The History Behind Hotel Rwanda: The Genocide That Shook a Nation
There had always been a seperation into categories of Tutsi and Hutu people. They are not just seperated as a part of society, but are actually different ethnic groups who arrived at different times from different parts of Africa.
Before the Hutu and Tutsi people, the Twa, a smaller race of people, inhabited central east Africa. Sometime during the 1st century it is believed that the Hutu arrived and drove out the Twa people and forced them to flee. Around the 15th Century, The Tutsi people, who were taller and lighter skinned than the Hutu people, came from the horn of Africa and invaded. They did not push out the Hutu people and their invasion was generally peaceful. The Belgian people and their ideas entered in 1916 and they influenced the country until after World War 2. They created the Union for National Progress (UPRONA) and The Chrisitan Democratic party and a Tutsi president, Louis Rwagsore, was put in charge of UPRONA. By 1959 the Hutu overthrew the Tusti monarchy and in 1961 a Hutu party was elected into parliament (Hutu Emancipation Movement). However on April 6, 1994, a plane carrying President Habyarimana, a Hutu, was shot down. Violence erupted after this between Hutus and Tutsis and this became war. During all this confusion and destruction, an extremist group known as the Hutu Interhamwe Militia launched their plan to wipe out the entire Tutsi population - including the younger generation - using mainly machetes to violently murder every suspected Tutsi citizen. Many beleived that they were the reason that their president had been assassinated and that they had rebelled to bring their own people back into power. This genocide lasted over 100 days and around 800,000 people were murdered; the majority being of Tutsi ethnicity. Those who tried to fight against the Hutu militia and protect the Tutsi people were murdered also. Beligian, French and US forces from the UN came to help, but they were only there as peacekeepers, not peacemakers. They would only shoot out of self defense and were not of much help in preventing the terror that the Rwandan people were facing. Eventually, this civil war and genocide ended when the Tutsi-dominated rebel group, the RPF, defeated the Hutu militia and President Paul Kagame took control. |