they could chew on. To me, the volcanoes resembled gigantic straw houses with roofs of manioc flour. [Mbazende referred to the clouds hovering over them]

I clearly remember the day that the RPA besieged our camp and seeing my father cry—my beloved father who always told me that a man never cries! It was the first and only time I ever saw him cry. He said that the camp was surrounded by soldiers. He was crying at the thought of losing us, as he had lost other family members in 1994 during the destruction of camps for those displaced by war. His loved ones died at the hands of the same army, the RPA. He didn’t think that we had any chance of survival. He began an inventory of all our relatives who had perished in warfare because of this army’s attack, launched from Uganda on October 1, 1994. Mom also made an inventory of her family members who had died during that war. Dad spoke of his little brother killed at Kinihira, a no-man’s land, or buffer zone between the positions of these two armies, Rwandan Patriotic Army, RPA, and Rwandan Army Forces, from 1992 to 1994. They had been killed by rebels. Grandfather had been killed in the region of Kagitumba during the first moment of attacks in 1990. My grandmother died of diarrhea in Goma, along with many more of our relatives. My two sisters had also been reported missing there.

After the destruction of this camp at Kibumba, we headed for the Katale refugee camp near Rutshuru, in northeastern Kivu. We had to pass through the jungle of Rumangabo, where the Zairian military took shots at us. We spent only a short time at Katale because a few days later, the same soldiers who destroyed Kibumba sacked this camp and destroyed it too. We abandoned it. It was during this second attack that I learned to differentiate the sound of various weapons—simple guns, machine guns, and mortars. I lived in the 4th Quarter. During the attack on Katale, my neighbor was killed by a bomb. Our burende (homes made with plastic tarps) were built side by side. The United Nations Zairian Contingent for Camp Security, (the UNZCCS) soldiers told us that the enemy had taken a detour, the road leading back to Rwanda from where they had come. But this was not true; they said this because they wanted to keep us calm. These soldiers had been abdicating and surrendering their positions on frontier lines to enemy soldiers. ZCCS had made a decision to leave us long before then. In other words, they had sold us to the enemy. During those days, I saw with my own eyes the UNZCCS (United Nations Zairian Contingent for Camp Security) soldiers packing up their belongings. After their departure, the assailants threw bombs and grenades on all sides of the camp, and shots were fired all over. They killed the people who got caught, using anything they had, possibly knives or hoes. Mortars and bomb launchers were placed all over the camp, especially at Biruma to the north of camp and at Karengera to the south as well as in the cafes and near the 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th Quarters.

The camp had been established in an old park once inhabited by animals. But a long time before our coming, Ugandan refugees had tried to settle there. They had evacuated shortly thereafter because of areas emitting noxious volcanic gases called mazouks. We were in danger of asphyxiation by these gases that killed anything that had blood running through it, breathed, or came near it. Stories had been told how, in the past, Ugandan refugees died, cause unknown. Some chose, then, to go back home, thinking that it was maleficent spirits that had