Grenade Attacks and Election Season in Rwanda

Grenade explosions in Kigali in recent weeks have set off a flurry of speculation about who is responsible, and reignited a discussion about political freedom (or lack thereof) in Rwanda as the highly anticipated presidential elections approach this summer.

The surprising thing I found in conversations with friends in Rwanda is that the Rwandans I spoke to didn’t seem overly concerned about the grenade attacks. One friend said with a laugh, “You in the West see these reports of grenade explosions and are very alarmed. Here in Rwanda, we’re not so surprised. It is election season, and this is expected.”

So what can we make of this?

The blog Texas in Africa provided a useful overview of some of potential culprits and motives behind the attack, but anecdotes I’ve heard in my regular correspondence with friends in Rwanda overwhelmingly tilted toward one explanation: that Rwanda’s ruling party, the RPF, led by President Paul Kagame, was responsible. When I pressed for details, it was clear that this conclusion was based more on intuition than evidence – which helps explain why my concern was met with such nonchalance. “Here in Rwanda, we’re not so surprised.”

Disclaimer: As the rumors pinning potential culprits fly, I want to reiterate that the conversations on which I based this discussion were informal and conversational; I made the first call simply to check in on a friend after receiving the most recent round of Warden Messages from the U.S. Embassy in Kigali notifying of the three grenade attacks. While the opinions I’ve conveyed here were by no means scientifically gathered, the public perception of the recent violence is valuable to consider. How those public perceptions will translate into public actions and votes in the coming months remains to be seen.

While a direct correlation cannot be drawn, even a cursory overview of the political climate in Rwanda, suggests why RPF culpability must be seriously considered – and investigated and addressed by international donors.

The dominant narrative of post-genocide Rwanda casts President Kagame as the hero who ended the gruesome 1994 genocide and shows Western governments in awe of Rwanda’s stability, prosperity, and promotion of women leaders. Guilt over inaction during the 1994 genocide has generally served to compel countries and high-level outside observers to overlook qualms about the abysmal state of press freedom, crackdowns on political opposition, and lack of accountability for former RPF rebels accused of carrying out ethnic-based attacks on civilians. (As a condition for agreeing to allow the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda to carry out its investigations in the country, President Paul Kagame has refused to permit investigations into RPF abuses.) As anyone familiar with the controversies over RPF actions before, during, and after the genocide can attest, lines between victim and perpetrator are not as clear cut as the Kagame government would have the world believe.

As Human Rights Watch recently reported, and Michelle blogged about in this space, crackdowns on political opposition groups – never a thriving business in Rwanda – have escalated. Not only are groups encountering obstacles to registering, there have been many reports of intimidation and dubious arrests of party leaders. In particular, Human Rights Watch documented harassment, apparently at the discretion of the government, of leaders of the new opposition parties NDU-Inkingi and the Democratic Green Party. Senator Russ Feingold (D-WI) also signaled his concern about abuses against opposition in Rwanda. In a statement last week on the “fragile state of democracy in Africa,” the senator noted that while Rwanda’s economic gains should be commended, the country “still has a long way to go” on the democracy front and called on the international community to “not shy away from pushing for greater democratic space in Rwanda.”

Perhaps the most useful tool at the government’s disposal for silencing critics is a deliberately vague provision of the Constitution banning “genocide ideology.” Journalists routinely encounter this charge, often with harsh consequences, leading many to self-censor their reporting. Freedom House’s 2009 press freedom rankings placed Rwanda 181st out of 195 countries – tied with China and Iran. This week, Burundian authorities arrested and extradited Deo Mushayidi, a prominent journalist and former head of an association of Rwandan journalists. He now stands accused of orchestrating, along with two former senior officers in the RPF who live in exile in South Africa, the most recent grenade attacks in downtown Kigali, though Rwandan authorities initially placed the blame on the FDLR, whose leadership were involved in orchestrating the 1994 genocide. (There are other allegations against Mushayidi as well, but at the very least, the link to the grenade attack sounds a bit farfetched.)

Concern about allegations of involvement or incitement of genocide is certainly not limited to people in prominent positions. The politics of genocide looms across Rwandan society, because allegations can be used to discredit opponents, settle personal scores, or retaliate for perceived injustices. As Human Rights Watch’s Kenneth Roth wrote in an op-ed for the LA Times last spring, “The prospect of suddenly being accused of past participation in the genocide, with little legal recourse against concocted charges, is enough to make most people keep their heads down in the political arena.”

On a practical level, the sophistication of the Rwandan intelligence raises the question of how these attacks could take place without the complicity of Rwanda’s ruling party. “Can you imagine that a grenade explodes and only one person is killed?” a former colleague rhetorically asked. “Only the RPF can plan an event like this. They don’t want people to die; they just want people to be afraid,” he said.

Photo credit: hjallig