The%20History%20of%20Rwanda

1
The History of Rwanda

• By
• Your Name Here
• Date

2
Pre-Colonial Rwanda

• Rwanda was a highly centralized kingdom ruled by
  Tutsi kings
• The king ruled through three categories of chiefs
  cattle chiefs, land chiefs and military chiefs
• Ubuhake, a clientele system, permeated the
  whole society

3
Colonial Rwanda

• In 1899, Rwanda became a German colony
• In 1919, after the defeat of the Germans during
  World War I, Rwanda became a territory of the
  League of Nations under the Belgian administration

4
Colonial Rwanda (Contd)

• In 1935, the Belgian colonial administration
  introduced a prejudiced national identification
  based on ethnicity wealthy people such as the
  ruling elite were registered as Tutsi and those
  with less wealth as Hutu
• With the demand for independence arose the Union
  Nationale Rwandaise (UNAR), a political party
  consisting of the Tutsi people

• The Belgians then quickly sided with another
  party called PARMEHUTU which was founded as a
  sectarian ethnic ideology
• In 1959, the first massive slayings of Tutsi by
  PARMEHUTU occurred under Belgian supervision
• With widespread violence, PARMEHUTU destroyed the
  monarchy
• On July 1st, 1962, Rwanda was granted formal
  independence from Belgium

5
Post-Independence

• From 1959 onward, Tutsi people were targeted
  causing the deaths of thousands
• The First Republic under President Gregoire
  Kayibanda institutionalized the discrimination
  and massacre of Tutsi people
• In 1973, President Kayibanda was overthrown in a
  coup detat Major General Juvenal Habyarimana
  was brought to power and more massacres of Tutsi
  occurred

6
Post-Independence (Contd)

• In 1975, President Habyarimana formed MRND, a
  single ruling party that in 1978 created a
  constitution to return him to office repeatedly
  through elections where he was the only
  candidate
• Habyarimanas regime became more violently
  intolerant political activities remained banned

7
Post-Independence (Contd)

• Divisions within the ruling Hutu class, which
  culminated in the 1973 coup, became more
  heightened in the 1970s and 1980s
• In 1987, the Rwandese Political Front (RPF) was
  formed, its objectives included promoting
  national unity, establishing a true democracy and
  providing security for all Rwandese
• On October 1st, 1990, the RPF took up arms
  against the dictatorship France, Belgium, and
  the Democratic Republic of Congo dispatched
  troops to Rwanda to help in the civil war
• On August 4th, 1993, the Arusha Peace Agreement
  was signed by both the RPF and the ruling
  government but it was never implemented

8
Genocide

• Although mass slayings of Tutsi took place
  throughout the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s and early
  1990s, between April and July 1994 over a million
  Rwandese (mainly Tutsi and Hutu opposition) were
  killed by the genocidal regime

9
The Fall of The Genocidal Regime

• On July 4th, 1994, the capital of Rwanda, Kigali,
  fell to the forces of the Rwandese Patriotic
  Army, a wing of the RPF
• Members of the former regime fled to the
  Democratic Republic of Congo

• On July 19th, 1994, RPF established a new
  government called the Government of National
  Unity with four other political parties

10
Eight Years of Progress

• About 3 and a half million refugees have returned
  to Rwanda
• The Government of National Unity has made
  progress rebuilding the justice system by
  starting with the enactment of the Genocide Law
• The Genocide Law allowed for the trial and
  conviction of genocide suspects currently
  120,000 genocide suspects are in prison

11
Eight Years of Progress (Contd)

• The Genocide Survivor Fund provides education,
  shelter, health and income-generating activities
  to the most vulnerable of survivors
• A Human Rights Commission has been established to
  protect the rights of all citizens