KENNETH ROTH AND TIMOTHY LONGMAN: FIGHTING RWANDA NATIONAL BUILDING PROGRAMS

KENNETH ROTH AND TIMOTHY LONGMAN: FIGHTING RWANDA NATIONAL BUILDING PROGRAMS

 Ladislas NGENDAHIMANA

The two, Kenneth Roth and Longman have been determined to fight Rwanda national building programs, among them Rwanda Gacaca courts. In Kenneth Roth “The power of Horror in Rwanda” (2009), he argues

 “One tool of repression has been the Gacaca courts -- informal tribunals run without trained lawyers or judges -- which the government established at the community level to try alleged perpetrators of the genocide”.

Timothy Longman in his article “Reevaluation of Gacaca Courts in Post Genocide Reconciliation” (2010), he argues that Gacaca courts have been a tool of fear and control for an authoritarian regime under guise of seeking justice”

After the genocide which left over one million Tutsis dead, the justice system had to deal with detainees in prisons who were over 120,000 as well as suspects who were still in the community. The majority of trained judges had either been killed or run out of the country into exile.

It was therefore, estimated that with the remaining few judges and lawyers, the classic court system would have taken over 100 years to dispense justice. Both the victims and the culprits who never live to see justice.

The objectives of Gacaca courts therefore, were both to administer justice and promote unity and reconciliation. The mission of Gacaca courts included among others;

To disclose the truth on genocide;

To speed up genocide trials;

To eradicate the culture of impunity;

To reconcile and strengthen unity among Rwandans;

To demonstrate the Rwandan society’s capacity to solve its own problems

The total number of cases tried is 1.237.256 and has been put to an end the culture of impunity and highly contributed to national reconciliation. This therefore is completely different from Timothy and Longman assertion that Gacaca courts have been used as an instrument of repression in Rwanda.

The two gentlemen arguments are characteristic of human rights watch (HRW), which has consistently weighed a protracted struggle to undermine the achievements and numerous success of the current government of Rwanda.