DB: Now in 1996, in March, then again in October while you were in Congo, there were several Spanish priests and nuns killed in Rwanda. Do you know anything about these incidents?

JCN: What happened there, every outsider…priests, nuns, none of them could survive because they were accused of supporting the former regime. The RPF killed many of the priests all across the country and as you know many of Rwanda’s religious figures were assassinated in Gakurizo. They slaughtered bishops, nuns, and priests, especially Hutus. Another reason to kill the Spanish priests was because they helped resist the Tutsi monarchy in the past. They empowered Hutu with education through their missions. Also, the Spanish priests knew the RPF massacred Bagogwe,1 who the RPF said were killed by Interahamwe. The RPF believed the Spanish priests and nuns were reporting RPF massacres of Hutu to the international community and NGOs.

DB: Do you believe now, we saw that the RPF was particularly violent towards Hutu in the north, towards the so-called “Bakiga.”

JCN: Yes.

DB: Do you believe that comes from their resistance to the monarchy? That Paul Kagame was carrying out an old feud so-to-speak?

JCN: Yes, I believe that is true. Even before when we had the monarchy in the country, it was rejected in the north and many of my fellow citizens, I mean those who were educated, were still threatened for not collaborating with the regime. I remember in 1996, Tito Rutaremara, the RPF’s main philosopher, his brother Jill Rutaremara,2 General Nyamwasa, and Antoine Mugesera, another RPF philosopher who actually is changing the history of Rwanda in Butare University, organized a meeting were they wanted to learn why the Bakiga did not accept a monarchy and minority rule. It was held in Ruhengeri town. Dr. Twagirayezy was there as an attendee and he actually wants to testify about this event as I told you before. They brought a document for everyone to sign as a contract agreeing to RPF rule in order to bring security back to the region and the person who signed it took an oath not to undermine the RPF’s efforts. Many of the people that gathered there were killed; especially those who refused to sign the document.

DB: Some individuals have brought up Paul Kagame’s own unique bloodlines that extend back to the monarchy. Does this influence his domestic policies?

JCN: In my country, we have a president, but we really have an unofficial monarchy. You know, in that country we have two competitive clans: Abanyiginya and Abega. They have been killing each other for power, you know, and whatever clan was in charge of the monarchy always killed local Hutu chiefs to expand their influence. Have you ever heard about the Kalinga?

DB: Yes, I have heard about that. It was a symbolic royal war drum.

JCN: Yea, they hung the testicles of Hutu from it for about four centuries.

DB: I have heard of it before, but I always wondered if it was real or just propaganda to demonize the monarchy.

JCN: It’s true. It’s true.

DB: Do you think his ties to the royal family help him keep the loyalty of some RPF members? 3

JCN: I know that he is related to one of the royal family, I don’t know, one of them was killed in the genocide.

DB: Oh, yes. That was his aunt. It’s his aunt Rosalie Gicanda. She was the Queen Mother.

JCN: Yes, I heard about that, but I already know, Kagame does not want the rule of a monarchy to become official because the king has to answer before the Tutsi council, “Abiru”, a council that holds the real power over the country. That is exactly the same council used in gacaca courts today to decide every Hutu’s fate.

DB: Are you saying that if he formally becomes king, he would have to answer to somebody?

JCN: Yes, and this is the big issue. Kagame is from the Abega tribe, so he hates the Abanyiginya who for four centuries were ruling the country before a revolution took place in 1959 to overthrow the monarchy and install a Republican regime. He is the king of Rwanda under the president’s label. He decides everyone’s destiny, takes or gives to anybody he likes or dislikes. The entire power is in his hands. Whoever says anything contrary to his will gets arrested or killed by his death squads. He says how everything must be done. I think you understand this.

DB: I saw President Kagame speak at Amahoro Stadium on Liberation Day last year and it was particularly remarkable how different his attitude was during his speech from his trips abroad. His delivery and word choice had so much more conviction and was so stern compared to when he is speaking abroad.

JCN: Also, in 1996, Kagame said that he would destroy the refugee camps in Congo anytime he wanted due to the fact they did not listen to him when he asked them to return to Rwanda. Then, after they forcibly returned, he invited the public to Amahoro Stadium and he had a group of Hutu refugees march before everyone in the stadium. He said, “You see these Interahamwe marching in front of you. They aren’t human anymore. Look at them! And they tell people they can attack Rwanda! They are nothing! Nothing!”

DB: Now in 1997, there were a number of assassinations in your country. In January and February, you had several U.N. observers killed.

JCN: If it was January or February, I don’t remember, but the killings were blamed on ex-FAR while it was really more RPF crimes. All of those ex-FAR who were sent back to Rwanda were told they would be integrated into the new RPF army. Many of them believed that and later in January they were killed together with their families and neighbors. This carnage took place in Rwanda during thirty straight days of killings. RPF soldiers and Local Defense Forces started by killing the high ranking ex-FAR officers together with their wives, children and all their neighbors so that nobody could testify. They killed everybody within one kilometer of the targeted neighborhood.

DB: Do you know Kiswahili by chance?

JCN: Yes, I do.

DB: You know the word, “Fagia?”

JCN: Yeah, fagia means “finish the job.”

DB: Ok. I am aware that Kagame….

JCN: Yes, that’s…

DB: …used that word to speak of such operations.

JCN: …to finish the job.

DB: So essentially, it’s….it’s a complete extermination of one’s bloodline in a sense, if it’s a targeted individual.

JCN: Yes. “Fagia” meaning to kill him or them, those who were targeted….nobody could survive.

DB: Yes.

JCN: We know that many people here, there, everywhere were killed in a different manner. The RPF used akandoya and other times, they forced someone to kill their own friend, bury them, and then the RPF killed them also. They used such cruel methods, not just killing someone but humiliating them first.

DB: What you just described, this was all around Ruhengeri?

JCN: Yes, Ruhengeri Prefecture was like….it was horrible.

DB: Now, when the U.N. observers were murdered on the 4th of February, I have it at the Karengera Commune near Cyangugu and that a Briton was among those killed. Only about a week earlier, several Spanish medical workers for Medicos del Mundo were killed and an American worker was among those wounded.4 There’s currently a pending lawsuit against several Rwandan military officials for this incident.5 What were these events about?

JCN: The RPF was always up there in 1997. They were always by the border area. We were told Interahamwe were crossing the border and killing people, but for us in the north, we never saw any Interahamwe as far as I can remember, but we saw many people getting killed. There were times around one hundred people were killed in Cyamabuye Pentecostal Church and in several schools, but they officially reported these killings were criminal acts by the Interahamwe, but this was not true. The RPF and Local Defense Forces killed everybody in the area and at the end of the day, RPF local authorities reported that all of them were killed by Interahamwe or by ex-FAR insurgents crossing over from Congo. The soldiers would even take weapons with them and leave them with the bodies and say they were Hutu infiltrators. Nobody could take a risk and say that RPF was involved in those massacres. Another trick that the RPF used is they went to your home at night and brought a pair of boots and left them there. In the morning, they came back and said that you were using the boots to help Interahamwe cross Lake Kivu into Rwanda. As a result, they killed those people and told everyone they were helping the insurgents.Those Spanish citizens, they died like so many Rwandans did. They were not killed by insurgents; they were killed by RPF soldiers and LDF (Local Defense Forces). As I said earlier, the RPF killed Bagogwe in that area and said the Interahamwe killed them. They added that the genocide is underway again. Those aid workers knew about this and were going to report it.6

DB: Then in February, as I mentioned, another priest was killed and then several U.N. were killed in Karengera.

JCN: Cyangugu?

DB: Yea. Was this a similar situation?

JCN: Yes. The RPF believed those guys were giving information to the international community and the RPF had a policy to kill without being seen or finish the job without any eyewitness to their crimes. That’s also what happened to the Canadian priest in Ruhengeri and to the Croatian priests and so on…

DB: I want to ask a question specifically about the Local Defense Forces. When I was in Rwanda, as I was coming in from the countryside, I saw soldiers in camouflage uniforms patrolling along the road to Kigali, particularly around the forests. In the forests, there were also soldiers blending in amongst the forest, presumably for border security. In Kigali, there were armed men, typically young, who wore pink uniforms, but not the prison uniforms. I was told by Rwandans they were called the “Local Defense Force.” Who were these different groups of soldiers?

JCN: You have guys who, most of those guys in the countryside roads are RPF. The Local Defense Force does not wear a uniform out there. They look like ordinary Rwandans. But all in all, they were Abakada as we Rwandans call them. Those guys travel in groups of five, all men, and they patrol the area they are in charge of. They are not paid and they do whatever they want in the area they control. Their main training camps are in Mutobo, Gabiro, and Gishari. But also, there are these so-called “Rasta,” who are Hutu soldiers, sometimes even ex-FAR, that work for and are under RPF supervision.7

DB: So it is a paramilitary unit.

JCN: A paramilitary unit as you said, yes, but they received training from RPF officers. They even make maps and generate plans together with RPF soldiers for their military operations.

DB: That helps clarify things for me a bit. Now just one more question with regards to specific military units. One well-known military unit in Rwanda is the Presidential Guard. In Rwanda today, in current times, what role does this unit play? What is their mission? Is it only to provide physical protection for President Kagame?

JCN: The Presidential Guard, what it is…ok. Everywhere President Kagame goes in the country; they are part of his escort and must be there with him. They are all chosen to do the job, you cannot volunteer. It is run by Frank Nziza. They are mostly used in special death squad missions inside and outside the country. There is no denying also they have received training by U.S. Special Forces and some of them, including U.S. intelligence-gathering units, are based in Kigali-Kacyiru?.

DB: When I was in Kigali, I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to tour the KIST (Kigali Institute of Science and Technology) school grounds. I asked some of the students there what they were going to do once they graduated. All of them told me they were going to work for their country. Since it is a technology-education school, they said they were going to work for firms like Terracom and other state-owned telecommunications firms. What is the relationship between schools, jobs, and political ideology in Rwanda?

JCN: Let me explain to you the job situation as I understand it. In the countryside, we were told by Rwandans coming from Kigali there was nowhere to go. I went to Kigali by taxi and got a job at Sulfo-Rwanda? Industries, an Indian-owned mining company. When I worked there, every intellectual Hutu had to pay 5,000 Rwandan Francs8 every week to their supervisor. This guy who worked there, he was a friend of Rose Kabuye’s9 husband. He told me if I didn’t pay him every week, he will come back to find me and my new home would be 1930, meaning the central prison in Kigali. I was afraid so I paid every week on Friday. They told me, “You have to know what happened to other Hutus.” He also told me he’s saving my life and I actually do agree with that. After that, I decided to try and find another job. I went for an interview with the UNDP (United Nations Development Project) and a Tutsi woman refused to give me access to the person in charge of interviews. She said I had to bring proof that I have a job from the Ministry of Industry. I told her, “No, I got a job at Sulfo-Rwanda? you cannot ask me to bring such proof. Everyone there knows me.” She responded, “That’s your business.” Then I left and understood I would never get that job.Also, there was a guy connected to Sulfo-Rwanda?, Froduald Karamira, who was killed on February 14th, 1997. I was in Nkuli Commune on that day, which is now known as Buhoma District. He was accused of being a Hutu extremist so he fled to India through his contacts at Sulfo-Rwanda?. He was arrested in Bombay and instead of being sent to the ICTR, he was deported back to Rwanda. In return, India was given a contract to supply the RPF military with TATA vehicles. Karamira admitted he was guilty and the RPF took him and a woman lawyer to Nyabugogo and shot them in public. However, the real reason he was shot was so the RPF could confiscate his property, just like they did with Kabuga’s properties. Clever, huh?Every Hutu lived like this. You had to work for the government, for the RPF. They used other workers to keep informed about every newcomer, everyone who’s starting work. To understand this, let me give you an example. Today, when you graduate, you must go to a training center at Gikondo for brainwashing to get a job. Every semester, some graduates are chosen to be sent there from among all the universities in Rwanda. Nobody knows where that person is going and then they return later, both Hutu and Tutsi, determined to kill anyone who opposes the RPF. You spend six months at the center. They give you a list of people to hate, people who are supposed to be opponents of the RPF. People are taught to hate their own parents and friends if they oppose the RPF. These people spy on everyone else at work and report suspicious people to the Department of Military Intelligence. After one and a half years of living in this hell, I fled to Nairobi.

DB: That was when you eventually moved out of Africa?

JCN: At that time, my wife was regularly travelling to Kigali. Many people thought she looked like a Tutsi so she didn’t have as much trouble. The third time she went there, her friends were killed. She came back and told me to leave. We got a traveling permit and I traveled to Kigali. The last day I fled to Kampala and from there I went to Nairobi. After Seth died, I left Africa. I am not afraid to say that. I have nothing to hide.DB: What happened in Bwindi Forest in 1999?JCN: You know Americans were killed there right?

DB: Well, there were reports that an armed group came and killed some western tourists. Some said it was Interahamwe, others said it was a Ugandan rebel group like the ADF (Allied Democratic Forces) or NALU (National Army for the Liberation of Uganda). There were different….

JCN: If you ask me that question, I will ask you why you the Bagogwe tribe got killed in Gisenyi. Who is the perpetrator? The same one who killed the American tourists: the RPF soldiers and Paul Kagame. After Madeline Albright arrived in Rwanda….

DB: This was where?

JCN: I was in Rwanda, in the countryside, in my commune of origin. Albright left to go to Congo or something like that. After they left Rwanda, Bagogwe were killed by the RPF and they reported the Interahamwe did it. Albright and…I don’t remember the other one; she was in African Affairs Department.

DB: That would be Susan Rice.

JCN: Yes, Miss Susan Rice. She also came back to Rwanda with Albright and met with Paul Kagame. After the meeting she approved his allegations that the Interahamwe killed the Bagogwe. Everybody knows that version of facts is incorrect. The Prefect of Gisenyi, Epimaque, said on Radio Rwanda the Bagogwe were killed because they were stealing potatoes. Kagame got mad about that and removed him. Exactly the same thing happened to the tourists, the American tourists. This was an act of terrorism.10 On that same day, in Jenda District, where I was born, and also in Nkuli, RPA soldiers killed at least 500 civilians on November 21st. Susan Rice did not say anything about this. Why did she condemn this crime and accuse Hutus before an independent inquiry team went there to investigate?

DB: Are you saying the RPF committed all those crimes?

JCN: Of course, I know this for sure. I also know that they even killed Tutsis in different areas, including a Tutsi agriculturist in Ruhengeri. I don’t know his name unfortunately, but he was an agriculturalist who worked at the plantations in the countryside of Nkuli and Karago communes. He was killed at the Adventist Church in Rwankeli, Nkuli Commune with his wife, children, and fifteen neighbors. The RPF blamed the Abacengezi.11 In total, seventeen people were killed that day in the same area.

Also that year, in January 1997, one RPF soldier was killed in public because he was supposed to kill some people, but did not. There was a Hutu woman who came to ask for her husband’s house back because it had been taken over by Tutsis. For this courageous act, the woman had to die. The soldier who was ordered to shoot her did not do so and that RPF soldier was killed for not following instructions. He was shot in public. So when Paul Kagame says he punished those who were involved in killings, it’s not really true. The RPF soldiers who did follow such orders, they were glorified and promoted to the highest military rankings. For example, Colonel Ibingira after he massacred displaced people in Kibeho. There was also (Faustin-Kayumba) Nyamwasa, (Jackson) Nziza, (Gerald) Gahima, (Charles) Zilimwabagabo…as a matter of fact; the RPF punishes those who don’t kill Hutus. Can you believe that? You can’t believe this. But it’s true.

DB: Let’s talk about another one of those cases you just mentioned. Can you tell me about Kibeho?

JCN: Yes, Kibeho, I cannot forget that because I had a good friend who was killed there. Remember, you asked me in the beginning about how people in Butare were killed by the RPF soldiers while U.N. forces were there? University workers, students, and teachers were massacred in front of the U.N. peacekeeping forces. At first, the Rwandans who ended up in that camp were going to flee to the southern region of Congo, but this did not happen because they were told they would be protected by the U.N. peacekeeping forces. At that time, Octave Iligukunze, a classmate and a friend of mine at Moscow University was there. He was there with other Hutu intellectuals at the camp and… you know what, I’ll never, ever see him again because the RPF killed all of them. They were told to go to Kibeho and after that, Paul Kagame gave an ultimatum and told them leave the camps. He said the RPF is going to close the camps in Rwanda starting with Kibeho because it was not necessary for them to stay open because the country is now safer than it was before. The result was catastrophic, unspeakable killings done with U.N. and UNHCR complicity. The RPF started by using machine guns and mortars to destroy the camp; destroy the houses, to destroy all the people. They killed women, children, and young guys from the university that were there. This was a bloody planned genocide as I told you before; genocide planned very well by the RPF leadership. No Hutu intellectual could be allowed survive. If you survived Kibeho, you had to go to the countryside and stay there until you disappeared or were killed very far from the U.N. observers in Kigali. We had no rights. We were treated animals that had to be butchered. No more, no less. Luckily, I had a chance to escape and go to Kigali. How did I get there? Through bribery and corruption…using whatever I could so that I could go there.

DB: To Kigali?

JCN: Yes. I know how my friends got killed at the same time as I left my area for Kigali, but you have asked me about Kibeho so…Kibeho was really our tragic history to live with. I don’t…I compare it to the Jewish Auschwitz. During the morning, starting at about 04:00, they started shooting and using all kinds of weapons, including heavy artillery to kill them. They killed a lot of innocent people. They did not care. U.N. soldiers from Australia that were there have said they are ready to testify anywhere if they are asked. They saw everything.12 There was also an organization that included this lady named Kleine who has a website where you can find pictures of the mass graves.13 You have seen those?

DB: Yea, I’ve seen those.

JCN: So the guy, Paul Kagame, decided to close the camps using this guy named Fred Ibingira, who was promoted to the rank of General a few months later. He worked with Jacques Bihozagara, who was first promoted to be the Rwandan Ambassador to Belgium then later as the Ambassador to France for having killed so many people. You know that I talked about him already. He was killing people in Ruhengeri before getting appointed to a higher position. Also, there was Major Rubagumya Gacinya, who headed the CID (Criminal Investigation Division) and was recently named the military attaché at the Rwandan Embassy in Washington D.C.

Now, let’s talk about happened to my people, my fellow citizens. President Bizimungu went to Kibeho because he was afraid of Kagame and he told everybody only a few hundred were killed there. At the same time, how many really died? Most people say eight thousand people but I met a guy from the UNHCR who told me twenty-one thousand died, including Kibeho and the surrounding area.

DB: I found some similar information that I would like to share with you and get your reaction. It started on the 22nd or 23rd, but the day after the killings, the United States Embassy sent its Defense Attaché Officer (DAO), whose name is Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Odom, along with Mr. Mickey Dunham, the Operations Officer in the Defense Attaché Office at the U.S. Embassy to Kibeho to find out exactly what happened.14

JCN: Yea.

DB: They spoke with Sam Kaka, Colonel Nyamwasa, Charles Muhire, and Lieutenant Colonel Karenzi. When they left, they told U.S. Ambassador David Rawson that 2,000 were killed in Kibeho. Now this is what Lieutenant Colonel Odom, a well-trained and veteran military officer said was his reasoning for his estimate. He determined eight thousand or more bodies could not possibly have been moved overnight because there were only five thousand RPF soldiers in the area, which wasn’t enough manpower to move that many bodies and also remove all the shell casings it would have taken to shoot that many people.15After that, Ambassador Rawson called in a lawyer named Maurice Nyberg, an American who was part of the U.N. Special Investigations Unit that eventually became the ICTR. Anyway, he investigated Kibeho for a month and stayed with Lieutenant Colonel Odom at the house of the U.S. Embassy’s Political Officer at the time, (then) Ms. Laura Lane. Whatever Mr. Nyberg discovered was never made public.16 The reason I bring this up, first it is clear the U.S. was on the ground in Kibeho very quickly after the event. Second, there are no indications they ever interrogated any surviving refugees in the camp. What are your thoughts on this?

JCN: Of course, this is ridiculous and shameful. I don’t understand how the U.S. could support such criminals.

DB: To move on from that subject, you, now in 1993, you were in Moscow for graduate school?

JCN: Yes, up to February 28th, 1993.

DB: Can you tell me what happened when you got back to Rwanda?

JCN: Well, I told you about the February attack in 1993. I thought there would be peace in Rwanda; otherwise I wouldn’t have gone back. What I remember is that the RPF signed the Arusha Accords. Rwandans thought those accords would be implemented, but the RPF had another agenda. Many people in Rwanda were hopeful the fighting would end, but, for the U.S. and the U.K., as RPF backers, this would be a tragedy because the RPF would lose the elections because they killed so many people and nobody wanted them in power after what they experienced. That is why RPF had to step up to the second level; to step up to the killing of Hutu political leaders like Gatabazi, Bucyana, Rwambuka and Gapyisi. The RPF expected the Hutu to react by killing Tutsis so the RPF could resume hostilities and say they were defending Tutsi, but this did not happen. Eventually, they stepped to the 3rd level and eliminated President Juvenal Habyarimana and hoped Hutus would be too angry to stay calm. Without that, the RPF could not seize power and accomplish the final agenda of going to the Congo to payback their debts to their backers.

DB: You believed the Arusha Accords would hold?

JCN: Myself, yes. I believed Hutu and Tutsi finally had a chance to live together without too many problems.

DB: Where did you go when you first arrived back in Rwanda?

JCN: I stayed in Kigali because I came back with Jews, Russian Jews who wanted to establish a company in Kigali for mineral resources.

DB: Do you know the name of the company?

JCN: Excuse me?

DB: Do you know the name of the company?

JCN: (Long pause)

DB: That’s ok if you don’t remember.

JCN: (Laughs) I will be telling you sometime maybe. I had a problem with the Rwandan Government because they said we cannot accept their offer because there was already another company mining the mineral resources. They did not want the Russians to go in there. They asked me to pay six thous-…er, six million Rwandan Francs unfortunately. I refused. I was so angry. In the end, we had to negotiate and we paid four to five million for the startup costs.

DB: So at some point, you said you went home to…er, you said you accepted a job at the university in Gisenyi.

JCN: What happened to me was, after that, people from the MRND said, “This guy, Jean-Christophe? is not helping so we have to work with someone else, we have to discuss directly with the Russians.” They decided to remove me and send me to Gisenyi. Before I came back to Rwanda, I had not even heard of this university, but I went because they asked me to and I had no choice.

DB: Who asked you to go?

JCN: They were people from the MRND. One of them belonged to Habyarimana’s family. They were angry with me, but I really don’t want to talk about this. Actually, in 1993, this is why I decided to pursue my PhD studies in Canada. First, I had a proposal from the U.S. Embassy, but later I decided to go to Canada after winning a French speaking scholarship that gave me the possibility to pursue PhD studies. I told the Canadian Embassy not to tell anyone because I was afraid they would find out and put an end to my dreams. I later resigned from the institute after March 5th and I got a letter from the Rwandan Embassy in Canada that I was chosen to fly to Canada. I didn’t tell anyone at the university where I was going for security reasons. Fortunately, at that time, everything went smoothly. What happened later in the beginning of April, it was unthinkable for me because the Canadian Embassy told me I had to prepare to leave for Canada in April 1994. Then, you know what happened next.

DB: Right.

JCN: The death of Habyarimana.

DB: You mentioned that you first had an offer to go abroad through the U.S. Embassy. How did you forge ties with the United States Embassy?

JCN: Ok, first of all, I needed books for my studies at the Institute so I got some contacts the embassy and they put me in touch with their Political Affairs officer named Linda. She told me there was no problem and she was going to help me. She said she could also get books from the U.S. and she did. I got many books from her. She also gave me a pass to attend a July 4th celebration held at the U.S. Embassy in 1993. After that, she told me that I could maybe get a Fulbright Scholarship to go to the U.S. and get my PhD. I said, “Ok. I have to tell those MRND guys who sent me to the university.” They told me that there was no problem to go to the U.S. I just had to wait and decide with Linda. In January 1994, she told me I really should go, but I thought the Arusha Accords would hold so I did not go. I have no idea if she knew that something was going to happen and was trying to warn me. I regret that I did not go because of what happened to me after that was not really….it was my fault. I made a mistake.

DB: But you honestly believed the Arusha Accords would work?

JCN: Yea.

DB: Ok. So you told Linda Buggeln at the U.S. Embassy you were not going to go and the Arusha Accords were already signed but not implemented. Then there were a series of political assassinations in Rwanda. You mentioned these names earlier. Gapyisi, Rwambuka, Gatabazi, Bucyana…what can you tell me about what it was like in Rwanda at that time? Who was responsible for these killings and did they influence the intensity of the genocide?

JCN: As I told you before, the killings were part of the strategy of genocide, so that mass killings of Tutsi would occur in Rwanda. It was a plan that was initiated by the RPF leadership because the RPF knew they could not seize power under the Arusha Accords. They had to have mass killings of Tutsi so they could start the final aggression and say that they were fighting to stop the killings when all they really wanted was to seize power. They had to get people to kill Tutsis and the killing of Hutu in the northwest of my country was obviously not enough to generate that kind of hate. People got angry and their anger was rising day after day towards the RPF, but they were not attacking Tutsi civilians. The second step was to create strong tension between the people to prepare them for killing. You are going to ask me how. In the beginning, they started by killing the heads of prefectures. They watched the reaction from the government, from others, you know, the chairmen of political parties, and they saw Rwandans acting disciplined. Rwandans were not reacting to every single RPF attack, every assassination. So they said, “Ok, we have people in power that really have influence in this country. Let’s start with them.”They started by killing Emmanuel Gapyisi of the MDR (Democratic Republican Movement) in May 1993.17 Gapysi was very intellectual and he was supposed to replace Habyarimana, as I understood it at the time. He was from the south, but was supported by Hutu in both the north and the south. He created a kind of a…he was in the right place at the right moment. The RPF saw that he was going to replace Habyarimana and possibly help unite Hutu in the north and the south, which was not in their interests.Then in August 1993, the RPF decided to really raise tensions by killing Fidele Rwambuka, the Mayor of Kanzenze Commune from the MRND party. These assassinations were trigger points and each time the RPF killed one of them, they thought the militias of their political parties would react by killing Tutsi, which would allow the RPF to resume aggressions. When they killed Fidel Rwambuka, there were riots but no lynching, so nothing happened.In February 1994, they killed Felicien Gatabazi of the PSD (Social Democratic Party). He was going home and the RPF killed him at the gate to his house. People say that Eric Hakizimana led the death squad that killed him. In 1993, when the RPF was killing people in the north and they attacked Ruhengeri, they destroyed the electricity source, water supply…they destroyed everything. Gatabazi, who was the Minister of Public Works, said, “We can’t trust the RPF anymore. What they did is a crime against humanity. How could they do this knowing that ninety percent of the population used that water? Why did they destroy it?”18 After he said that, he was killed because the RPF knew they would no longer have his support. You see, he went too far because he sent the Abakombozi19 to train with RPF soldiers in Mulindi. They thought he had no right to criticize them. That’s why they killed him. After he was killed, Abakombozi militias of the PSD got angry and started riots with the CDR (Coalition for the Defense of the Republic)20 militia, the Impuzamugambi21, who they thought had killed Gatabazi. This was just what the RPF wanted. See, after Gatabazi was killed, the RPF began using Radio Muhabura to spread lots of rumors about who had done it. Infiltrators in Kigali helped out by telling people in town. You know the big difference rumors can make during wartime. Still, Habyarimana did not believe it. He told everybody to stop the riots because this is exactly what somebody wants us to do. We must stop. Everybody did stop, but divisions were created between the parties. It also made the Rwandan conflict look like a civil war to the outside world and that is what the RPF wanted. Unfortunately for them, the Hutu stopped rioting and they still did not kill Tutsi. The next day, the RPF did a very smart move from their viewpoint. They killed Martin Bucyana, the CDR’s president. By killing the head of the “extremist” party, they thought for sure Tutsi were going to be killed because they knew the CDR would blame the RPF and kill Tutsi civilians who they thought were RPF infiltrators in revenge. Also, Bucyana was killed when he was travelling from Cyangugu to Butare in his own car. The RPF killed him knowing that, if he was killed in the area where Gatabazi was born, the CDR might also blame the Abakombozi for the killing and the Abakombozi would start riots with the CDR militias again. At the same time, Radio Muhabura said the Hutu militias were responsible to make sure there was mass confusion. The RPF also got help from the international community, who were only saying in the press that Bucyana was an extremist, like he deserved to be killed. That way, nobody cared that he was killed and nobody would ask questions about who really killed him.The RPF was increasing tensions to get an explosion of violence. I myself can say that tensions were much worse after each political killing. Sometimes during the latest riots after Bucyana’s death, there was lynching. After that, people did not want to be around anyone they didn’t know. You would go to a new place, for example a bar, and the people there would say to you, “Who are you? Don’t you know the RPF is going to be here in two weeks? Get out of the bar!” Then people, including infiltrators, were going around telling Hutu, “You have to get armed, the enemy is increasing every day.” Infiltrators were also committing random killings in the city. They would drive by somewhere on a motorcycle and use a grenade somewhere that people had gathered. Myself, I had Tutsi family friends, but we became divided by stereotypes. While all of this is going on, one of these politicians were killed, somebody’s friend and a member of a powerful political party. The RPF expected people to react! Still, it did not happen! The RPF and its allies were very angry with that. They did not understand what kind of people they were dealing with.

DB: Where the FAR and Presidential Guard compromised by RPF infiltrators by the time President Habyarimana was killed?

JCN: I really don’t know for sure but I do not think so. Other units were infiltrated but not the Presidential Guard. The RPF did offer Major Ntabakuze millions of dollars to work for the RPF, but I was told he refused.So the final step, the final job, was to kill President Habyarimana, the president’s staff, and Déogratias Nsabimana, the FAR Chief of Staff who went with him to Tanzania. They were killed coming back from a meeting about implementing the Arusha Accords. What the RPF did is obvious. That series of assassinations, the killers showed deep knowledge of Rwandans’ limits of tolerance. It was the last possible step in something they had planned for a long time. I believe they chose April 6th because Paul Kagame thought the militias were at their breaking point and they would kill with the most anger because of the tensions.22 They knew that people were already very angry and prepared to kill because they were paranoid and thought so many Tutsi were RPF sympathizers. The RPF knew people would get revenge this time. That’s why you saw those people killing everybody after President Habyarimana. The country had not only Tutsi, who were financing the RPF, but you had infiltrators, RPF infiltrators in so many places. You must know Valens Kajeguhakwa, who was with the RPF, said they even used priests to hide RPF weapons in churches. Everyone knew this and unfortunately, the Hutu militias found documents and RPA identity cards on many people in the churches and that is why so many people believed this and killed so many people in the churches. They realized they had been betrayed and because of the tension, because of the situation after the killing of President Habyarimana, the FAR and gendarmes were unable to control the militias. The country was beheaded and the genocide could only be planned by someone who knew the consequences of the 6th of April and it was not a surprise to anyone to see the RPF attack in Kigali and Kanombe on the same night Habyarimana died.

DB: President Habyarimana had a famous nickname did he not?

JCN: Huh?

DB: He was called, “Ikinani.”

JCN: Ok!

DB: The Invincible.

JCN: The Invincible. What that means, he said so because when he went to Ruhengeri, he said that at the time we had many political parties in the country. So they had to go and vote. He had been in power for many years and he said he was going to stay there. He also said to everyone, “My Interahamwe are going to win.” Radio Muhabura told everyone Habyarimana was not invincible to the RPF. The truth is, people who wanted democracy would never have voted for the RPF over Habyarimana, and he knew that. So the RPF knew they had to somehow mobilize opinion against the MRND.

1 Note: The Bagogwe are a sub-group of Tutsi pastoralists who live in northwestern Rwanda around Gisenyi and Ruhengeri.

2 Note: Jill Rutaremara is currently the Military Spokesman for the RPA.

3 Note: In pre-colonial times, before the ethnic (or racial within Rwanda) identity of Hutu and Tutsi deeply divided the country; clans (ubwoko singular) formed the foundation of Rwandan society and identity. The clan is the most abstract form of patrilineal kinship in Rwanda but its members do not trace back to a common ancestor. Clans do not regard ethnic identity and all clans have both Hutu and Tutsi members. Clan membership does not bestow a social status or privilege to its members and clans do not have a “leader” or person in charge. (Government of the Republic of Rwanda. “The Counting of the Genocide Victims: Final Report.” Ministry for Local Government: Department of Information and Social Affairs. November 2002. pg. 7.) The only possible exceptions were the Abanyiginya and Abega clans. However, originating from one of these clans does not afford an elevated social status to its members because other sub-divisions within the clan, such as lineage, are more indicative of social status. Rwandan mythology says these two clans hold a sacred origin because the Rwandan Kings were chosen from these clans. In pre-colonial times, the King was believed to be a divine being sent by God and was considered to be the physical embodiment of Rwanda itself. (Mamdani, Mahmood. “When Victims Become Killers.” Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. 2002. 3rd Edition. pg. 54-55, 79.) The Queen Mother came from the Abega clan. (Martins, Ludo. “Rwanda: The Responsibility of Belgium in the Creation of a Racist Ideology.” Report Presented at the Conference on Rwanda. English Translation. Brussels, Belgium. 5 April 1997; Prunier, Gérard. “The Rwanda Crisis: History of a Genocide.” New York, New York: Columbia University Press. 1995. pg. 9.) As the Rwandan refugees from the late 1950s-very early 1960s grew up in Uganda.