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Kwibuka

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Remembered: The genocide of the Tutsi was not the product of primordial tribal feeling but it was the product of a political project, carefully constructed over decades. Photo: Rwanda Government
BUKAVU

Becoming umwana – a son: Part 2

The family who sheltered me was, by any measure, participating in genocide: they were killing Tutsi every day. They were also, in their own logic, maintaining a family, going to…

  • Nelson Gashagaza
4 min read
Never again: The Walk to Remember, an annual, solemn, youth-led event on 7 April to commemorate the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi. Photo: Flickr
COMMEMORATION

Africa’s unfinished reckoning

The question is not whether the world recognises the genocide against the Tutsi. It does. The question is whether the continent has claimed it — intellectually, historically and…

  • Albert Rudatsimburwa
5 min read
Engraved in memory: The Kigali Genocide Memorial engenders remembrance of the genocide’s victims, promoting peace and reconciliation and building peace through education. Photo: Supplied
BUKAVU

Becoming Umwana – a son

In the ruins of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi, Nelson Gashagaza survived by becoming someone else’s child. In this two-part series as Rwanda commemorates Kwibuka32, he…

  • Nelson Gashagaza
6 min read
The commemoration, Kwibuka (which means “to remember” in Kinyarwanda), begins on April 7. The country remains in mourning for the rest of the month. Photo: Supplied
EDITORIAL

Kwibuka32: Never and never again

But as they mourn, remember and reflect on their past, Rwandans are building their country into one of the continent’s shining examples of what can be done when the people unite…

  • Editorial
3 min read
Human remains from victims of the Rwanda genocide as seen at the Nyamata Church Genocide Memorial on April 06, 2024 in Nyamata, Rwanda. Over 45,000 genocide victims are buried at the UNESCO World Heritage Site. During a roughly 100-day period in 1994, hundreds of thousands of members of the Tutsi ethnic group were killed by Hutu militias, during the the country’s civil war. (Photo by Luke Dray/Getty Images)
GENOCIDE

How Rwanda’s annual genocide commemoration fans the flame of ethnicity

In 2014, the genocide was officially renamed from the Rwandan genocide to ‘the 1994 Genocide Against the Tutsi’

  • Gretchen Baldwin
5 min read