AfroAmerica Network
Kigali
06.10.01
The Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) has manipulated Rwandan and international media since it launched the invasion of Rwanda from its military bases in Southwestern Uganda in October 1990.
AfroAmerica Network has learned that before October 1990 Paul Kagame and Fred Rwigema approached a Rwandan Hutu dissident living in Brussels and asked him to run the RPF information department. They offered him a budget of twenty five million Belgian franks. According to this Rwandan dissident, they told him that he had to use the money to pay journalists to write stories favorable to the RPF.
During and after its military campaign against the Habyarimana regime, the RPF enlisted the services of at least three key figures: Philip Gourevitch, a journalist, Roger Winter, the director of the United States Committee for Refugees, and Ms. Courtaux, a human rights activist based in Paris. Gourevitch and Winter made contacts on behalf of the RPF with American news organizations particularly the Washington Post, The New York Times, and Time Magazine. As to Courtaux, she lobbied French media on behalf of the RPF.
Gourevitch, a friend of Kagame published a book in 1998 called "We wish to inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with our families" which portrays Kagame as a hero and labels Hutus genocidaires.
Winter and the United States Committee for Refugees organized the international conference of Rwandan Tutsi refugees held in Washington, DC in 1988. Rwandan Tutsi refugees from Africa, Europe, and North America held this conference to plan the invasion of Rwanda that started on October 1, 1990. The United States Committee for Refugees provided accommodation and transportation. A person who was present at the conference says Winter oversaw its deliberations.
After the RPF launched its invasion of Rwanda, Winter visited Kampala, Uganda several times to advise and energize the RPF. In the spring of 1995, the College of Public Health of the University of Illinois at Chicago organized a conference on the Rwandan crisis. A participant at this conference says Winter tried to have it cancelled, then decided to attend and handed out several documents spreading the RPF propaganda.
After the RPF and Laurent Kabila's forces attacked Rwandan refugee camps in Zaire, now the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Roger Winter visited Goma and met with Kabila. Upon his return to the US he became the self appointed spokesperson of the ADFL, Kabila's rebel movement. He appeared as a guest on major US television networks such as PBS and CNN.
Kagame and the RPF received help from Buchizya Mseteka, a reporter working for Reuters. Mseteka is a Zambian national. He and Kagame became friend when they were living in Kampala as neighbors. In 1994 he told some Rwandan refugees living in Nairobi that Kagame was his friend and could call each other using a satellite line and added that Reuters supported Kagame and the RPF.
In 1994, defrocked father Privat Rutazibwa, some Rwandan entrepreneurs and the RPF created the Rwandan News Agency. Rutazibwa and his friend had 40 percent of the shares and the RPF 60 percent. Today the RPF holds 80 percent of the shares.
Rwandan President Kagame owns a newspaper known as New Times. He also has a website that Byarugaba Milimo maintains. Byaragaba, a journalist working for the Rwandan News Agency posts Kagame's messages and replies on his behalf to emails sent to him.
In addition to controlling the private press through ownership, the RPF has persecuted Rwandan independent minded journalists. The AfroAmerica correspondent in Kigali has identified the casualties of press repression in Rwanda. There are:
Dominique Makeli, a Radio Rwanda journalist who has been in prison without trial since 1994;
Edouard Mutsinzi, editor of Le Messager / Intumwa is paralyzed after an RPF failed assassination;
Appolo Hakizimana, editor Umuravumba, was shot dead in Nyamirambo in April 1997;
Amiel Nkuliza, editor of Intego, was arrested on May 13, 1997;
Manasse Mugabo, a journalist working for the Kinyarwanda Service of Radio UNAMIR disappeared in August 1995;
Sylvestre Kalisa, a Radio Rwanda technician disappeared in early 1998 upon his return from exile in Nairobi;
Munyemanzi, a Rwandan Television journalist was found dead after he fell out of favor with the RPF;
Helene Nyirabikali, a journalist working for the state-run newspaper Imvaho was arrested and charged with false accusations of genocide and later died in prison due to lack of medical care;
Deo Mushayidi, a journalist working for Le Barometre de l'Economie, a private newspaper fled to Belgium;
Jason Muhawenimana, a journalist working for Imboni, a private newspaper fled to Belgium;
Jean Claude Nkubito, a journalist working for the Rwandan News Agency and President of the Association of Rwandan journalist fled to Belgium;
Philbert Muzima fled to Canada;
Kwitegetse, a journalist working for Kinyamateka, a Catholic Church newspaper fled to Uganda;
Jean-Pierre Mugabe, editor of Le Tribun du Peuple and an RPF military officer fled to the United States.
Sources in Kigali say the RPF has used state-run media to demonize government officials or politicians it wants to destroy. To illustrate their point these sources point to state run media campaigns against former Prime Minister Twagiramungu, former Prime Minister Pierre Celestin Rwigema, former Speaker of the National Transitional Assembly Joseph Kabuye Sebarenzi, and former Rwandan President Pasteur Twagiramungu before and after the RPF demoted them.
The RPF has also been able to coopt some western journalists. Many observers cite Emmanuel Goujon, an AFP correspondent now based in Abidjan as a good illustration of RPF cozy relationship with foreign journalists. These observers say when he was in Kigali; he would just relay information provided by RPF officials.
At one occasion, Goujon visited the commune of Giti, Byumba and reported that Giti was the only commune of Rwanda where genocide was not committed and that the RPF had rewarded its mayor Sebushumba with one million Rwandan franks. A resident of Giti who asked not to be identified remarks: "The RPF massacred so many people in Giti and dumped corpses into Lake Muhazi. The RPF rounded up Catholic priests at Rwesero Seminary, took them to an undisclosed location and nobody found their bodies."
In order to silence opponents, RPF officials provided Goujon with concocted information on members of political parties who disagreed with them and he published it.
A former Rwandan government official says the RPF takes journalists to places it wants to show them and those who refuse to cooperate are threatened with expulsion.
Some foreign journalists who have resisted the pressures of the RPF. These include French journalist Stephen Smith, and British journalist Nick Gordon. Because of their journalistic independence, the Rwandan government has refused to issue a visa to them.
A senior Rwandan government official says Belgian journalist Colette Braeckman has distanced herself from RPF propaganda. According to him, her recent articles indicate that after years of relying on interpretations close to the Rwandan regime, she has become critical of it. "I am worried", the official says.
(c)AfroAmerica Network, June 2001.
For contact, please e-mail us: mail@afroamerica.net
Visit us at www.afroamerica.net to check resources on woman health, achievement, challenges, and hopes.
Do not forget to visit our web page:
http://www.afroamerica.net/afroamerica.html
http://www.afroamerica.net/rwanda.html