256 News
10 April 2010
By Robert Kafeero
Rwanda president has sacked his defence minister and replaced him with the country's army chief.
256 News has just landed on scanty information on the development.
Army Chief, Gen. James Kabarebe replaces Defence Minister Marcel Gatsinzi in a reshuffle just announced from the capital Kigali.
Gen. Charles Kayonga replaces Gen Kabarebe as army chief while Gen. Muhire is transferred to airforce as head of reserve force.
Last month, the country former army chief, Gen. Kayumba Nyamwasa fled the country through neighbouring Uganda.
Whether the army shake-up is a response to this or not remains to be seen.
10 April, 2010
Polish President Killed in Plane Crash.
NBC
10 April 2010
Polish President Lech Kaczynski and some of the country's highest military and civilian leaders died when the presidential plane crashed as it came in for a landing in thick fog in western Russia on Saturday, killing 96, officials said.
Russian and Polish officials said there were no survivors on the Soviet-era Tupolev, which was taking the president, his wife and staff to events marking the 70th anniversary of the massacre of thousands of Polish officers by Soviet secret police.
The Army chief of staff, Gen. Franciszek Gagor, National Bank President Slawomir Skrzypek and Deputy Foreign Minister Andrzej Kremer were also on board, the Polish foreign ministry said.
Russia's Emergency Ministry said there were 96 dead, 88 part of a Polish state delegation. Poland's Foreign Ministry spokesman, Piotr Paszkowski, said there were 89 people on the passenger list but one person had not shown up.
Earlier, several reports had put the death toll at 132. There was no explanation for the change.
"We still cannot fully understand the scope of this tragedy and what it means for us in the future. Nothing like this has ever happened in Poland," Paszkowski said. "We can assume with great certainty that all persons on board have been killed."
The governor of the Smolensk region, where the crash took place about 11 a.m. (3 a.m. ET), also said no one survived.
State news channel Rossiya-24 showed footage from the crash site, with pieces of the plane scattered widely amid leafless trees and small fires burning in woods shrouded with fog. A tail fin with the Polish red and white colors stuck up from the debris.
"The Polish presidential plane did not make it to the runway while landing. Tentative findings indicate that it hit the treetops and fell apart," regional governor Sergei Anufriev said on Rossiya-24. "Nobody has survived the disaster."
The presidential Tu-154 was at least 20 years old. Polish officials have long discussed replacing the planes that carry the country's leaders but said they lacked the funds. According to the Aviation Safety Network, there have been 66 crashes involving Tu-154s, including six in the past five years. The Russian carrier Aeroflot recently withdrew its Tu-154 fleet from service.
Early elections
A government spokesman said Poland will hold an early presidential election after Kaczynski's death, the government spokesman said.
"In line with the constitution, we will have to hold an early presidential poll," Pawel Gras told Reuters. "For now, the speaker of the lower house of parliament, Bronislaw Komorowski, is automatically ... the acting president."
Constitutionalists say the election date must be announced within two weeks and the election must take place within two months of the announcement.
Poland, a nation of 38 million people, is by far the largest of he 10 formerly communist countries that have joined the European Union in recent years.
Last year, Poland was the only EU nation to avoid recession and posted economic growth of 1.7 percent. It has become a firm U.S. ally in the region since the fall of communism — a stance that crosses party lines.
The country sent troops to the U.S.-led war in Iraq and recently boosted its contingent in Afghanistan to some 2,600 soldiers.
Russia never has formally apologized for the murders of some 22,000 Polish officers, but Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's decision to attend a memorial ceremony earlier this week in the forest near Katyn was seen as a gesture of goodwill toward reconciliation. Rossiya-24 showed hundreds of people around the Katyn monument, many holding Polish flags, some weeping.
Putin has been put in charge of a commission investigating the crash, the Kremlin said.
In Warsaw, Prime Minister Donald Tusk called an extraordinary meeting of his Cabinet and the national flag was lowered to half-staff at the presidential palace, where people gathered to lay flowers and light candles.
Black ribbons appeared in some windows in the Polish capital.
Poland's president is commander-in-chief of its armed forces but the position's domestic duties are chiefly symbolic. Kaczynski, 60, became president in December 2005 after defeating Tusk in that year's presidential vote.
The nationalist conservative was the twin brother of Poland's opposition leader, former Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski.
Kaczynski's wife, Maria, was an economist. They had a daughter, Marta, and two granddaughters.
Missile deal
U.S. Patriot missiles are expected to be deployed in Poland this year. That was a Polish condition for a 2008 deal to host long-range missile defense interceptors.
The deal, which was struck by the Bush administration, angered Russia and was later reconfigured under President Barack Obama's administration.
Under the Obama plan, Poland would host a different type of missile defense interceptors as part of a more mobile system and at a later date, probably not until 2018.
Kaczynski is the first serving Polish leader to die since exiled World War II-era leader Gen. Wladyslaw Sikorski in a plane crash off Gibraltar in 1943.
U.S. State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said Saturday, "This is a horrible tragedy for Poland and we extend to the people of Poland our deepest condolences."
Neighboring Germany's foreign minister, Guido Westerwelle, said he was "shocked and full of sadness" at Kaczynski's death.
"All the German people are mourning with our Polish neighbors," Westerwelle said during a visit to South Africa.
Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
10 April 2010
Polish President Lech Kaczynski and some of the country's highest military and civilian leaders died when the presidential plane crashed as it came in for a landing in thick fog in western Russia on Saturday, killing 96, officials said.
Russian and Polish officials said there were no survivors on the Soviet-era Tupolev, which was taking the president, his wife and staff to events marking the 70th anniversary of the massacre of thousands of Polish officers by Soviet secret police.
The Army chief of staff, Gen. Franciszek Gagor, National Bank President Slawomir Skrzypek and Deputy Foreign Minister Andrzej Kremer were also on board, the Polish foreign ministry said.
Russia's Emergency Ministry said there were 96 dead, 88 part of a Polish state delegation. Poland's Foreign Ministry spokesman, Piotr Paszkowski, said there were 89 people on the passenger list but one person had not shown up.
Earlier, several reports had put the death toll at 132. There was no explanation for the change.
"We still cannot fully understand the scope of this tragedy and what it means for us in the future. Nothing like this has ever happened in Poland," Paszkowski said. "We can assume with great certainty that all persons on board have been killed."
The governor of the Smolensk region, where the crash took place about 11 a.m. (3 a.m. ET), also said no one survived.
State news channel Rossiya-24 showed footage from the crash site, with pieces of the plane scattered widely amid leafless trees and small fires burning in woods shrouded with fog. A tail fin with the Polish red and white colors stuck up from the debris.
"The Polish presidential plane did not make it to the runway while landing. Tentative findings indicate that it hit the treetops and fell apart," regional governor Sergei Anufriev said on Rossiya-24. "Nobody has survived the disaster."
The presidential Tu-154 was at least 20 years old. Polish officials have long discussed replacing the planes that carry the country's leaders but said they lacked the funds. According to the Aviation Safety Network, there have been 66 crashes involving Tu-154s, including six in the past five years. The Russian carrier Aeroflot recently withdrew its Tu-154 fleet from service.
Early elections
A government spokesman said Poland will hold an early presidential election after Kaczynski's death, the government spokesman said.
"In line with the constitution, we will have to hold an early presidential poll," Pawel Gras told Reuters. "For now, the speaker of the lower house of parliament, Bronislaw Komorowski, is automatically ... the acting president."
Constitutionalists say the election date must be announced within two weeks and the election must take place within two months of the announcement.
Poland, a nation of 38 million people, is by far the largest of he 10 formerly communist countries that have joined the European Union in recent years.
Last year, Poland was the only EU nation to avoid recession and posted economic growth of 1.7 percent. It has become a firm U.S. ally in the region since the fall of communism — a stance that crosses party lines.
The country sent troops to the U.S.-led war in Iraq and recently boosted its contingent in Afghanistan to some 2,600 soldiers.
Russia never has formally apologized for the murders of some 22,000 Polish officers, but Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's decision to attend a memorial ceremony earlier this week in the forest near Katyn was seen as a gesture of goodwill toward reconciliation. Rossiya-24 showed hundreds of people around the Katyn monument, many holding Polish flags, some weeping.
Putin has been put in charge of a commission investigating the crash, the Kremlin said.
In Warsaw, Prime Minister Donald Tusk called an extraordinary meeting of his Cabinet and the national flag was lowered to half-staff at the presidential palace, where people gathered to lay flowers and light candles.
Black ribbons appeared in some windows in the Polish capital.
Poland's president is commander-in-chief of its armed forces but the position's domestic duties are chiefly symbolic. Kaczynski, 60, became president in December 2005 after defeating Tusk in that year's presidential vote.
The nationalist conservative was the twin brother of Poland's opposition leader, former Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski.
Kaczynski's wife, Maria, was an economist. They had a daughter, Marta, and two granddaughters.
Missile deal
U.S. Patriot missiles are expected to be deployed in Poland this year. That was a Polish condition for a 2008 deal to host long-range missile defense interceptors.
The deal, which was struck by the Bush administration, angered Russia and was later reconfigured under President Barack Obama's administration.
Under the Obama plan, Poland would host a different type of missile defense interceptors as part of a more mobile system and at a later date, probably not until 2018.
Kaczynski is the first serving Polish leader to die since exiled World War II-era leader Gen. Wladyslaw Sikorski in a plane crash off Gibraltar in 1943.
U.S. State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said Saturday, "This is a horrible tragedy for Poland and we extend to the people of Poland our deepest condolences."
Neighboring Germany's foreign minister, Guido Westerwelle, said he was "shocked and full of sadness" at Kaczynski's death.
"All the German people are mourning with our Polish neighbors," Westerwelle said during a visit to South Africa.
Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Ugandan Government delays oil block sale.
Daily Monitor
10 April 2010
By Katherine Haywood
Kampala
The government has defended its right to delay the finalisation of the sale of Heritage Oil’s interests to Tullow Oil, after it emerged that the former had complained that deadlines were stretching.
A recent letter from Heritage Oil’s lawyers dated March 23 March, expresses the company’s concerns that completion of the transfer would be delayed beyond the anticipated end-date at the end of March.
“We would therefore be grateful for your explanation as to what are the reasons which are causing written consent to be withheld or delayed,” the letter reads in part.
But the company issued a press release informing shareholders that: “Heritage has received a letter from the government stating that it supports Heritage’s sale and transfer of the Disposed Assets and that it will conclude its review of the transaction within eight weeks.”
Sale agreement
In January, Tullow Oil signed a Sale and Purchase Agreement with Heritage Oil to buy its interests in oil Block 1 and 3A, and has subsequently proposed to the government that they, along with partners Cnooc, a Chinese oil company and Total, a French oil giant, develop the oil fields.
“These are transactions that are materially important to the national economy,” Mr Kabagambe Kalisa, the Permanent Secretary of the Energy Ministry told Daily Monitor on Tuesday.
He said the government has to carefully evaluate the transactions.
“There has been no extension anywhere because government never committed to any deadline,” he said.
He said there is no guarantee that when the government concludes its evaluation, it will endorse Tullow Oil’s acquisition of the oil interests.
It appears that Heritage’s lawyers also raised the possibility they may take legal action in English Courts if Tullow Oil inaccurately represented government’s support for the takeover.
Heritage Oil lawyer’s letter draws attention to Tullow Oil’s apparent representation to Heritage that Tullow had written confirmation from the government, which welcomed and supported Tullow’s intentions to acquire the Heritage interests.
No favours
Mr Kalisa would not be drawn directly on this matter. “We support the farm out of Heritage and the farm in of an entity that meets our criteria,” he told Daily Monitor.
But Mr Brian Glover, Tullow Oil’s Business Unit Manager Uganda & East Africa, said he was not worried about reports of legal action.
Tullow Oil pre-empted the sale of Heritage Oil’s interests to Italian oil company, ENI for Shs30 trillion Shs30 trillion ($1.5billion).
The delay to the finalisation of this transaction could in turn delay early production of oil on a commercial scale.
But Mr Glover said the final deliberations by the government on the transfer of Heritage’s oil interests has not affected Tullow Oil’s long term plans for oil field development.
“There’s been no delay to the development or appraisal drilling by Heritage Oil or Tullow Oil,” he said.
10 April 2010
By Katherine Haywood
Kampala
The government has defended its right to delay the finalisation of the sale of Heritage Oil’s interests to Tullow Oil, after it emerged that the former had complained that deadlines were stretching.
A recent letter from Heritage Oil’s lawyers dated March 23 March, expresses the company’s concerns that completion of the transfer would be delayed beyond the anticipated end-date at the end of March.
“We would therefore be grateful for your explanation as to what are the reasons which are causing written consent to be withheld or delayed,” the letter reads in part.
But the company issued a press release informing shareholders that: “Heritage has received a letter from the government stating that it supports Heritage’s sale and transfer of the Disposed Assets and that it will conclude its review of the transaction within eight weeks.”
Sale agreement
In January, Tullow Oil signed a Sale and Purchase Agreement with Heritage Oil to buy its interests in oil Block 1 and 3A, and has subsequently proposed to the government that they, along with partners Cnooc, a Chinese oil company and Total, a French oil giant, develop the oil fields.
“These are transactions that are materially important to the national economy,” Mr Kabagambe Kalisa, the Permanent Secretary of the Energy Ministry told Daily Monitor on Tuesday.
He said the government has to carefully evaluate the transactions.
“There has been no extension anywhere because government never committed to any deadline,” he said.
He said there is no guarantee that when the government concludes its evaluation, it will endorse Tullow Oil’s acquisition of the oil interests.
It appears that Heritage’s lawyers also raised the possibility they may take legal action in English Courts if Tullow Oil inaccurately represented government’s support for the takeover.
Heritage Oil lawyer’s letter draws attention to Tullow Oil’s apparent representation to Heritage that Tullow had written confirmation from the government, which welcomed and supported Tullow’s intentions to acquire the Heritage interests.
No favours
Mr Kalisa would not be drawn directly on this matter. “We support the farm out of Heritage and the farm in of an entity that meets our criteria,” he told Daily Monitor.
But Mr Brian Glover, Tullow Oil’s Business Unit Manager Uganda & East Africa, said he was not worried about reports of legal action.
Tullow Oil pre-empted the sale of Heritage Oil’s interests to Italian oil company, ENI for Shs30 trillion Shs30 trillion ($1.5billion).
The delay to the finalisation of this transaction could in turn delay early production of oil on a commercial scale.
But Mr Glover said the final deliberations by the government on the transfer of Heritage’s oil interests has not affected Tullow Oil’s long term plans for oil field development.
“There’s been no delay to the development or appraisal drilling by Heritage Oil or Tullow Oil,” he said.
Nigerian acting leader heads to US.
AFP
9 April 2010
Nigeria's acting leader flies to the United States at the weekend on his first foreign trip since taking over two months ago from the country's sick president, the government said on Friday.
Acting President Goodluck Jonathan will be in Washington to attend an international nuclear security summit and is expected to meet US President Barack Obama.
"He is expected to meet US President, Barack Obama, on Sunday, April 11, for a one-on-one meeting. He is also expected to meet with US Vice President Joe Biden, the US Congressional black caucus, as well as the president of the World Bank," Jonathan's spokesman Ima Niboro said in a statement.
"The president of the (Nigerian) senate, David Mark, has been fully apprised of the acting president?s four-day visit to the United States," the statement said.
Senior officials in the presidency, including federal government secretary Yayale Ahmed and national security adviser Aliyu Gusau, "would be fully on ground during the period of Jonathan's absence, it added.
"The purpose of the visit is the nuclear summit. On the side of that summit, the acting president will have a chance to meet with President Obama and to discuss matters of bilateral interests," Foreign Minister Odein Ajumogobia said earlier Friday.
Bilateral talks between the United States and Nigeria, its fifth largest source of oil, are expected to take place on the fringes of the summit.
Ajumogobia refused to disclose details of the bilateral agenda, but Jonathan on Thursday met the father of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian accused of attempting to blow up a US airliner on Christmas Day.
No details of the meeting between the two were released.
Abdulmutallab was arrested and accused of trying to detonate explosives sewn to his pants during a US-bound flight on December 25 last year, after which the United States placed Nigeria on its security blacklist.
The US Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano is due in Nigeria at the weekend for a conference on aviation security, organised by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO), the US embassy said Wednesday.
Jonathan has vowed that his new government will continue the policies of the former cabinet of President Umaru Yar'Adua, who has been ill with a heart condition since November.
On Monday Nigeria and the US launched a "strategic partnership" deal to bolster bilateral ties on energy, regional security and good governance, making Nigeria the first African nation to be afforded such a status under the Obama administration.
Nigeria is the United States' largest trading partner in sub-Saharan Africa, thanks in large part to its petroleum industry. Nigerian oil comprises eight percent of US imports, while about half of the oil produced in Nigeria goes to the United States.
Johnnie Carson, assistant secretary of state for African affairs, said the new deal aims at helping Nigeria attain its full potential, including in the critically important area of petroleum, the country's greatest export.
It also will help provide stability in the volatile Niger Delta area where militant attacks have severely hampered oil production.
Obama hosts world leaders from April 12-13 for a nuclear security summit to discuss the prevention of acts of nuclear terrorism, and steps that can be taken to secure vulnerable nuclear materials.
"We support the principles that Obama has been promoting in trying to reduce nuclear proliferation," said Ajumogobia.
9 April 2010
Nigeria's acting leader flies to the United States at the weekend on his first foreign trip since taking over two months ago from the country's sick president, the government said on Friday.
Acting President Goodluck Jonathan will be in Washington to attend an international nuclear security summit and is expected to meet US President Barack Obama.
"He is expected to meet US President, Barack Obama, on Sunday, April 11, for a one-on-one meeting. He is also expected to meet with US Vice President Joe Biden, the US Congressional black caucus, as well as the president of the World Bank," Jonathan's spokesman Ima Niboro said in a statement.
"The president of the (Nigerian) senate, David Mark, has been fully apprised of the acting president?s four-day visit to the United States," the statement said.
Senior officials in the presidency, including federal government secretary Yayale Ahmed and national security adviser Aliyu Gusau, "would be fully on ground during the period of Jonathan's absence, it added.
"The purpose of the visit is the nuclear summit. On the side of that summit, the acting president will have a chance to meet with President Obama and to discuss matters of bilateral interests," Foreign Minister Odein Ajumogobia said earlier Friday.
Bilateral talks between the United States and Nigeria, its fifth largest source of oil, are expected to take place on the fringes of the summit.
Ajumogobia refused to disclose details of the bilateral agenda, but Jonathan on Thursday met the father of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian accused of attempting to blow up a US airliner on Christmas Day.
No details of the meeting between the two were released.
Abdulmutallab was arrested and accused of trying to detonate explosives sewn to his pants during a US-bound flight on December 25 last year, after which the United States placed Nigeria on its security blacklist.
The US Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano is due in Nigeria at the weekend for a conference on aviation security, organised by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO), the US embassy said Wednesday.
Jonathan has vowed that his new government will continue the policies of the former cabinet of President Umaru Yar'Adua, who has been ill with a heart condition since November.
On Monday Nigeria and the US launched a "strategic partnership" deal to bolster bilateral ties on energy, regional security and good governance, making Nigeria the first African nation to be afforded such a status under the Obama administration.
Nigeria is the United States' largest trading partner in sub-Saharan Africa, thanks in large part to its petroleum industry. Nigerian oil comprises eight percent of US imports, while about half of the oil produced in Nigeria goes to the United States.
Johnnie Carson, assistant secretary of state for African affairs, said the new deal aims at helping Nigeria attain its full potential, including in the critically important area of petroleum, the country's greatest export.
It also will help provide stability in the volatile Niger Delta area where militant attacks have severely hampered oil production.
Obama hosts world leaders from April 12-13 for a nuclear security summit to discuss the prevention of acts of nuclear terrorism, and steps that can be taken to secure vulnerable nuclear materials.
"We support the principles that Obama has been promoting in trying to reduce nuclear proliferation," said Ajumogobia.
09 April, 2010
Victoire Ingabire addresses Rwandan during the genocide memorial period.
Dear countrymen,
Today, we are starting the commemoration of the Rwandan genocide period. On behalf of UDF party and its entire membership, the Interim Executive Committee extends its deepest sympathy to all Rwandan who lost their beloved parents, brothers and sisters, and to all survivors who are aggrieved because of the genocide.
The memorial period should be an opportunity for all of us to think about this tragedy that befell our country. It should bring each and every one into devising ways and means of ensuring that innocent blood never be shed again.
It is painful to hear that, 16 years after the genocide, there are still people vowing to harm genocide survivors. It is also unbelievable to hear that some of the aid meant for genocide survivors ends up in pockets of those who were supposed to manage them. Indeed, there are reports of genocide survivors who are still languishing in abject poverty, unattended to, without shelter, and orphans still being at the mercy of charity.
It is not enough to denounce malpractices. People need action. They need to see that the government is truly behind them. It is nonsense to denounce those who swindle survivors’ aid, without bringing them to justice, or transferring them to other offices in the civil service. It amounts to putting a finger in a wound.
This should be high on the agenda of the government, in order to ease suffering and regain the confidence of all orphans and widows who were traumatised by the genocide.
It is urgent for the government to go beyond slogans and unveil plans of ensuring security for genocide survivors. It is high time for the security services to publish reports of investigations that were carried out into genocide survivors’ attacks. The victims are calling out for help.
Dear countrymen,
It is paramount not to be hostages to history. We should be courageous enough to think about the long term. We should learn from the past, although it may not be an easy task. We should agree to join forces for the interests of our beloved country, in peace, unity and mutual respect. This is the heritage that we should leave to our future generations.
I will finish by calling upon every Rwandan to remember all our deceased, to remember what happened, but without forgetting the future.
May God bless you all,
Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza
Chairperson UDF-Inkingi
Today, we are starting the commemoration of the Rwandan genocide period. On behalf of UDF party and its entire membership, the Interim Executive Committee extends its deepest sympathy to all Rwandan who lost their beloved parents, brothers and sisters, and to all survivors who are aggrieved because of the genocide.
The memorial period should be an opportunity for all of us to think about this tragedy that befell our country. It should bring each and every one into devising ways and means of ensuring that innocent blood never be shed again.
It is painful to hear that, 16 years after the genocide, there are still people vowing to harm genocide survivors. It is also unbelievable to hear that some of the aid meant for genocide survivors ends up in pockets of those who were supposed to manage them. Indeed, there are reports of genocide survivors who are still languishing in abject poverty, unattended to, without shelter, and orphans still being at the mercy of charity.
It is not enough to denounce malpractices. People need action. They need to see that the government is truly behind them. It is nonsense to denounce those who swindle survivors’ aid, without bringing them to justice, or transferring them to other offices in the civil service. It amounts to putting a finger in a wound.
This should be high on the agenda of the government, in order to ease suffering and regain the confidence of all orphans and widows who were traumatised by the genocide.
It is urgent for the government to go beyond slogans and unveil plans of ensuring security for genocide survivors. It is high time for the security services to publish reports of investigations that were carried out into genocide survivors’ attacks. The victims are calling out for help.
Dear countrymen,
It is paramount not to be hostages to history. We should be courageous enough to think about the long term. We should learn from the past, although it may not be an easy task. We should agree to join forces for the interests of our beloved country, in peace, unity and mutual respect. This is the heritage that we should leave to our future generations.
I will finish by calling upon every Rwandan to remember all our deceased, to remember what happened, but without forgetting the future.
May God bless you all,
Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza
Chairperson UDF-Inkingi
Une captive politique au Rwanda? Une interview avec Victoire Ingabire.
Radio Netherlands
9 Avril 2010
http://www.rnw.nl/afrique/article/une-captive-politique-au-rwanda
Les choses ne se passent pas comme prévu pour Victoire Ingabire, candidate à l’élection présidentielle au Rwanda.
" C’est une stratégie que justement le régime a trouvé pour m’empêcher de continuer mes activités politiques. Mais nous continuons à nous battre pour instaurer le processus démocratique dans notre pays" , affirme la candidate dans une interview accordée à RNW.
Et bien la situation actuelle , c’est que je suis toujours bloquée par le gouvernement du général Kagame qui refuse que j’organise l’assemblée constituante de notre parti pour pouvoir l’enregistrer et pour pouvoir participer à l’élection. Ça fait deux mois maintenant que je dois répondre aux convocations de la police, donc il y a une enquête interminable . Comme vous le savez bien , il y a le ministre de la Justice, lui-même qui a déclaré qu’il n’y a pas de preuves de ce qu’ils m’accusent. Mais jusqu’aujourd’hui ils disent qu’ils doivent continuer à chercher encore. C’est une stratégie que justement le régime a trouvé pour m’empêcher de continuer mes activités politiques. Mais nous continuons à nous battre pour instaurer le processus démocratique dans notre pays.
Etes vous obligée de vous présenter tous les jours aux convocations de la police ?
Non, non , de temps en temps…de temps en temps , c’est pas quelque chose de fixe. Ils nous envoient des convocations quand ils veulent.
Etes vous libre de vos mouvements dans le pays, je veux dire à Kigali la capitale ?
Non je suis libre de mes mouvements, je peux visiter tout le pays. Quand j’ai le temps je passe pour discuter avec la population, pour écouter leurs problèmes, pour qu’on puisse justement apporter les solutions adéquates. Donc, je suis libre de mes mouvements dans le pays , à part aller à l’extérieur du pays.
Et pour quelles raisons on ne veut pas vous laisser quitter le pays car vous avez de la famille aux Pays-Bas ?
Oui ça m’étonne aussi parce que il n’y a aucune loi qui m’empêche de sortir. Ils m’empêche de sortir verbalement, ils n’ont pas un écrit, ils ne peuvent pas écrire parce qu’ils ne peuvent pas justifier cette interdiction. Verbalement ils m’ont dit que je ne peux pas quitter le pays. Donc je sais bien , normalement je peux quitter le pays, mais je sais qu’à ce moment là je leur donnerai l’occasion de m’arrêter. Alors je ne vais pas non plus leur donner cette occasion.
Vous avez une campagne que vous compter mener malgré tous ces problèmes, quelle est votre stratégie pour continuer à concourir lors de ces élections?
Oui c’est pas seulement pour les élections, mais aussi pour que les gens sachent que notre priorité, la priorité du FDU, les Forces démocratiques Unifiées, c’est pas vraiment les élections présidentielles, la priorité c’es de mettre en place un système démocratique . Vous savez au Rwanda nous avons régime qui a été installé après la guerre. C’est un système d’après guerre. Alors seize ans après cette guerre, il est grand temps que l’on sorte de ce système et qu’on entre dans un système démocratique. Donc c’est ça la priorité pour nous , c’est entrer dans un système démocratique au Rwanda. Donc le travail que nous sommes entrain de faire maintenant c’est de mobiliser, de sensibiliser la population et de travailler ensemble avec nous pour ce changement de système. C’est pas le régime de Paul Kagame qui va décider , c’est le peuple qui va décider.
Qu’ attendez vous des pays partenaires du Rwanda, comme les Pays-Bas ?
Nous continuons à avoir des contacts avec les pays partenaires du Rwanda. La Hollande est deuxième grand donateur du Rwanda et du régime du général Kagame. Nous essayons de leur faire comprendre qu’il est grand temps d’accepter qu’il y ait un processus au Rwanda. Donc, nous savons que ces pays ( donateurs) , si ils veulent bien, ils sont capables de ramener le régime de Kagame à accepter de relancer le processus au Rwanda.
9 Avril 2010
http://www.rnw.nl/afrique/article/une-captive-politique-au-rwanda
Les choses ne se passent pas comme prévu pour Victoire Ingabire, candidate à l’élection présidentielle au Rwanda.
" C’est une stratégie que justement le régime a trouvé pour m’empêcher de continuer mes activités politiques. Mais nous continuons à nous battre pour instaurer le processus démocratique dans notre pays" , affirme la candidate dans une interview accordée à RNW.
Et bien la situation actuelle , c’est que je suis toujours bloquée par le gouvernement du général Kagame qui refuse que j’organise l’assemblée constituante de notre parti pour pouvoir l’enregistrer et pour pouvoir participer à l’élection. Ça fait deux mois maintenant que je dois répondre aux convocations de la police, donc il y a une enquête interminable . Comme vous le savez bien , il y a le ministre de la Justice, lui-même qui a déclaré qu’il n’y a pas de preuves de ce qu’ils m’accusent. Mais jusqu’aujourd’hui ils disent qu’ils doivent continuer à chercher encore. C’est une stratégie que justement le régime a trouvé pour m’empêcher de continuer mes activités politiques. Mais nous continuons à nous battre pour instaurer le processus démocratique dans notre pays.
Etes vous obligée de vous présenter tous les jours aux convocations de la police ?
Non, non , de temps en temps…de temps en temps , c’est pas quelque chose de fixe. Ils nous envoient des convocations quand ils veulent.
Etes vous libre de vos mouvements dans le pays, je veux dire à Kigali la capitale ?
Non je suis libre de mes mouvements, je peux visiter tout le pays. Quand j’ai le temps je passe pour discuter avec la population, pour écouter leurs problèmes, pour qu’on puisse justement apporter les solutions adéquates. Donc, je suis libre de mes mouvements dans le pays , à part aller à l’extérieur du pays.
Et pour quelles raisons on ne veut pas vous laisser quitter le pays car vous avez de la famille aux Pays-Bas ?
Oui ça m’étonne aussi parce que il n’y a aucune loi qui m’empêche de sortir. Ils m’empêche de sortir verbalement, ils n’ont pas un écrit, ils ne peuvent pas écrire parce qu’ils ne peuvent pas justifier cette interdiction. Verbalement ils m’ont dit que je ne peux pas quitter le pays. Donc je sais bien , normalement je peux quitter le pays, mais je sais qu’à ce moment là je leur donnerai l’occasion de m’arrêter. Alors je ne vais pas non plus leur donner cette occasion.
Vous avez une campagne que vous compter mener malgré tous ces problèmes, quelle est votre stratégie pour continuer à concourir lors de ces élections?
Oui c’est pas seulement pour les élections, mais aussi pour que les gens sachent que notre priorité, la priorité du FDU, les Forces démocratiques Unifiées, c’est pas vraiment les élections présidentielles, la priorité c’es de mettre en place un système démocratique . Vous savez au Rwanda nous avons régime qui a été installé après la guerre. C’est un système d’après guerre. Alors seize ans après cette guerre, il est grand temps que l’on sorte de ce système et qu’on entre dans un système démocratique. Donc c’est ça la priorité pour nous , c’est entrer dans un système démocratique au Rwanda. Donc le travail que nous sommes entrain de faire maintenant c’est de mobiliser, de sensibiliser la population et de travailler ensemble avec nous pour ce changement de système. C’est pas le régime de Paul Kagame qui va décider , c’est le peuple qui va décider.
Qu’ attendez vous des pays partenaires du Rwanda, comme les Pays-Bas ?
Nous continuons à avoir des contacts avec les pays partenaires du Rwanda. La Hollande est deuxième grand donateur du Rwanda et du régime du général Kagame. Nous essayons de leur faire comprendre qu’il est grand temps d’accepter qu’il y ait un processus au Rwanda. Donc, nous savons que ces pays ( donateurs) , si ils veulent bien, ils sont capables de ramener le régime de Kagame à accepter de relancer le processus au Rwanda.
Cinq chefs d'accusation contre V. Ingabire.
Radio Netherlands
9 April 2010
http://www.rnw.nl/afrique/article/cinq-chefs-daccusation-contre-v-ingabire
Après l’interview accordée par Victoire Ingabire (Une captive au Rwanda ?) , RNW a joint Augustin Nkusi, porte-parole du Parquet général rwandais, et Procureur national . Voici sa réaction :
Je ne pense pas que je doive parler des élections , parce que les élections concernent les instances politiques, mais en ce qui concerne la justice plutôt, madame Ingabire est suspectée de cinq chefs d’accusations à savoir:
La collaboration avec des éléments terroristes FDLR qui sont reconnus ainsi même par la communauté internationale, vus leurs actes ignobles perpétrés en République démocratique du Congo.
Elle est également suspectée de crimes attentatoires à la sûreté de l’Etat
Et il y a également des preuves selon lesquelles, elle serait entrain de créer une force armée irrégulière parallèle aux forces régulières nationales pour venir déstabiliser le pays.
Elle serait aussi suspectée d’après ses déclarations publiques à gauche et à droite dans le pays, lesquelles déclarations sont entachées de caractère divisionniste de nature à dresser les populations les unes contre les autres . Et enfin, cette dame serait poursuivie d’avoir lancé des propos entachés d’une idéologie de génocide.
Avez vous des preuves concernant ces cinq chefs d’accusation ?
Oui, nous avons déjà eu certaines preuves. Les enquêtes continuent pour en avoir plus.
Pourquoi avoir attendu 2010 pour lancer ces accusations contre Victoire Ingabire ?
Ce sont des crimes qui sont tout à fait récents .Ce ne sont pas des crimes qui avaient existé bien avant . Elle n’est pas accusée pour avoir commis le génocide, non, c’est plutôt des actes criminels qui sont tout à fait récents , on ne pouvait pas le faire bien avant, c’est tout à fait naturel.
La procédure va durer combien de temps ?
On ne sait pas quand ça va finir , parce que certaines enquêtes doivent être menées à l’étranger. Elle a vécu à l’étranger, en Hollande. Ça va prendre quelques temps…
C’est combien quelques temps ? Des semaines, des mois… ?
Est ce que vous même vous pouvez le savoir ? C’est vraiment difficile de savoir.
9 April 2010
http://www.rnw.nl/afrique/article/cinq-chefs-daccusation-contre-v-ingabire
Après l’interview accordée par Victoire Ingabire (Une captive au Rwanda ?) , RNW a joint Augustin Nkusi, porte-parole du Parquet général rwandais, et Procureur national . Voici sa réaction :
Je ne pense pas que je doive parler des élections , parce que les élections concernent les instances politiques, mais en ce qui concerne la justice plutôt, madame Ingabire est suspectée de cinq chefs d’accusations à savoir:
La collaboration avec des éléments terroristes FDLR qui sont reconnus ainsi même par la communauté internationale, vus leurs actes ignobles perpétrés en République démocratique du Congo.
Elle est également suspectée de crimes attentatoires à la sûreté de l’Etat
Et il y a également des preuves selon lesquelles, elle serait entrain de créer une force armée irrégulière parallèle aux forces régulières nationales pour venir déstabiliser le pays.
Elle serait aussi suspectée d’après ses déclarations publiques à gauche et à droite dans le pays, lesquelles déclarations sont entachées de caractère divisionniste de nature à dresser les populations les unes contre les autres . Et enfin, cette dame serait poursuivie d’avoir lancé des propos entachés d’une idéologie de génocide.
Avez vous des preuves concernant ces cinq chefs d’accusation ?
Oui, nous avons déjà eu certaines preuves. Les enquêtes continuent pour en avoir plus.
Pourquoi avoir attendu 2010 pour lancer ces accusations contre Victoire Ingabire ?
Ce sont des crimes qui sont tout à fait récents .Ce ne sont pas des crimes qui avaient existé bien avant . Elle n’est pas accusée pour avoir commis le génocide, non, c’est plutôt des actes criminels qui sont tout à fait récents , on ne pouvait pas le faire bien avant, c’est tout à fait naturel.
La procédure va durer combien de temps ?
On ne sait pas quand ça va finir , parce que certaines enquêtes doivent être menées à l’étranger. Elle a vécu à l’étranger, en Hollande. Ça va prendre quelques temps…
C’est combien quelques temps ? Des semaines, des mois… ?
Est ce que vous même vous pouvez le savoir ? C’est vraiment difficile de savoir.
Rwanda: Le moment de la vérité approche; le régime de Kigali dont la légitimité est fondée sur le mensonge est inquiet.
Les relations diplomatiques ont été rétablies entre Paris et Kigali alors que le Général Kagame n’a pas retiré ses graves accusations diffamatoires portées contre la France:
« Quant aux Français, leur rôle dans ce qui s’est passé au Rwanda est l’évidence même. Ils ont sciemment entraîné et armé les troupes gouvernementales et les milices qui allaient commettre le génocide. Et ils savaient qu’ils allaient commettre un génocide. »
Parlant des soldats français qui participèrent à l’opération Turquoise il ajouta, sans grande nuance :
« Ils ont ouvert des routes pour permettre aux auteurs du génocide de fuir (…) Ils ont sauvé ceux qui tuaient, pas ceux qui étaient tués ».
En France même, certains ont adopté sans la moindre distanciation la thèse officielle de Kigali qui est que la France est complice du génocide du Rwanda. Les raisons avancées par le régime de Kigali sont au nombre de trois:
- La France aurait formé les tueurs.
- Elle savait que le génocide allait avoir lieu.
- Elle aurait laissé faire.
Ces accusations sont scandaleuses et il est pour le moins regrettable que l’Etat français, pourtant parfaitement renseigné sur le dossier, n’ait pas répondu dans des termes qu’elles méritaient. En effet :
- primo, les tueurs furent des paysans armés de machettes et de gourdins. Dans ces conditions on voit mal en quoi la coopération militaire française qui a d’abord porté sur l’artillerie et le pilotage des hélicoptères aurait pu les former…
- secundo, parce que le génocide n’ayant pas été programmé, comme cela a été clairement établi par le Tribunal Pénal International pour le Rwanda (Jugement du 18 décembre 2008 dans l’affaire Bagosora et consorts, TPIR-98-41-T), la France ne pouvait donc savoir qu’il allait avoir lieu.
- tertio parce que les forces françaises avaient quitté le Rwanda en décembre 1993, soit six mois avant le 6 avril 1994, date du déclenchement du génocide, et à la demande expresse des actuels maîtres de Kigali. Ces derniers savent d’ailleurs bien que si l’armée française était demeurée sur place, jamais le génocide n’aurait eu lieu car, à la différence des hommes de l’ONU qui les avaient remplacés, les Français s’y seraient opposés.
En réalité, ces attaques constituent une manoeuvre servant à masquer les véritables responsabilités dans le génocide. N’oublions pas en effet que c’est l’attentat du 6 avril 1994, qui coûta la vie à deux présidents en exercice, celui du Rwanda et celui du Burundi, qui en fut l’élément déclencheur.
Le régime de Kigali est inquiet ; le moment approche en effet qui verra éclater la vérité qui est que c’est en utilisant l’apocalypse du génocide qu’il a pris le pouvoir et qu’il a été accepté par la « communauté internationale ».
Sa légitimité étant fondée sur le mensonge, il veille donc avec un soin jaloux à ce que l’histoire « officielle » qu’il a réussi à imposer aux médias ne soit pas contestée.
Le juge Bruguière l’ayant fait voler en éclats, il exerce donc un chantage sur la France afin que l’exécution des mandats d’arrêt internationaux lancés contre ceux que la justice française considère comme les auteurs ou les commanditaires de l’attentat du 6 avril 1994 soit enterrée.
Le plus insolite est que, dans cette entreprise, il bénéficie de l’aide d’alliés influents au sein de l’Etat français et notamment de la plus haute hiérarchie du ministère des Affaires étrangères…
Bernard Lugan – L’Afrique Réelle N° 4 – Avril 2010.
« Quant aux Français, leur rôle dans ce qui s’est passé au Rwanda est l’évidence même. Ils ont sciemment entraîné et armé les troupes gouvernementales et les milices qui allaient commettre le génocide. Et ils savaient qu’ils allaient commettre un génocide. »
Parlant des soldats français qui participèrent à l’opération Turquoise il ajouta, sans grande nuance :
« Ils ont ouvert des routes pour permettre aux auteurs du génocide de fuir (…) Ils ont sauvé ceux qui tuaient, pas ceux qui étaient tués ».
En France même, certains ont adopté sans la moindre distanciation la thèse officielle de Kigali qui est que la France est complice du génocide du Rwanda. Les raisons avancées par le régime de Kigali sont au nombre de trois:
- La France aurait formé les tueurs.
- Elle savait que le génocide allait avoir lieu.
- Elle aurait laissé faire.
Ces accusations sont scandaleuses et il est pour le moins regrettable que l’Etat français, pourtant parfaitement renseigné sur le dossier, n’ait pas répondu dans des termes qu’elles méritaient. En effet :
- primo, les tueurs furent des paysans armés de machettes et de gourdins. Dans ces conditions on voit mal en quoi la coopération militaire française qui a d’abord porté sur l’artillerie et le pilotage des hélicoptères aurait pu les former…
- secundo, parce que le génocide n’ayant pas été programmé, comme cela a été clairement établi par le Tribunal Pénal International pour le Rwanda (Jugement du 18 décembre 2008 dans l’affaire Bagosora et consorts, TPIR-98-41-T), la France ne pouvait donc savoir qu’il allait avoir lieu.
- tertio parce que les forces françaises avaient quitté le Rwanda en décembre 1993, soit six mois avant le 6 avril 1994, date du déclenchement du génocide, et à la demande expresse des actuels maîtres de Kigali. Ces derniers savent d’ailleurs bien que si l’armée française était demeurée sur place, jamais le génocide n’aurait eu lieu car, à la différence des hommes de l’ONU qui les avaient remplacés, les Français s’y seraient opposés.
En réalité, ces attaques constituent une manoeuvre servant à masquer les véritables responsabilités dans le génocide. N’oublions pas en effet que c’est l’attentat du 6 avril 1994, qui coûta la vie à deux présidents en exercice, celui du Rwanda et celui du Burundi, qui en fut l’élément déclencheur.
Le régime de Kigali est inquiet ; le moment approche en effet qui verra éclater la vérité qui est que c’est en utilisant l’apocalypse du génocide qu’il a pris le pouvoir et qu’il a été accepté par la « communauté internationale ».
Sa légitimité étant fondée sur le mensonge, il veille donc avec un soin jaloux à ce que l’histoire « officielle » qu’il a réussi à imposer aux médias ne soit pas contestée.
Le juge Bruguière l’ayant fait voler en éclats, il exerce donc un chantage sur la France afin que l’exécution des mandats d’arrêt internationaux lancés contre ceux que la justice française considère comme les auteurs ou les commanditaires de l’attentat du 6 avril 1994 soit enterrée.
Le plus insolite est que, dans cette entreprise, il bénéficie de l’aide d’alliés influents au sein de l’Etat français et notamment de la plus haute hiérarchie du ministère des Affaires étrangères…
Bernard Lugan – L’Afrique Réelle N° 4 – Avril 2010.
Victoire Ingabire s’adresse à la nation à l’occasion de la commémoration du génocide rwandais.
Rwandaises, Rwandais,
Nous débutons aujourd’hui les cérémonies de la commémoration du génocide. Au nom des FDU-Inkingi et tous leurs membres, le comité exécutif provisoire se tient aux côtés de tous les Rwandais, et plus spécialement à côté de ceux qui ont perdu les leurs pendant le génocide, à côté des rescapés dont le génocide a tout emporté.
Ces commémorations nous concernent tous, nous devons nous souvenir des horreurs qui se sont abattus sur notre pays. Se souvenir de ce crime des crimes doit nous faire réfléchir et nous amener à prendre des dispositions nécessaires pour que dans ce pays, plus jamais le sang des innocents ne coule.
C’est regrettable de constater que 16 ans après le génocide, certains continuent de porter atteinte à la vie des rescapés ; c’est très choquant de voir que certaines personnes chargées de gérer les fonds destinés à venir en aide aux rescapés, les détournent; que jusqu’à ce jour certains rescapés manquent de tous les besoins essentiels et que des orphelins du génocide sont laissés pour compte.
Il ne suffit pas de critiquer, les rescapés ont besoin de voir des actions concrètes du gouvernement montrant qu’il est réellement à leurs côtés.
Critiquer ceux qui détournent les fonds d’aide aux rescapés sans qu’il y ait des suites judiciaires, se contentant souvent des simples mutations de ces personnes, fait mal au plus haut point à tous les malheureux destinataires de ces fonds. Voilà une des actions que le gouvernement devrait mettre en place pour que toutes les veuves et tous les orphelins du génocide retrouvent un peu d’espoir, un peu de réconfort pour aujourd’hui et dans le futur.
Il est nécessaire que le gouvernement adopte un vrai programme pour protéger les rescapés du génocide. Pourquoi, par exemple, les services de sécurité ne publient-elles pas les conclusions des enquêtes diligentées contre ces attaques visant les rescapés du génocide alors que ces derniers ne cessent de crier au secours ?
Rwandaises, Rwandais,
Il est aussi important de ne pas rester prisonnier de l’histoire, nous devons
oser regarder vers l’avant afin d’envisager le futur.
En tirant des leçons de ce qui nous est arrivé, nous devons décider, même si nous savons que ce n’est pas facile, d’ensemble construire notre pays, dans l’unité, la paix et le respect mutuel.
Rwandaises, Rwandais,
Je termine en vous demandant de nous souvenir en vue de construire un avenir meilleur ; souvenons-nous de ce qui s’est passé tout en essayant de nous tourner vers l’avenir.
Que Dieu vous protège.
Fait à Kigali, le 7 avril 2010
Mme Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza
Présidente des FDU-Inkingi
Nous débutons aujourd’hui les cérémonies de la commémoration du génocide. Au nom des FDU-Inkingi et tous leurs membres, le comité exécutif provisoire se tient aux côtés de tous les Rwandais, et plus spécialement à côté de ceux qui ont perdu les leurs pendant le génocide, à côté des rescapés dont le génocide a tout emporté.
Ces commémorations nous concernent tous, nous devons nous souvenir des horreurs qui se sont abattus sur notre pays. Se souvenir de ce crime des crimes doit nous faire réfléchir et nous amener à prendre des dispositions nécessaires pour que dans ce pays, plus jamais le sang des innocents ne coule.
C’est regrettable de constater que 16 ans après le génocide, certains continuent de porter atteinte à la vie des rescapés ; c’est très choquant de voir que certaines personnes chargées de gérer les fonds destinés à venir en aide aux rescapés, les détournent; que jusqu’à ce jour certains rescapés manquent de tous les besoins essentiels et que des orphelins du génocide sont laissés pour compte.
Il ne suffit pas de critiquer, les rescapés ont besoin de voir des actions concrètes du gouvernement montrant qu’il est réellement à leurs côtés.
Critiquer ceux qui détournent les fonds d’aide aux rescapés sans qu’il y ait des suites judiciaires, se contentant souvent des simples mutations de ces personnes, fait mal au plus haut point à tous les malheureux destinataires de ces fonds. Voilà une des actions que le gouvernement devrait mettre en place pour que toutes les veuves et tous les orphelins du génocide retrouvent un peu d’espoir, un peu de réconfort pour aujourd’hui et dans le futur.
Il est nécessaire que le gouvernement adopte un vrai programme pour protéger les rescapés du génocide. Pourquoi, par exemple, les services de sécurité ne publient-elles pas les conclusions des enquêtes diligentées contre ces attaques visant les rescapés du génocide alors que ces derniers ne cessent de crier au secours ?
Rwandaises, Rwandais,
Il est aussi important de ne pas rester prisonnier de l’histoire, nous devons
oser regarder vers l’avant afin d’envisager le futur.
En tirant des leçons de ce qui nous est arrivé, nous devons décider, même si nous savons que ce n’est pas facile, d’ensemble construire notre pays, dans l’unité, la paix et le respect mutuel.
Rwandaises, Rwandais,
Je termine en vous demandant de nous souvenir en vue de construire un avenir meilleur ; souvenons-nous de ce qui s’est passé tout en essayant de nous tourner vers l’avenir.
Que Dieu vous protège.
Fait à Kigali, le 7 avril 2010
Mme Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza
Présidente des FDU-Inkingi
Les détenus du TPIR parlent lors de la 16ème commémoration de la tragédie rwandaise de 1994.
Press Release
6 April 2010
Communiqué de presse des détenus du TPIR en commémoration de la tragédie rwandaise de 1994.
« …prendre un marteau,frapper une mouche, tuer la mouche avec un marteau, nous n’hésiterions pas à lefaire! » Président Kagame, le 25 mars 2010.
C’est sur cette tonitruante déclaration du Président KAGAME que les détenus du Tribunal Pénal International sur le Rwanda abordent le SEIZIÈME anniversaire de la tragédie rwandaise, déclenchée le 06 avril 1994 par l’attentat contre l’avion du Chef de l’Etat et la reprise unilatérale et généralisée des hostilités par le Front Patriotique Rwandais pour la conquête du pouvoir au Rwanda par les armes.
Cette déclaration du Président KAGAME est un éloquent témoignage du climat de terreur et d’intimidation dans lequel vit le peuple rwandais depuis 16 ans sous l’innommable dictature du FPR.
Ces propos, empreints d’une cruauté légendaire mais ovationnés par les deux chambres du Parlement du FPR, laissent présager que le régime en place concocte une tragédie envers le peuple en cette année électorale.
Aussi les détenus du TPIR en appellent-t-ils à la vigilance de la communauté internationale.
Les détenus constatent avec amertume que le TPIR, à l’aube de sa fermeture confirmée, n’a fait que garantir l’impunité au FPR. Son bilan au bout de seize ans d’activités aura été celui d’un tribunal du vainqueur.
Le FPR a récemment tenté de se disculper de ses responsabilités dans l’attentat terroriste contre l’avion du Président HABYARIMANA à travers le rapport MUTSINZI. Mais ce ne fut qu’un coup d’épée dans l’eau. Le FPR n’a fait qu’en rajouter à la crédibilité du rapport du Juge français Jean Louis BRUGUIERE, comme le démontrent les personnalités indépendantes ayant analysé ce rapport ainsi que les détenus dans leur réaction du 18 février 2010.
Il est plus que temps que les auteurs de cet attentat et d’autres graves violations du droit international humanitaire commises au Rwanda en 1994 en répondent devant la Justice.
Les détenus présentent leurs condoléances les plus attristées aux victimes de la tragédie rwandaise de 1994, de toutes les ethnies et régions du Rwanda.
Ils renouvellent leur profonde sympathie aux Pays ayant perdu leurs ressortissants dans la tragédie rwandaise, ainsi qu’aux victimes des guerres du FPR qui ravagent la région des Grands lacs africains depuis 1990.
Le FPR reproche à la communauté internationale d’avoir abandonné le Rwanda alors que c’est bien lui qui s’est opposé à l’intervention des forces étrangères au moment où le Rwanda en avait grand besoin.
Les détenus sont intimement convaincus que l’opération turquoise menée par la France au Rwanda avec l’aval de l’ONU en 1994, mérite aux yeux d’honnêtes citoyens rwandais et étrangers, plus de considération plutôt que le discrédit que lui attire une politique téméraire du FPR visant à en faire une monnaie d’échange pour échapper à la Justice.
Les détenus déplorent l’acharnement contre l’épouse du feu président Habyarimana. Les poursuites engagées contre elle, sont déplacées et cyniques car dirigées contre la victime avérée et innocente de l’attentat déclencheur de l’hécatombe rwandaise. Elles devraient définitivement cesser.
Les détenus constatent que le FPR a verrouillé l’espace politique au RWANDA, le fermant complètement à ceux qui n’accordent pas leur violon au refrain de ce front, et qui sont désormais victimes d’intimidations et de harcèlements incessants.
La communauté internationale est appelée à cesser toute louange au régime dictatorial de KIGALI dominé par les criminels du FPR. Elle devrait plutôt tout mettre en oeuvre pour que criminels du FPR répondent de leurs actes et contraindre ce régime à l’ouverture démocratique favorable à l’Etat de droit et à la vraie réconciliation des rwandais.
Les détenus en appellent à tous les acteurs de la communauté internationale à oeuvrer pour mettre au pas le régime actuel de KIGALI, en vue de favoriser l’émergence d’une vraie gouvernance démocratique, respectueuse des droits de la personne humaine et l’exercice responsable des devoirs légitimes de citoyens égaux et dignes dans leur chère patrie.
Fait à Arusha, le 06 avril 2010.
Les représentants des Détenus:
Innocent Sagahutu et Arsène Shalom Ntahobari
6 April 2010
Communiqué de presse des détenus du TPIR en commémoration de la tragédie rwandaise de 1994.
« …prendre un marteau,frapper une mouche, tuer la mouche avec un marteau, nous n’hésiterions pas à lefaire! » Président Kagame, le 25 mars 2010.
C’est sur cette tonitruante déclaration du Président KAGAME que les détenus du Tribunal Pénal International sur le Rwanda abordent le SEIZIÈME anniversaire de la tragédie rwandaise, déclenchée le 06 avril 1994 par l’attentat contre l’avion du Chef de l’Etat et la reprise unilatérale et généralisée des hostilités par le Front Patriotique Rwandais pour la conquête du pouvoir au Rwanda par les armes.
Cette déclaration du Président KAGAME est un éloquent témoignage du climat de terreur et d’intimidation dans lequel vit le peuple rwandais depuis 16 ans sous l’innommable dictature du FPR.
Ces propos, empreints d’une cruauté légendaire mais ovationnés par les deux chambres du Parlement du FPR, laissent présager que le régime en place concocte une tragédie envers le peuple en cette année électorale.
Aussi les détenus du TPIR en appellent-t-ils à la vigilance de la communauté internationale.
Les détenus constatent avec amertume que le TPIR, à l’aube de sa fermeture confirmée, n’a fait que garantir l’impunité au FPR. Son bilan au bout de seize ans d’activités aura été celui d’un tribunal du vainqueur.
Le FPR a récemment tenté de se disculper de ses responsabilités dans l’attentat terroriste contre l’avion du Président HABYARIMANA à travers le rapport MUTSINZI. Mais ce ne fut qu’un coup d’épée dans l’eau. Le FPR n’a fait qu’en rajouter à la crédibilité du rapport du Juge français Jean Louis BRUGUIERE, comme le démontrent les personnalités indépendantes ayant analysé ce rapport ainsi que les détenus dans leur réaction du 18 février 2010.
Il est plus que temps que les auteurs de cet attentat et d’autres graves violations du droit international humanitaire commises au Rwanda en 1994 en répondent devant la Justice.
Les détenus présentent leurs condoléances les plus attristées aux victimes de la tragédie rwandaise de 1994, de toutes les ethnies et régions du Rwanda.
Ils renouvellent leur profonde sympathie aux Pays ayant perdu leurs ressortissants dans la tragédie rwandaise, ainsi qu’aux victimes des guerres du FPR qui ravagent la région des Grands lacs africains depuis 1990.
Le FPR reproche à la communauté internationale d’avoir abandonné le Rwanda alors que c’est bien lui qui s’est opposé à l’intervention des forces étrangères au moment où le Rwanda en avait grand besoin.
Les détenus sont intimement convaincus que l’opération turquoise menée par la France au Rwanda avec l’aval de l’ONU en 1994, mérite aux yeux d’honnêtes citoyens rwandais et étrangers, plus de considération plutôt que le discrédit que lui attire une politique téméraire du FPR visant à en faire une monnaie d’échange pour échapper à la Justice.
Les détenus déplorent l’acharnement contre l’épouse du feu président Habyarimana. Les poursuites engagées contre elle, sont déplacées et cyniques car dirigées contre la victime avérée et innocente de l’attentat déclencheur de l’hécatombe rwandaise. Elles devraient définitivement cesser.
Les détenus constatent que le FPR a verrouillé l’espace politique au RWANDA, le fermant complètement à ceux qui n’accordent pas leur violon au refrain de ce front, et qui sont désormais victimes d’intimidations et de harcèlements incessants.
La communauté internationale est appelée à cesser toute louange au régime dictatorial de KIGALI dominé par les criminels du FPR. Elle devrait plutôt tout mettre en oeuvre pour que criminels du FPR répondent de leurs actes et contraindre ce régime à l’ouverture démocratique favorable à l’Etat de droit et à la vraie réconciliation des rwandais.
Les détenus en appellent à tous les acteurs de la communauté internationale à oeuvrer pour mettre au pas le régime actuel de KIGALI, en vue de favoriser l’émergence d’une vraie gouvernance démocratique, respectueuse des droits de la personne humaine et l’exercice responsable des devoirs légitimes de citoyens égaux et dignes dans leur chère patrie.
Fait à Arusha, le 06 avril 2010.
Les représentants des Détenus:
Innocent Sagahutu et Arsène Shalom Ntahobari
Paul Kagame's Address at the April 7, 2010 Commemoration of the Genocide of the Tutsi.
Text:
http://www.paulkagame.com/speeches07-04-2010.php
Audio:
http://www.paulkagame.tv/podcast/?p=episode&name=2010-04-08_16th_commemoration_of_the_genocide01.mp3
As you can see, the transcript is from an official website that supports President Kagame. As with his speech at Murambi in 2007 (available by e-mailing WNJ's editor and the transcript is available through the Office of the President's website or posted here on WNJ), there are allegations of "cleaning up" the speech to remove any of his comments that were non-scripted. The audio is allegedly the entire speech. We leave it to the reader/listener to examine both and decide for themselves. The transcript is in English, the audio in English and Kinyarwanda.
http://www.paulkagame.com/speeches07-04-2010.php
Audio:
http://www.paulkagame.tv/podcast/?p=episode&name=2010-04-08_16th_commemoration_of_the_genocide01.mp3
As you can see, the transcript is from an official website that supports President Kagame. As with his speech at Murambi in 2007 (available by e-mailing WNJ's editor and the transcript is available through the Office of the President's website or posted here on WNJ), there are allegations of "cleaning up" the speech to remove any of his comments that were non-scripted. The audio is allegedly the entire speech. We leave it to the reader/listener to examine both and decide for themselves. The transcript is in English, the audio in English and Kinyarwanda.
Communiqué des enfants du feu Président Juvénal Habyarimana.
Press Release
En ce mois d’avril 2010, nous commémorons le 16e anniversaire de la mort de notre père, le Président Juvénal Habyarimana, et celle de son homologue du Burundi, le Président Cyprien Ntaryamira, ainsi que celle de leurs proches collaborateurs et membres d’équipage, victimes d’un attentat terroriste relégué jusqu’à ce jour aux oubliettes et devenu une énigme devant le mutisme complice de la Communauté internationale.
Cet ignoble crime a laissé les enfants et épouses de 12 familles toutes entières orphelins et veuves dont tout travail de deuil digne reste comme un mirage constamment éloigné.
Leurs assassins ne sont nullement inquiétés, certains se faisant dérouler le tapis rouge et se voyant accorder des honneurs dans des pays étrangers, tandis qu’ils sont confortablement installés au pouvoir à Kigali où l’impunité leur est assurée, malgré la terreur et l’écrasement qu’ils infligent au peuple qui ne cesse de crier au secours!
Nonobstant de sérieuses découvertes et d’importantes révélations accablantes, dont celles se dégageant des enquêtes des juges français Jean Louis Bruguière et espagnol Fernando Merelles, qui ont été sanctionnées par la délivrance de mandats d’arrêt internationaux visant une quarantaine de personnalités de l’entourage du Président Kagame, lui-même pointé du doigt par ces enquêtes comme commanditaire de plusieurs crimes, y compris l’ignoble attentat du 6 avril 1994, nous regrettons d’assister toujours à l’inertie déconcertante de la Communauté internationale devant cette impunité.
Nous espérons et attendons de cette même Communauté qu’elle accorde au peuple rwandais en particulier et aux africains en général, la même reconnaissance et la même estime que celles dont a bénéficié le peuple libanais lorsque les grandes puissances et les Nations Unies ont mis en place un tribunal spécialement chargé de faire la lumière sur l’assassinant de l’ancien premier ministre libanais, Rafic Hariri, et poursuivre ses assassins.
En ce début d’avril 2010, nous, enfants du feu Président Habyarimana, renouvelons nos condoléances et notre sympathie aux milliers de victimes du génocide rwandais, provoqué par l’assassinat de notre père, et dont les conséquences ont frappé toute la région des Grands Lacs africains, encore une fois sous le regard indifférent et complice de la Communauté internationale.
Nous dénonçons une fois de plus, avec une profonde déception, ce que nous appelons une véritable aberration à la justice dans le cas du génocide rwandais, où le Tribunal Pénal International pour le Rwanda juge les conséquences d’un acte terroriste sans juger les auteurs de l’acte lui-même. Où le Tribunal juge les crimes commis pendant l’année entière de 1994 mais efface délibérément la date du 6 avril 1994 de son calendrier de compétence, alors que cette date marque pourtant le déclenchement du génocide rwandais. Où le Tribunal décide de ne juger que les vaincus, et de fermer complètement les yeux devant les crimes flagrants des vainqueurs.
La vérité et la justice sur l’assassinat de notre père ne peuvent en aucun cas être exclues de l’impératif préalable à une véritable justice et une réelle réconciliation du peuple rwandais meurtri par une tragédie qu’il n’a ni souhaitée ni méritée.
Malgré la volonté des autorités actuelles de Kigali, la date du 6 avril ne doit pas être effacée dans l’histoire du Rwanda ni dans la mémoire du peuple rwandais et de l’humanité toute entière.
La commémoration du 6 avril doit être notre droit naturel de pleurer tous les nôtres et des centaines de milliers, sinon des millions, de compatriotes sacrifiés pour des raisons inexpliquées.
L’extermination de toutes ces victimes est intervenue dans le cadre d’un vaste plan de control du pouvoir par épuration qui continue de sévir sous plusieurs formes dans notre pays d’origine, le Rwanda, depuis 1990 jusqu’à ce jour.
Voilà déjà 16 ans que notre famille, sans oublier de nombreuses autres familles de compatriotes rwandais et d’autres personnes éprises de justice, sommes malmenés par certains représentants des États et de la presse à différents échelons, et par certaines associations qui se cachent derrière des objectifs nobles, mais agissent officieusement en complicité avec le gouvernement du FPR dans un plan minutieusement étudié, visant à anéantir tout opposant avéré ou présumé, ou toute personne représentant une menace pour le régime du FPR, afin de faire obstruction à la vérité et ainsi assurer son impunité.
Une fois de plus, ces dernières semaines nous avons assisté avec indignation à une pitoyable comédie médiatique où certaines personnalités et la presse tentent encore de faire passer notre chère mère, épouse du feu Président Habyarimana, comme étant une instigatrice des malheureux événements qui ont frappé notre pays en 1994.
Ils se font ainsi la caisse de résonance du pouvoir de Kigali, se fondant sur des accusations purement gratuites et mensongères – accusations que d’ailleurs le Tribunal Pénal International pour le Rwanda a considérées comme étant des éléments issus du montage du pouvoir de Kigali.
Avec un cynisme sans égal, ils essaient de se substituer au TPIR en refondant leurs accusations sur une prétendue planification du génocide rwandais par Madame Habyarimana et ses proches et une prétendue appartenance à l’”Akazu”.
Or, comme nous venons de le dire, ces deux éléments ont été démolis par des avocats de la défense et des experts au TPIR, puis rejetés par ce même tribunal.
Cette tentative de détournement et de réécriture de l’histoire réelle vise à couvrir les forfaits du FPR et de son Président Paul Kagame, qui n’ont pourtant cessé d’humilier et d’incriminer la France. Paradoxalement, ces responsables français n’hésitent pas à couvrir les ignominies du FPR au détriment de l’armée française diffamée par ce dernier, et de leurs compatriotes et ressortissants exterminés par les combattants de ce mouvement rebelle devenu aujourd’hui parti au pouvoir.
Notre chère mère est fort déchirée par la mort atroce de son mari et par la tragédie qui s’en est suivie, semant une désolation inexprimable dans tout le pays.
Elle est une fois de plus poignardée dans le dos par ces assassins qui, depuis déjà 16 ans organise un complot contre elle dans le but d’opérer une diversion et de tromper l’opinion publique internationale en voulant la passer pour une criminelle.
Nous saisissons cette occasion pour réaffirmer avec véhémence l’innocence de notre mère Agathe Kanziga Habyarimana ainsi que celle des autres membres de notre famille accusés par le pouvoir de Kigali.
En effet, différents mensonges, rumeurs, délations et menaces sont toujours orchestrés contre nous par les assassins de notre père, puisque nous sommes des témoins directs, et donc des témoins gênants, qu’ils doivent éliminer ou discréditer par tous les moyens pour continuer à assoir leur mensonge.
Toutes ces accusations n’ont qu’un seul but ; celui d’anéantir politiquement voire physiquement toute personne susceptible d’incarner le refus d’une idéologie d’apartheid des temps modernes qui s’est installée au Rwanda, en s’attaquant aux symboles, et ainsi couvrir les crimes du régime dictatorial du FPR installé à Kigali depuis juillet 1994.
Comme l’a dit notre mère elle-même, nous aussi avons confiance en la justice française et nous souhaiterions qu’elle aille jusqu’au bout afin que le statut de victime soit reconnu à notre mère et à la majorité du peuple rwandais qui se trouve injustement accusée et dont elle incarne le symbole.
Nous espérons que notre mère aura droit à un procès équitable qui lui permettra enfin de casser une fois pour toutes ces fausses rumeurs accablantes et de prouver son innocence. Nous espérons par ailleurs que cet éventuel procès contribuera à faire connaître la vérité et à rendre la vraie justice.
Il existe maintenant suffisamment de preuves accablantes, de rapports judiciaires, de témoignages crédibles de témoins oculaires ainsi qu’une abondante documentation qui attestent que le Front Patriotique Rwandais (FPR), aujourd’hui au pouvoir au Rwanda, a planifié, depuis l’invasion du Rwanda en 1990, et exécuté la déstabilisation du pays, des assassinats ciblés y compris celui du Président de la République et d’autres personnalités politiques, des intellectuels, des religieux, des commerçants ainsi que d’anciens cadres administratifs, et des massacres à grande échelle de la population en vue de s’assurer le contrôle exclusif du pouvoir et des ressources du Rwanda et des régions voisines, essentiellement de la République Démocratique du Congo.
Nous en appelons à la Communauté internationale, de tourner son regard vers le bas peuple rwandais qui souffre sous le joug d’un régime totalitaire, afin de l’aider à jouir d’une vraie démocratie, en passant par la vérité, la justice équitable, la réconciliation réelle et la paix durable.
Nous renouvelons encore une fois notre attachement au peuple rwandais tout entier. Nous sommes en communion avec toutes les victimes du génocide rwandais en ce mois d’avril et espérons de tout coeur que le Rwanda retrouve un équilibre et une égalité entre ses composantes pour que le chemin de la dignité et l’apaisement des coeurs lui soit, enfin, accessible.
Fait à Paris le 8 avril 2010
Par les enfants du feu Président Juvénal Habyarimana
En ce mois d’avril 2010, nous commémorons le 16e anniversaire de la mort de notre père, le Président Juvénal Habyarimana, et celle de son homologue du Burundi, le Président Cyprien Ntaryamira, ainsi que celle de leurs proches collaborateurs et membres d’équipage, victimes d’un attentat terroriste relégué jusqu’à ce jour aux oubliettes et devenu une énigme devant le mutisme complice de la Communauté internationale.
Cet ignoble crime a laissé les enfants et épouses de 12 familles toutes entières orphelins et veuves dont tout travail de deuil digne reste comme un mirage constamment éloigné.
Leurs assassins ne sont nullement inquiétés, certains se faisant dérouler le tapis rouge et se voyant accorder des honneurs dans des pays étrangers, tandis qu’ils sont confortablement installés au pouvoir à Kigali où l’impunité leur est assurée, malgré la terreur et l’écrasement qu’ils infligent au peuple qui ne cesse de crier au secours!
Nonobstant de sérieuses découvertes et d’importantes révélations accablantes, dont celles se dégageant des enquêtes des juges français Jean Louis Bruguière et espagnol Fernando Merelles, qui ont été sanctionnées par la délivrance de mandats d’arrêt internationaux visant une quarantaine de personnalités de l’entourage du Président Kagame, lui-même pointé du doigt par ces enquêtes comme commanditaire de plusieurs crimes, y compris l’ignoble attentat du 6 avril 1994, nous regrettons d’assister toujours à l’inertie déconcertante de la Communauté internationale devant cette impunité.
Nous espérons et attendons de cette même Communauté qu’elle accorde au peuple rwandais en particulier et aux africains en général, la même reconnaissance et la même estime que celles dont a bénéficié le peuple libanais lorsque les grandes puissances et les Nations Unies ont mis en place un tribunal spécialement chargé de faire la lumière sur l’assassinant de l’ancien premier ministre libanais, Rafic Hariri, et poursuivre ses assassins.
En ce début d’avril 2010, nous, enfants du feu Président Habyarimana, renouvelons nos condoléances et notre sympathie aux milliers de victimes du génocide rwandais, provoqué par l’assassinat de notre père, et dont les conséquences ont frappé toute la région des Grands Lacs africains, encore une fois sous le regard indifférent et complice de la Communauté internationale.
Nous dénonçons une fois de plus, avec une profonde déception, ce que nous appelons une véritable aberration à la justice dans le cas du génocide rwandais, où le Tribunal Pénal International pour le Rwanda juge les conséquences d’un acte terroriste sans juger les auteurs de l’acte lui-même. Où le Tribunal juge les crimes commis pendant l’année entière de 1994 mais efface délibérément la date du 6 avril 1994 de son calendrier de compétence, alors que cette date marque pourtant le déclenchement du génocide rwandais. Où le Tribunal décide de ne juger que les vaincus, et de fermer complètement les yeux devant les crimes flagrants des vainqueurs.
La vérité et la justice sur l’assassinat de notre père ne peuvent en aucun cas être exclues de l’impératif préalable à une véritable justice et une réelle réconciliation du peuple rwandais meurtri par une tragédie qu’il n’a ni souhaitée ni méritée.
Malgré la volonté des autorités actuelles de Kigali, la date du 6 avril ne doit pas être effacée dans l’histoire du Rwanda ni dans la mémoire du peuple rwandais et de l’humanité toute entière.
La commémoration du 6 avril doit être notre droit naturel de pleurer tous les nôtres et des centaines de milliers, sinon des millions, de compatriotes sacrifiés pour des raisons inexpliquées.
L’extermination de toutes ces victimes est intervenue dans le cadre d’un vaste plan de control du pouvoir par épuration qui continue de sévir sous plusieurs formes dans notre pays d’origine, le Rwanda, depuis 1990 jusqu’à ce jour.
Voilà déjà 16 ans que notre famille, sans oublier de nombreuses autres familles de compatriotes rwandais et d’autres personnes éprises de justice, sommes malmenés par certains représentants des États et de la presse à différents échelons, et par certaines associations qui se cachent derrière des objectifs nobles, mais agissent officieusement en complicité avec le gouvernement du FPR dans un plan minutieusement étudié, visant à anéantir tout opposant avéré ou présumé, ou toute personne représentant une menace pour le régime du FPR, afin de faire obstruction à la vérité et ainsi assurer son impunité.
Une fois de plus, ces dernières semaines nous avons assisté avec indignation à une pitoyable comédie médiatique où certaines personnalités et la presse tentent encore de faire passer notre chère mère, épouse du feu Président Habyarimana, comme étant une instigatrice des malheureux événements qui ont frappé notre pays en 1994.
Ils se font ainsi la caisse de résonance du pouvoir de Kigali, se fondant sur des accusations purement gratuites et mensongères – accusations que d’ailleurs le Tribunal Pénal International pour le Rwanda a considérées comme étant des éléments issus du montage du pouvoir de Kigali.
Avec un cynisme sans égal, ils essaient de se substituer au TPIR en refondant leurs accusations sur une prétendue planification du génocide rwandais par Madame Habyarimana et ses proches et une prétendue appartenance à l’”Akazu”.
Or, comme nous venons de le dire, ces deux éléments ont été démolis par des avocats de la défense et des experts au TPIR, puis rejetés par ce même tribunal.
Cette tentative de détournement et de réécriture de l’histoire réelle vise à couvrir les forfaits du FPR et de son Président Paul Kagame, qui n’ont pourtant cessé d’humilier et d’incriminer la France. Paradoxalement, ces responsables français n’hésitent pas à couvrir les ignominies du FPR au détriment de l’armée française diffamée par ce dernier, et de leurs compatriotes et ressortissants exterminés par les combattants de ce mouvement rebelle devenu aujourd’hui parti au pouvoir.
Notre chère mère est fort déchirée par la mort atroce de son mari et par la tragédie qui s’en est suivie, semant une désolation inexprimable dans tout le pays.
Elle est une fois de plus poignardée dans le dos par ces assassins qui, depuis déjà 16 ans organise un complot contre elle dans le but d’opérer une diversion et de tromper l’opinion publique internationale en voulant la passer pour une criminelle.
Nous saisissons cette occasion pour réaffirmer avec véhémence l’innocence de notre mère Agathe Kanziga Habyarimana ainsi que celle des autres membres de notre famille accusés par le pouvoir de Kigali.
En effet, différents mensonges, rumeurs, délations et menaces sont toujours orchestrés contre nous par les assassins de notre père, puisque nous sommes des témoins directs, et donc des témoins gênants, qu’ils doivent éliminer ou discréditer par tous les moyens pour continuer à assoir leur mensonge.
Toutes ces accusations n’ont qu’un seul but ; celui d’anéantir politiquement voire physiquement toute personne susceptible d’incarner le refus d’une idéologie d’apartheid des temps modernes qui s’est installée au Rwanda, en s’attaquant aux symboles, et ainsi couvrir les crimes du régime dictatorial du FPR installé à Kigali depuis juillet 1994.
Comme l’a dit notre mère elle-même, nous aussi avons confiance en la justice française et nous souhaiterions qu’elle aille jusqu’au bout afin que le statut de victime soit reconnu à notre mère et à la majorité du peuple rwandais qui se trouve injustement accusée et dont elle incarne le symbole.
Nous espérons que notre mère aura droit à un procès équitable qui lui permettra enfin de casser une fois pour toutes ces fausses rumeurs accablantes et de prouver son innocence. Nous espérons par ailleurs que cet éventuel procès contribuera à faire connaître la vérité et à rendre la vraie justice.
Il existe maintenant suffisamment de preuves accablantes, de rapports judiciaires, de témoignages crédibles de témoins oculaires ainsi qu’une abondante documentation qui attestent que le Front Patriotique Rwandais (FPR), aujourd’hui au pouvoir au Rwanda, a planifié, depuis l’invasion du Rwanda en 1990, et exécuté la déstabilisation du pays, des assassinats ciblés y compris celui du Président de la République et d’autres personnalités politiques, des intellectuels, des religieux, des commerçants ainsi que d’anciens cadres administratifs, et des massacres à grande échelle de la population en vue de s’assurer le contrôle exclusif du pouvoir et des ressources du Rwanda et des régions voisines, essentiellement de la République Démocratique du Congo.
Nous en appelons à la Communauté internationale, de tourner son regard vers le bas peuple rwandais qui souffre sous le joug d’un régime totalitaire, afin de l’aider à jouir d’une vraie démocratie, en passant par la vérité, la justice équitable, la réconciliation réelle et la paix durable.
Nous renouvelons encore une fois notre attachement au peuple rwandais tout entier. Nous sommes en communion avec toutes les victimes du génocide rwandais en ce mois d’avril et espérons de tout coeur que le Rwanda retrouve un équilibre et une égalité entre ses composantes pour que le chemin de la dignité et l’apaisement des coeurs lui soit, enfin, accessible.
Fait à Paris le 8 avril 2010
Par les enfants du feu Président Juvénal Habyarimana
"Support Committee" for UDF-Inkingi Created.
UDF-Inkingi
Press Release
The United Democratic Forces, UDF-Inkingi, were created on April 29th, 2006, in
Brussels. It was created to offer Rwandans a unified framework for peaceful political resistance against the dictatorship that has been established by the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF). Since then, the creators of the organization have been working hard to make Rwanda a democratic, inclusive, united, and peaceful nation for all. Translating this vision into reality amounts to a non-violent democratic revolution whose triumph requires the Rwandan people’s unity, determination, courage and lucidity. This is not a linear process devoid of any obstacles. It is a long and difficult struggle.
On September 28, 2009, after seriously analyzing the prevailing situation and in order to provide an option for peaceful political change in our country (not through violence as has been the case for several decades), the UDF-Inkingi decided to take its democratic program to Rwanda with the goal of competing in elections. This would be accomplished through registering the party, establishing its structures in the country and taking part in the presidential election to be held on August 9th, 2010. Despite repeated acts of intimidation and impediments imposed by the RPF regime (notably its refusal to grant passports or visas to almost all of the party leaders and managers previously expected to be deployed in the country), Ms Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza, current Chairperson of UDF-Inkingi, along with a small team, arrived in Rwanda on January 16th, 2010.
She immediately became the target of a media lynching campaign, consisting of slander, violation of the right to privacy, physical assault, and some threats of the use of violence. As of February 10, 2010, the campaign against the UDF-Inkingi turned into an administrative and judicial guerrilla war designed to prevent the organization of the party's constitutional congress and to put the party's chairperson and nominated candidate for the presidential election in prison, causing the party's peaceful political process to fail and eliminate political space. Braving courageously against these extremely hostility conditions, members of the UDF-Inkingi living inside Rwanda have continued the work of preparing the registration and implementation of the party's objectives by putting in place an Interim Executive Committee.
Meeting in Brussels from 03 to 04 April 2010, in order to examine ways and means to
support this process, individuals living outside Rwanda decided to create a Support
Committee for the UDF-Inkingi party. The committee is led by a team of about twelve persons coordinated by:
1. Mr. Eugene NDAHAYO, President
2. Dr. Nkiko NSENGIMANA, First Vice President
3. Dr. Jean-Baptiste MBERABAHIZI, Second Vice President
4. Mr. Benoit NDAGIJIMANA, Secretary General
During this period of commemoration for the genocide of the Tutsi, all members of the Support Committee for the UDF-Inkingi honor the memory of the victims and express the deepest sympathy for their surviving relatives. They call upon all consciences so that we may not truncate the memories nor let indifference and oppression allow other people to become victims of crimes against humanity in the future.
Done in Brussels,
04 April 2010,
For the Support Committee for UDF-Inkingi,
Eugene NDAHAYO
President of the UDF-Inkingi Support Committee
Press Release
The United Democratic Forces, UDF-Inkingi, were created on April 29th, 2006, in
Brussels. It was created to offer Rwandans a unified framework for peaceful political resistance against the dictatorship that has been established by the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF). Since then, the creators of the organization have been working hard to make Rwanda a democratic, inclusive, united, and peaceful nation for all. Translating this vision into reality amounts to a non-violent democratic revolution whose triumph requires the Rwandan people’s unity, determination, courage and lucidity. This is not a linear process devoid of any obstacles. It is a long and difficult struggle.
On September 28, 2009, after seriously analyzing the prevailing situation and in order to provide an option for peaceful political change in our country (not through violence as has been the case for several decades), the UDF-Inkingi decided to take its democratic program to Rwanda with the goal of competing in elections. This would be accomplished through registering the party, establishing its structures in the country and taking part in the presidential election to be held on August 9th, 2010. Despite repeated acts of intimidation and impediments imposed by the RPF regime (notably its refusal to grant passports or visas to almost all of the party leaders and managers previously expected to be deployed in the country), Ms Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza, current Chairperson of UDF-Inkingi, along with a small team, arrived in Rwanda on January 16th, 2010.
She immediately became the target of a media lynching campaign, consisting of slander, violation of the right to privacy, physical assault, and some threats of the use of violence. As of February 10, 2010, the campaign against the UDF-Inkingi turned into an administrative and judicial guerrilla war designed to prevent the organization of the party's constitutional congress and to put the party's chairperson and nominated candidate for the presidential election in prison, causing the party's peaceful political process to fail and eliminate political space. Braving courageously against these extremely hostility conditions, members of the UDF-Inkingi living inside Rwanda have continued the work of preparing the registration and implementation of the party's objectives by putting in place an Interim Executive Committee.
Meeting in Brussels from 03 to 04 April 2010, in order to examine ways and means to
support this process, individuals living outside Rwanda decided to create a Support
Committee for the UDF-Inkingi party. The committee is led by a team of about twelve persons coordinated by:
1. Mr. Eugene NDAHAYO, President
2. Dr. Nkiko NSENGIMANA, First Vice President
3. Dr. Jean-Baptiste MBERABAHIZI, Second Vice President
4. Mr. Benoit NDAGIJIMANA, Secretary General
During this period of commemoration for the genocide of the Tutsi, all members of the Support Committee for the UDF-Inkingi honor the memory of the victims and express the deepest sympathy for their surviving relatives. They call upon all consciences so that we may not truncate the memories nor let indifference and oppression allow other people to become victims of crimes against humanity in the future.
Done in Brussels,
04 April 2010,
For the Support Committee for UDF-Inkingi,
Eugene NDAHAYO
President of the UDF-Inkingi Support Committee
08 April, 2010
Burundi: Ensure Justice Over Activist’s Killing.
Human Rights Watch
8 April 2010
The president of Burundi should act to ensure justice in the killing of an anti-corruption activist, Amnesty International, East and Horn of Africa Human Rights Defenders Project, and Human Rights Watch said today. President Pierre Nkurunziza should ask the prosecutor general to accelerate investigations and prosecutions in the case and ensure witness protection, the groups said. The activist, Ernest Manirumva, was stabbed to death a year ago, on April 9, 2009.
One year after the killing, investigations have still not been concluded. Nine suspects, including several police officers, are in pre-trial detention, but with no dates fixed for trial. A judicial investigatory commission has made some efforts since it was formed in October 2009 to establish responsibility for the murder, but, according to civil society organizations, has not adequately followed all available leads and has not concluded its work. Because Burundi has no witness protection program, a number of witnesses are afraid to come forward.
"The government of Burundi should make an unequivocal commitment to deliver justice in this critical case," said Véronique Aubert, Africa deputy director at Amnesty International. "President Nkurunziza should ask the prosecutor general to investigate the killing fully and promptly, ensure the protection of witnesses, and bring all perpetrators to justice - including those who may hold senior positions in the security forces."
Manirumva was vice president of the Burundian civil society organization Anti-corruption and Economic Malpractice Observatory (OLUCOME) and vice president of an official body that regulates public procurement. He was found stabbed to death outside his home. An empty, blood-stained file folder found on his bed, and evidence of a break-in at an office he maintained at the Agriculture Ministry, suggested that Manirumva's killers were seeking sensitive documents in his possession. Shortly before his death, according to his colleagues and friends, Manirumva had been investigating cases of police corruption and police attempts to purchase firearms illegally from Malaysia.
"If the Burundian authorities are truly committed to fighting corruption, they should work to identify and bring to justice the perpetrators of this killing, which appears to be linked to Manirumva's anti-corruption work, as soon as possible," said Hassan Shire Sheikh, executive director of the East and Horn of Africa Human Rights Defenders Project. "The authorities have the obligation to demonstrate that civil society activists can freely criticize the government without risking their lives."
Some government officials have also attempted to stifle calls for justice by civil society. On two occasions in 2009, Burundian organizations were forbidden by government officials from organizing a march in the capital, Bujumbura, to call for justice for Manirumva. When civil society organizations made statements in late 2009 suggesting that the government investigatory commission was not pursuing all leads, Interior Minister Edouard Nduwimana summoned them to his office and accused them of "interfering with the work of the justice system."
Members of organizations that have publicly denounced the killing and the failings of the judicial inquiries into the case have themselves received threats. Two of them, Pierre Claver Mbonimpa, president of the Association for the Protection of Human Rights and Detained Persons (APRODH), and Gabriel Rufyiri, president of OLUCOME, received a tip from an informant in March 2010 that state agents were preparing to assassinate one of them by orchestrating a car accident. In mid-March, Mbonimpa said he was followed in the Carama neighborhood of Bujumbura by a blue Jeep from the national intelligence service (SNR). (Contacted by Human Rights Watch, the deputy director of the SNR said that the service does not own a blue Jeep.) Mbonimpa also received threatening phone calls. He said that one caller told him, "If you don't stop working on this Ernest Manirumva case, you'll end up like him."
Similarly, in November 2009, Pacifique Nininahazwe, delegate general of the Forum for the Strengthening of Civil Society (FORSC), which spearheaded the "Justice for Ernest Manirumva" campaign, received warning of a plot to assassinate him. His organization was then banned by an ordinance issued by the Interior Minister, who cited apparent technical problems with the forum's official registration documents from 2006. Though the minister subsequently "suspended" the ordinance, FORSC remains in legal limbo.
"Instead of threatening and obstructing civil society organizations, the Burundian authorities should work with them to follow every possible lead to identify Manirumva's killers," said Georgette Gagnon, Africa director at Human Rights Watch. "The president should wholeheartedly back these investigations and should stand behind civil society's call for justice for this brutal murder."
The organizations called on Nkurunziza and the government of Burundi to:
•Establish a witness protection mechanism that will allow witnesses to provide testimony securely and confidentially, especially witnesses who may hold information implicating members of the security forces;
•Ensure that the commission's work is concluded fully, speedily, and fairly, and that it identifies and charges all persons against whom there is evidence of criminal responsibility - including those responsible for giving orders for the killing;
•Ensure that the trials against the currently detained suspects proceed swiftly, while allowing evidence gathering against others to continue in full before, during, and after those trials;
•Support civil society activism such as the "Justice for Ernest Manirumva campaign" by permitting marches and rallies and by ceasing harassment of civil society groups;
•Investigate all threats against civil society activists who have called for justice for Manirumva, and bring the perpetrators to justice.
Background
The Burundian government has taken some steps to identify the killers. A judicial commission was established on April 22, 2009, to carry out investigations, but took very few steps. After civil society organizations denounced the commission's inaction and its president's close relationship with the head of the National Intelligence Service, which was cited by some witnesses as having played a role in the crime, the prosecutor general dissolved the commission. He replaced it in October with a commission whose members were more active in pursuing the investigation and who were seen by civil society groups as having less questionable relationships with members of the security forces.
The government accepted an offer from the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to provide technical assistance in the investigation. Though the first judicial commission stonewalled, the subsequent commission was more cooperative, allowing FBI agents to help interview, fingerprint, and do DNA testing of suspects. The results of the FBI's forensic assistance have not been made public.
Nine suspects have been detained and charged. However, at least three individuals who might have been able to provide information on the case have been killed or have disappeared. On April 15, 2009, an agent of the National Intelligence Service fled to Canada after obtaining a visa on the false premise that he was to participate in a conference in the United States on behalf of a state-run coffee company. Three weeks after Manirumva was killed, on April 30, a police captain, Pacifique Ndikuriyo, was shot dead in Bujumbura. In March 2010, a police officer named Ezéchiel Coyishakiye disappeared from a mental hospital where he was held under armed guard after having been arrested in connection with another crime, and police say they do not know his whereabouts. The investigatory commission is looking into claims by witnesses that all three of these individuals may have been directly involved in, or had knowledge about, the killing.
The judicial commission has instructions from the prosecutor to submit a report of its conclusions as soon as it has collected sufficient evidence to prepare a case for prosecution. To date, however, the commission has not submitted any report.
8 April 2010
The president of Burundi should act to ensure justice in the killing of an anti-corruption activist, Amnesty International, East and Horn of Africa Human Rights Defenders Project, and Human Rights Watch said today. President Pierre Nkurunziza should ask the prosecutor general to accelerate investigations and prosecutions in the case and ensure witness protection, the groups said. The activist, Ernest Manirumva, was stabbed to death a year ago, on April 9, 2009.
One year after the killing, investigations have still not been concluded. Nine suspects, including several police officers, are in pre-trial detention, but with no dates fixed for trial. A judicial investigatory commission has made some efforts since it was formed in October 2009 to establish responsibility for the murder, but, according to civil society organizations, has not adequately followed all available leads and has not concluded its work. Because Burundi has no witness protection program, a number of witnesses are afraid to come forward.
"The government of Burundi should make an unequivocal commitment to deliver justice in this critical case," said Véronique Aubert, Africa deputy director at Amnesty International. "President Nkurunziza should ask the prosecutor general to investigate the killing fully and promptly, ensure the protection of witnesses, and bring all perpetrators to justice - including those who may hold senior positions in the security forces."
Manirumva was vice president of the Burundian civil society organization Anti-corruption and Economic Malpractice Observatory (OLUCOME) and vice president of an official body that regulates public procurement. He was found stabbed to death outside his home. An empty, blood-stained file folder found on his bed, and evidence of a break-in at an office he maintained at the Agriculture Ministry, suggested that Manirumva's killers were seeking sensitive documents in his possession. Shortly before his death, according to his colleagues and friends, Manirumva had been investigating cases of police corruption and police attempts to purchase firearms illegally from Malaysia.
"If the Burundian authorities are truly committed to fighting corruption, they should work to identify and bring to justice the perpetrators of this killing, which appears to be linked to Manirumva's anti-corruption work, as soon as possible," said Hassan Shire Sheikh, executive director of the East and Horn of Africa Human Rights Defenders Project. "The authorities have the obligation to demonstrate that civil society activists can freely criticize the government without risking their lives."
Some government officials have also attempted to stifle calls for justice by civil society. On two occasions in 2009, Burundian organizations were forbidden by government officials from organizing a march in the capital, Bujumbura, to call for justice for Manirumva. When civil society organizations made statements in late 2009 suggesting that the government investigatory commission was not pursuing all leads, Interior Minister Edouard Nduwimana summoned them to his office and accused them of "interfering with the work of the justice system."
Members of organizations that have publicly denounced the killing and the failings of the judicial inquiries into the case have themselves received threats. Two of them, Pierre Claver Mbonimpa, president of the Association for the Protection of Human Rights and Detained Persons (APRODH), and Gabriel Rufyiri, president of OLUCOME, received a tip from an informant in March 2010 that state agents were preparing to assassinate one of them by orchestrating a car accident. In mid-March, Mbonimpa said he was followed in the Carama neighborhood of Bujumbura by a blue Jeep from the national intelligence service (SNR). (Contacted by Human Rights Watch, the deputy director of the SNR said that the service does not own a blue Jeep.) Mbonimpa also received threatening phone calls. He said that one caller told him, "If you don't stop working on this Ernest Manirumva case, you'll end up like him."
Similarly, in November 2009, Pacifique Nininahazwe, delegate general of the Forum for the Strengthening of Civil Society (FORSC), which spearheaded the "Justice for Ernest Manirumva" campaign, received warning of a plot to assassinate him. His organization was then banned by an ordinance issued by the Interior Minister, who cited apparent technical problems with the forum's official registration documents from 2006. Though the minister subsequently "suspended" the ordinance, FORSC remains in legal limbo.
"Instead of threatening and obstructing civil society organizations, the Burundian authorities should work with them to follow every possible lead to identify Manirumva's killers," said Georgette Gagnon, Africa director at Human Rights Watch. "The president should wholeheartedly back these investigations and should stand behind civil society's call for justice for this brutal murder."
The organizations called on Nkurunziza and the government of Burundi to:
•Establish a witness protection mechanism that will allow witnesses to provide testimony securely and confidentially, especially witnesses who may hold information implicating members of the security forces;
•Ensure that the commission's work is concluded fully, speedily, and fairly, and that it identifies and charges all persons against whom there is evidence of criminal responsibility - including those responsible for giving orders for the killing;
•Ensure that the trials against the currently detained suspects proceed swiftly, while allowing evidence gathering against others to continue in full before, during, and after those trials;
•Support civil society activism such as the "Justice for Ernest Manirumva campaign" by permitting marches and rallies and by ceasing harassment of civil society groups;
•Investigate all threats against civil society activists who have called for justice for Manirumva, and bring the perpetrators to justice.
Background
The Burundian government has taken some steps to identify the killers. A judicial commission was established on April 22, 2009, to carry out investigations, but took very few steps. After civil society organizations denounced the commission's inaction and its president's close relationship with the head of the National Intelligence Service, which was cited by some witnesses as having played a role in the crime, the prosecutor general dissolved the commission. He replaced it in October with a commission whose members were more active in pursuing the investigation and who were seen by civil society groups as having less questionable relationships with members of the security forces.
The government accepted an offer from the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to provide technical assistance in the investigation. Though the first judicial commission stonewalled, the subsequent commission was more cooperative, allowing FBI agents to help interview, fingerprint, and do DNA testing of suspects. The results of the FBI's forensic assistance have not been made public.
Nine suspects have been detained and charged. However, at least three individuals who might have been able to provide information on the case have been killed or have disappeared. On April 15, 2009, an agent of the National Intelligence Service fled to Canada after obtaining a visa on the false premise that he was to participate in a conference in the United States on behalf of a state-run coffee company. Three weeks after Manirumva was killed, on April 30, a police captain, Pacifique Ndikuriyo, was shot dead in Bujumbura. In March 2010, a police officer named Ezéchiel Coyishakiye disappeared from a mental hospital where he was held under armed guard after having been arrested in connection with another crime, and police say they do not know his whereabouts. The investigatory commission is looking into claims by witnesses that all three of these individuals may have been directly involved in, or had knowledge about, the killing.
The judicial commission has instructions from the prosecutor to submit a report of its conclusions as soon as it has collected sufficient evidence to prepare a case for prosecution. To date, however, the commission has not submitted any report.
al-Sadr supporters reject leading candidates for Iraqi PM, call for Jaafari to be PM.
BBC News
8 April 2010
The Iraqi political group of radical Shia cleric Moqtada Sadr has rejected both of the front-running candidates for prime minister.
The members of the Sadrist bloc voted for former Interim Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari in a referendum.
The Sadrist bloc of 40 parliamentary seats could have swung the decision for either Iyad Allawi or Nouri Maliki who lead the two biggest political blocs.
The decision means government-forming negotiations have become more complex.
It may take months, and not weeks, for the parties to form the coalitions necessary to get enough seats to form a governing majority.
The referendum offered a choice of five candidates, all of them Shias - Mr Maliki, Mr Allawi, Mr Jaafari, Vice-President Adel Abdel Mahdi, and Jaafar Mohammed Baqir Sadr, a second cousin of Moqtada Sadr and son of the revered Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Sadiq Sadr, who was assassinated during the rule of Saddam Hussein.
Crushed
In the informal poll of grass-roots supporters, Mr Maliki came only fourth, with 10% of the votes.
The man who heads the coalition which narrowly won the election, Iyad Allawi, came behind Mr Maliki with 9% of the vote.
Mr Jaafari, a former doctor, headed the American-appointed interim government in 2005.
He was seen at the time as a popular leader who wanted to unify Sunni and Shia interests.
He was replaced by Mr Maliki as head of the largest Shia coalition in 2006.
As prime minister, Mr Maliki crushed the military wing of the Sadr organisation, the Mehdi Army, in an offensive during 2008.
If the Sadrist movement had backed one of the two top contenders their role as kingmakers would have been clear the BBC's Jim Muir reports from Baghdad.
The bloc's choice of Mr Jaafari is not likely to be viewed with enthusiasm by other political blocs, our correspondent says.
It is a month since the general election was concluded.
None of the political groups won a big enough majority to form a government.
Al-Iraqiyya (Iraqi National Movement): Nationalist bloc led by former PM Iyad Allawi, a secular Shia, includes Vice-President Tariq al-Hashemi, a Sunni Arab, and senior Sunni politician Saleh al-Mutlaq.
State of Law: Led by Prime Minister Nouri Maliki and his Shia Islamist Daawa Party, the alliance purportedly cuts across religious and tribal lines, includes some Sunni tribal leaders, Shia Kurds, Christians and independents.
Iraqi National Alliance: Shia-led bloc includes followers of the radical cleric, Moqtada Sadr, the Supreme Iraqi Islamic Council, and the Fadhilah Party, along with ex-PM Ibrahim Jaafari and Ahmad Chalabi.
Kurdish alliance: Coalition dominated by the two parties administering Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdish region - the Kurdistan Democratic Party and Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, led by President Jalal Talabani.
8 April 2010
The Iraqi political group of radical Shia cleric Moqtada Sadr has rejected both of the front-running candidates for prime minister.
The members of the Sadrist bloc voted for former Interim Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari in a referendum.
The Sadrist bloc of 40 parliamentary seats could have swung the decision for either Iyad Allawi or Nouri Maliki who lead the two biggest political blocs.
The decision means government-forming negotiations have become more complex.
It may take months, and not weeks, for the parties to form the coalitions necessary to get enough seats to form a governing majority.
The referendum offered a choice of five candidates, all of them Shias - Mr Maliki, Mr Allawi, Mr Jaafari, Vice-President Adel Abdel Mahdi, and Jaafar Mohammed Baqir Sadr, a second cousin of Moqtada Sadr and son of the revered Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Sadiq Sadr, who was assassinated during the rule of Saddam Hussein.
Crushed
In the informal poll of grass-roots supporters, Mr Maliki came only fourth, with 10% of the votes.
The man who heads the coalition which narrowly won the election, Iyad Allawi, came behind Mr Maliki with 9% of the vote.
Mr Jaafari, a former doctor, headed the American-appointed interim government in 2005.
He was seen at the time as a popular leader who wanted to unify Sunni and Shia interests.
He was replaced by Mr Maliki as head of the largest Shia coalition in 2006.
As prime minister, Mr Maliki crushed the military wing of the Sadr organisation, the Mehdi Army, in an offensive during 2008.
If the Sadrist movement had backed one of the two top contenders their role as kingmakers would have been clear the BBC's Jim Muir reports from Baghdad.
The bloc's choice of Mr Jaafari is not likely to be viewed with enthusiasm by other political blocs, our correspondent says.
It is a month since the general election was concluded.
None of the political groups won a big enough majority to form a government.
Al-Iraqiyya (Iraqi National Movement): Nationalist bloc led by former PM Iyad Allawi, a secular Shia, includes Vice-President Tariq al-Hashemi, a Sunni Arab, and senior Sunni politician Saleh al-Mutlaq.
State of Law: Led by Prime Minister Nouri Maliki and his Shia Islamist Daawa Party, the alliance purportedly cuts across religious and tribal lines, includes some Sunni tribal leaders, Shia Kurds, Christians and independents.
Iraqi National Alliance: Shia-led bloc includes followers of the radical cleric, Moqtada Sadr, the Supreme Iraqi Islamic Council, and the Fadhilah Party, along with ex-PM Ibrahim Jaafari and Ahmad Chalabi.
Kurdish alliance: Coalition dominated by the two parties administering Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdish region - the Kurdistan Democratic Party and Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, led by President Jalal Talabani.
Nigerian President Jonathan to Meet Obama On Sunday.
This Day
8 April 2010
By Tokunbo Adedoja
In what would be his first major outing as Acting President, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan would be hosted by US President Barack Obama on Sunday at the White House in Washington D.C.
It would be a rare meeting between an American President and a non-substantive president of a country.
The high-level meeting has not been officially announced by both countries.
But sources at the Nigerian Embassy and the US Department of State told THISDAY that all necessary preparations had been made for this important parley.
It was reliably gathered that the meeting was finally sealed on Tuesday when the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF) Alhaji Ahmed Yayale and US Secretary of State Senator Hillary Clinton met in Washington, D.C., to sign the Bi-national commission agreement between the two countries.
President Obama had sent an invitation to Jonathan last month to attend the Nuclear Security Summit which is taking place between April 11 and 14. Nigeria's Ambassador to US Professor Adebowale Adefuye had told Obama while presenting his letter of credence at the White House two weeks ago that Jonathan has accepted his invitation.
It could however not be confirmed if the Acting President would stay throughout the duration of the summit especially when he does not have a Vice-President to take charge of affairs in his absence.
The two leaders are expected to discuss bilateral relations at the meeting which would take place by 5pm on Sunday. The Nigeria-US Bi-national Commission is on the agenda, in addition to global terrorism and counterterrorism measures.
Also to be discussed are issues of regional security and peace-keeping. Nigeria is Africa's largest contributor to peace-keeping.
Working groups had been formed by the commission to address specific issues. These include: good governance; transparency and Integrity; energy and investment; food security and agriculture; Niger Delta and regional security co-operation.
The Good Governance, Transparency and Integrity working group will be launched first because of the preparations and reforms necessary to ensure that the 2011 elections are free and fair.
US had last week announced new enhanced aviation security measures and set aside the list of countries of interest (which Nigeria is part of) announced on January 3, 2010, as an emergency security measure after the botched Christmas Day bombing of an American aircraft by 23-year-old Nigerian, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab.
Although, THISDAY could not get the itinerary of the Acting President's during the visit, it was gathered that he may hold a meeting with selected members of the Nigerian community in that country.
THISDAY also confirmed that the US Secretary, Department of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano, who announced the new enhanced aviation security measures last week, will arrive Nigeria on Saturday.
8 April 2010
By Tokunbo Adedoja
In what would be his first major outing as Acting President, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan would be hosted by US President Barack Obama on Sunday at the White House in Washington D.C.
It would be a rare meeting between an American President and a non-substantive president of a country.
The high-level meeting has not been officially announced by both countries.
But sources at the Nigerian Embassy and the US Department of State told THISDAY that all necessary preparations had been made for this important parley.
It was reliably gathered that the meeting was finally sealed on Tuesday when the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF) Alhaji Ahmed Yayale and US Secretary of State Senator Hillary Clinton met in Washington, D.C., to sign the Bi-national commission agreement between the two countries.
President Obama had sent an invitation to Jonathan last month to attend the Nuclear Security Summit which is taking place between April 11 and 14. Nigeria's Ambassador to US Professor Adebowale Adefuye had told Obama while presenting his letter of credence at the White House two weeks ago that Jonathan has accepted his invitation.
It could however not be confirmed if the Acting President would stay throughout the duration of the summit especially when he does not have a Vice-President to take charge of affairs in his absence.
The two leaders are expected to discuss bilateral relations at the meeting which would take place by 5pm on Sunday. The Nigeria-US Bi-national Commission is on the agenda, in addition to global terrorism and counterterrorism measures.
Also to be discussed are issues of regional security and peace-keeping. Nigeria is Africa's largest contributor to peace-keeping.
Working groups had been formed by the commission to address specific issues. These include: good governance; transparency and Integrity; energy and investment; food security and agriculture; Niger Delta and regional security co-operation.
The Good Governance, Transparency and Integrity working group will be launched first because of the preparations and reforms necessary to ensure that the 2011 elections are free and fair.
US had last week announced new enhanced aviation security measures and set aside the list of countries of interest (which Nigeria is part of) announced on January 3, 2010, as an emergency security measure after the botched Christmas Day bombing of an American aircraft by 23-year-old Nigerian, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab.
Although, THISDAY could not get the itinerary of the Acting President's during the visit, it was gathered that he may hold a meeting with selected members of the Nigerian community in that country.
THISDAY also confirmed that the US Secretary, Department of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano, who announced the new enhanced aviation security measures last week, will arrive Nigeria on Saturday.
DynCorp to stay on for anti-narcotics Ops in Pakistan: US.
Daily Times
8 April 2010
By Irfan Ghauri
DynCorp International will continue to provide maintenance facilities at the Interior Ministry’s Air Wing in Balochistan and does not plan to terminate its contract with the organisation, said David T Johnson, assistant secretary of the US Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs.
Johnson told reporters on Wednesday that under an agreement, an anti-narcotics chopper surveillance squad was set up in Quetta in 2002 by the Interior Ministry with US assistance, which includes 14 Huey II helicopters and three Cessna Caravan aircraft. To a question, he disclosed that the Pakistan and US governments had agreed to carry out the maintenance of these helicopters for which Washington had engaged DynCorp.
Regarding Islamabad’s reservations over the presence of DynCorp officials, Johnson clarified that Washington was not considering changing them in the near future.
Drug trafficking: He appreciated the efforts of Pakistan’s law enforcement agencies for taking effective measures against drug-trafficking and poppy cultivation, saying poppy still continues to be cultivated at a small scale in FATA due to the poor law and order situation there.
“There are some very small areas in Pakistan where poppy is still being cultivated, but these are relatively very small,” he added.
Johnson said the US is working on a $150-million programme against drug trafficking with the cooperation of Pakistan’s anti-narcotics forces.
He said over 93 percent of the poppy used around the world was being supplied from Afghanistan, adding that Pakistan’s share in the drug’s supply was very low.
On achieving a “poppy-free” status for Pakistan, Johnson said it depended on how soon the law enforcement agencies could regain control of the areas where an anti-terror operation was going on.
The US assistant secretary said political will could play an important role in achieving a “poppy-free” status for Pakistan. He agreed that money earned through drug trafficking was being used to fund terrorist activities, adding that there was a need to keep a check on this type of income.
Acknowledging the processing of cases against drug traffickers, he said the rate of conviction in drug cases in Pakistan is very high. He, however, emphasised the need for scientific methods and explanations to examine evidence in drug cases to punish those responsible.
Highlighting other features of Pak-US cooperation against narcotics, Johnson said it had resulted in completion of 200 outposts in the NWFP and FATA, benefiting the Frontier Corps, Frontier Constabulary and Levies Force. He said the US had also been providing assistance and cooperation to Pakistan’s law enforcement agencies to cope with drug trafficking.
8 April 2010
By Irfan Ghauri
DynCorp International will continue to provide maintenance facilities at the Interior Ministry’s Air Wing in Balochistan and does not plan to terminate its contract with the organisation, said David T Johnson, assistant secretary of the US Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs.
Johnson told reporters on Wednesday that under an agreement, an anti-narcotics chopper surveillance squad was set up in Quetta in 2002 by the Interior Ministry with US assistance, which includes 14 Huey II helicopters and three Cessna Caravan aircraft. To a question, he disclosed that the Pakistan and US governments had agreed to carry out the maintenance of these helicopters for which Washington had engaged DynCorp.
Regarding Islamabad’s reservations over the presence of DynCorp officials, Johnson clarified that Washington was not considering changing them in the near future.
Drug trafficking: He appreciated the efforts of Pakistan’s law enforcement agencies for taking effective measures against drug-trafficking and poppy cultivation, saying poppy still continues to be cultivated at a small scale in FATA due to the poor law and order situation there.
“There are some very small areas in Pakistan where poppy is still being cultivated, but these are relatively very small,” he added.
Johnson said the US is working on a $150-million programme against drug trafficking with the cooperation of Pakistan’s anti-narcotics forces.
He said over 93 percent of the poppy used around the world was being supplied from Afghanistan, adding that Pakistan’s share in the drug’s supply was very low.
On achieving a “poppy-free” status for Pakistan, Johnson said it depended on how soon the law enforcement agencies could regain control of the areas where an anti-terror operation was going on.
The US assistant secretary said political will could play an important role in achieving a “poppy-free” status for Pakistan. He agreed that money earned through drug trafficking was being used to fund terrorist activities, adding that there was a need to keep a check on this type of income.
Acknowledging the processing of cases against drug traffickers, he said the rate of conviction in drug cases in Pakistan is very high. He, however, emphasised the need for scientific methods and explanations to examine evidence in drug cases to punish those responsible.
Highlighting other features of Pak-US cooperation against narcotics, Johnson said it had resulted in completion of 200 outposts in the NWFP and FATA, benefiting the Frontier Corps, Frontier Constabulary and Levies Force. He said the US had also been providing assistance and cooperation to Pakistan’s law enforcement agencies to cope with drug trafficking.
07 April, 2010
Kyrgyz opposition says it has taken full power in the country.
RIA Novosti
7 April 2010
A government formed by opposition in the ex-Soviet Central Asian state of Kyrgyzstan said it has taken full power in the country after a day of unrest in which over 40 people were killed, the opposition-nominated premier said on Wednesday.
"(Prime Minister Daniyar) Usenov has signed a resignation letter. Power is fully in the control of the opposition," Rosa Otunbayeva said.
"The whereabouts of (President Kurmanbek) Bakiyev are unknown."
7 April 2010
A government formed by opposition in the ex-Soviet Central Asian state of Kyrgyzstan said it has taken full power in the country after a day of unrest in which over 40 people were killed, the opposition-nominated premier said on Wednesday.
"(Prime Minister Daniyar) Usenov has signed a resignation letter. Power is fully in the control of the opposition," Rosa Otunbayeva said.
"The whereabouts of (President Kurmanbek) Bakiyev are unknown."
U.S. – Nigeria Binational Commission.
United States Department of State Office of the Spokesman
6 April 2010
Press Release
On April 6, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Nigerian Secretary to the Government of the Federation Yayale Ahmed inaugurated the U.S.-Nigeria Binational Commission, a strategic dialogue designed to expand mutual cooperation across a broad range of shared interests. The Commission is a collaborative forum to build partnerships for tangible and measurable progress on issues critical to our shared future.
The United States establishes such commissions with valued and strategic partners. Nigeria is Africa’s most populous nation, its largest contributor of peacekeepers, its largest producer of oil and a significant trading partner for the United States.
Secretaries Clinton and Ahmed are forming four working groups to address specific bilateral issues: Good Governance, Transparency, and Integrity; Energy and Investment; Food Security and Agriculture; and, Niger Delta and Regional Security Cooperation. They plan to launch the Good Governance, Transparency, and Integrity working group first, in light of preparations and reforms necessary to ensure Nigeria’s 2011 elections are free, fair, and transparent.
6 April 2010
Press Release
On April 6, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Nigerian Secretary to the Government of the Federation Yayale Ahmed inaugurated the U.S.-Nigeria Binational Commission, a strategic dialogue designed to expand mutual cooperation across a broad range of shared interests. The Commission is a collaborative forum to build partnerships for tangible and measurable progress on issues critical to our shared future.
The United States establishes such commissions with valued and strategic partners. Nigeria is Africa’s most populous nation, its largest contributor of peacekeepers, its largest producer of oil and a significant trading partner for the United States.
Secretaries Clinton and Ahmed are forming four working groups to address specific bilateral issues: Good Governance, Transparency, and Integrity; Energy and Investment; Food Security and Agriculture; and, Niger Delta and Regional Security Cooperation. They plan to launch the Good Governance, Transparency, and Integrity working group first, in light of preparations and reforms necessary to ensure Nigeria’s 2011 elections are free, fair, and transparent.
Nigeria gets female oil minister.
AFP
6 April 2010
Nigeria's acting President Goodluck Jonathan on Tuesday installed his new cabinet assigning the powerful oil ministry for the first time to a female, Diezani Allison-Madueke.
Allison-Madueke, from the southern oil-rich Niger Delta, was formerly in charge of the mines and steel ministry in the old cabinet dissolved on March 17.
A top banker from Goldman Sachs in London, Olusegun Aganga, is the new minister of finance.
Jonathan gave the foreign affairs portfolio to Odein Ajumogobia, the erstwhile junior oil minister.
Godsday Orubebe, the former junior minister for the Niger Delta, now becomes the substantive head of the ministry.
Jonathan dissolved the cabinet last month as he moved to assert his authority after taking power from ailing President Umaru Yar'Adua, who only recently returned to Nigeria after three months in Saudi Arabia for treatment for a heart condition.
6 April 2010
Nigeria's acting President Goodluck Jonathan on Tuesday installed his new cabinet assigning the powerful oil ministry for the first time to a female, Diezani Allison-Madueke.
Allison-Madueke, from the southern oil-rich Niger Delta, was formerly in charge of the mines and steel ministry in the old cabinet dissolved on March 17.
A top banker from Goldman Sachs in London, Olusegun Aganga, is the new minister of finance.
Jonathan gave the foreign affairs portfolio to Odein Ajumogobia, the erstwhile junior oil minister.
Godsday Orubebe, the former junior minister for the Niger Delta, now becomes the substantive head of the ministry.
Jonathan dissolved the cabinet last month as he moved to assert his authority after taking power from ailing President Umaru Yar'Adua, who only recently returned to Nigeria after three months in Saudi Arabia for treatment for a heart condition.
06 April, 2010
Nigeria: Jonathan Fires Barkindo, NNPC GMD.
Vanguard
6 April 2010
By Daniel Idonor
Barely few hours after he swore in his new cabinet, the Acting President, Dr. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, Tuesday fired the Group Managing Director (GMD) of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, (NNPC), Alhaji Mohammed Sanusi Barkindo.
This was contained in a statement issued by the Senior Special Assistant to the Acting President on Media and Publicity, Mr Ima Niboro, the Acting President has approved the appointment of a former Group Executive Director of the NNPC, Alhaji Shehu Ladan as the new (GMD)
"The Acting President, Dr. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, has appointed Alhaji Shehu Ladan as the new Group Managing Director of the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC".
"He replaces Alhaji Mohammed Sanusi Barkindo".
According to the statement, "Ladan retired from NNPC April 6th, 2009, as Group Executive Director, Commercial and Investment. He was also former Deputy Managing Director of Nigeria LNG, Executive Director of NETCo as well as NPDC, both subsidiaries of NNPC".
It said further that "Ladan is expected to execute the administration's vision of transforming the NNPC into a global brand and player".
Dr. Jonathan thanked Barkindo for his stewardship and wished him well in his future endeavours.
6 April 2010
By Daniel Idonor
Barely few hours after he swore in his new cabinet, the Acting President, Dr. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, Tuesday fired the Group Managing Director (GMD) of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, (NNPC), Alhaji Mohammed Sanusi Barkindo.
This was contained in a statement issued by the Senior Special Assistant to the Acting President on Media and Publicity, Mr Ima Niboro, the Acting President has approved the appointment of a former Group Executive Director of the NNPC, Alhaji Shehu Ladan as the new (GMD)
"The Acting President, Dr. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, has appointed Alhaji Shehu Ladan as the new Group Managing Director of the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC".
"He replaces Alhaji Mohammed Sanusi Barkindo".
According to the statement, "Ladan retired from NNPC April 6th, 2009, as Group Executive Director, Commercial and Investment. He was also former Deputy Managing Director of Nigeria LNG, Executive Director of NETCo as well as NPDC, both subsidiaries of NNPC".
It said further that "Ladan is expected to execute the administration's vision of transforming the NNPC into a global brand and player".
Dr. Jonathan thanked Barkindo for his stewardship and wished him well in his future endeavours.
French 'Military to stay where needed' in Africa.
SAPA/AFP
6 April 2010
France will maintain a military presence in African states that wish it to do so, French Interior Minister Brice Hortefeux said following a decision by Senegal to take back control of military bases.
"Concerning the military presence, France will be present where African states wish it to be," he said on Sunday night on public television after holding talks with Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade.
As Senegal marked 50 years of independence on Sunday, Wade announced the country was asserting its sovereignty by taking back French military bases, a symbolic move to be cemented after talks with its former colonial occupier.
"Senegal has asserted its sovereignty over the bases, in accordance with the various positions expressed by (French) President Nicolas Sarkozy..." said Hortefeux.
He said that during his talks with Wade, the Senegalese president agreed that discussions could begin on the future of the bases.
Despite the decision, the act of taking back the bases does not indicate anti-French sentiment and Hortefeux said "naturally the French (military) and civilians, and all Europeans, will be welcome in Senegal."
"This meeting was an occasion to recall the historical links, both amicable and affectionate, which unite Senegal and France. My presence today at the anniversary of independence bears concrete testimony to this."
The historic step announced by Wade has no marked effect in the short term, but is very symbolic for a country branded by 350 years of French presence.
The first French colony south of the Sahara, Senegal hosts one of three permanent French military bases in Africa with 1 200 men based in Dakar.
6 April 2010
France will maintain a military presence in African states that wish it to do so, French Interior Minister Brice Hortefeux said following a decision by Senegal to take back control of military bases.
"Concerning the military presence, France will be present where African states wish it to be," he said on Sunday night on public television after holding talks with Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade.
As Senegal marked 50 years of independence on Sunday, Wade announced the country was asserting its sovereignty by taking back French military bases, a symbolic move to be cemented after talks with its former colonial occupier.
"Senegal has asserted its sovereignty over the bases, in accordance with the various positions expressed by (French) President Nicolas Sarkozy..." said Hortefeux.
He said that during his talks with Wade, the Senegalese president agreed that discussions could begin on the future of the bases.
Despite the decision, the act of taking back the bases does not indicate anti-French sentiment and Hortefeux said "naturally the French (military) and civilians, and all Europeans, will be welcome in Senegal."
"This meeting was an occasion to recall the historical links, both amicable and affectionate, which unite Senegal and France. My presence today at the anniversary of independence bears concrete testimony to this."
The historic step announced by Wade has no marked effect in the short term, but is very symbolic for a country branded by 350 years of French presence.
The first French colony south of the Sahara, Senegal hosts one of three permanent French military bases in Africa with 1 200 men based in Dakar.
Pres. Kagame Lashes Out at Opposition Party With ad Hominem Attacks.
Rwandan News Agency
6 April 2010
The tone of verbal attacks against his critics shifted to new levels as President Paul Kagame used unusual comments on Monday – at one point saying the opposition has “funny backgrounds” and no history for themselves, RNA reports. Last week, a cabinet minister went as far as describing Ms. Ingabire Victoire as representing “darkness” for Rwanda.
The President graded Mr. Bernard Ntaganda of the registered PS-Imberakuri party and Ms. Ingabire Victoire of yet-to-be registered FDU-Inkingi in the same category – and accused the international community of being “insulting”, for viewing Rwanda at the level of these two politicians.
“I consider this insulting for some people to look at politics in Rwanda
or a Rwandan in the context of people like Ingabire or Ntaganda,” he told reporters Monday, before adding in a mixture of English and Kinyarwanda that he thinks these politicians are “…people with no history, no ideas and neither even basic culture of a normal human up-bringing.”
He lashed out: “The world wants to look at us like this. These are the people who represent the other views…the opposition. These fellows have no views at all…they are just a creation of some sort by people who have contempt for us.”
Indicative of a changing mood clearly marked with irritation, Mr. Kagame continued: “What do they represent really? If we had a referendum [asking] all Rwandans - even in their confused history and all sorts of problems, I don’t think they know what these people stand for at all…I don’t think so.”
Referring to Ms. Ingabire, the President dismissed allegations that his government is deliberately blocking her from leaving the country. He also claimed that due to her association with Genocide convict and ex-assistant Joseph Ntawangundi, it clearly shows the kind of politics she espouses. “It could even be difficult for her to disassociate from this problem,” he added.
The President claimed these politicians have no moral authority to comment on any issue in the country – instead saying the existing parties are the ones better placed to criticize government as they have lived through the country’s “hardships”.
Mr. Kagame said that he encourages the known parties to take up the position of the “so-called opposition because these one have no place”, also arguing that the mainstream small parties, some allied with the RPF, have now “matured [and] developed through these hardships we have shared together”.
However, on naming some of the nine parties in Parliament, the President caused laughter when he mentioned only PSD and PL - but asked the Interior Minister Sheikh Musa Fazil Harelimana, “which one else...the one you represent”.
For the troubled yet-to-be registered Green Party of Rwanda of Mr. Frank Habineza, President Kagame accused it of being managed from outside Rwanda. He claimed all those writing to him campaigning on behalf of the group are foreigners – so he concluded and claimed the Green Party has no membership or leadership inside the country.
The President rejected claims that Green Party in-fighting is caused by his RPF party. He said for the group to be allowed to operate in the country, it has to be a
Rwandan-based party with all the requirements for registration.
Information emerged from an uncorroborated media report in back in February claiming a senior advisor to Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni was providing financing and guidance to the Green Party. The man in question is allegedly Dr. John Nagenda, but he has officially distanced himself from the party.
President Kagame did not make specific reference to these allegations, but was instead speaking about the numerous letters of support his office has received from
Green movements and parties in Europe and North America. They have petitioned him to use his office to allow the Rwandan Greens to operate freely.
On media reports that some senior army officers are under house arrest or on surveillance for planning a coup against government or intending to flee the country, President Kagame said that is not how a government does business.
Unconfirmed reports claim Land Forces Chief Gen. Charles Kayonga is under house arrest over plans to topple his boss. The President claimed the information is baseless rumours.
“Why surveillance when they can jail you with handcuffs…,” he said. “Government has no problem with openly jailing anybody.”
He repeated his call made at a March press conference for the Rwandan population to go about their business without fear of any security concerns.
6 April 2010
The tone of verbal attacks against his critics shifted to new levels as President Paul Kagame used unusual comments on Monday – at one point saying the opposition has “funny backgrounds” and no history for themselves, RNA reports. Last week, a cabinet minister went as far as describing Ms. Ingabire Victoire as representing “darkness” for Rwanda.
The President graded Mr. Bernard Ntaganda of the registered PS-Imberakuri party and Ms. Ingabire Victoire of yet-to-be registered FDU-Inkingi in the same category – and accused the international community of being “insulting”, for viewing Rwanda at the level of these two politicians.
“I consider this insulting for some people to look at politics in Rwanda
or a Rwandan in the context of people like Ingabire or Ntaganda,” he told reporters Monday, before adding in a mixture of English and Kinyarwanda that he thinks these politicians are “…people with no history, no ideas and neither even basic culture of a normal human up-bringing.”
He lashed out: “The world wants to look at us like this. These are the people who represent the other views…the opposition. These fellows have no views at all…they are just a creation of some sort by people who have contempt for us.”
Indicative of a changing mood clearly marked with irritation, Mr. Kagame continued: “What do they represent really? If we had a referendum [asking] all Rwandans - even in their confused history and all sorts of problems, I don’t think they know what these people stand for at all…I don’t think so.”
Referring to Ms. Ingabire, the President dismissed allegations that his government is deliberately blocking her from leaving the country. He also claimed that due to her association with Genocide convict and ex-assistant Joseph Ntawangundi, it clearly shows the kind of politics she espouses. “It could even be difficult for her to disassociate from this problem,” he added.
The President claimed these politicians have no moral authority to comment on any issue in the country – instead saying the existing parties are the ones better placed to criticize government as they have lived through the country’s “hardships”.
Mr. Kagame said that he encourages the known parties to take up the position of the “so-called opposition because these one have no place”, also arguing that the mainstream small parties, some allied with the RPF, have now “matured [and] developed through these hardships we have shared together”.
However, on naming some of the nine parties in Parliament, the President caused laughter when he mentioned only PSD and PL - but asked the Interior Minister Sheikh Musa Fazil Harelimana, “which one else...the one you represent”.
For the troubled yet-to-be registered Green Party of Rwanda of Mr. Frank Habineza, President Kagame accused it of being managed from outside Rwanda. He claimed all those writing to him campaigning on behalf of the group are foreigners – so he concluded and claimed the Green Party has no membership or leadership inside the country.
The President rejected claims that Green Party in-fighting is caused by his RPF party. He said for the group to be allowed to operate in the country, it has to be a
Rwandan-based party with all the requirements for registration.
Information emerged from an uncorroborated media report in back in February claiming a senior advisor to Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni was providing financing and guidance to the Green Party. The man in question is allegedly Dr. John Nagenda, but he has officially distanced himself from the party.
President Kagame did not make specific reference to these allegations, but was instead speaking about the numerous letters of support his office has received from
Green movements and parties in Europe and North America. They have petitioned him to use his office to allow the Rwandan Greens to operate freely.
On media reports that some senior army officers are under house arrest or on surveillance for planning a coup against government or intending to flee the country, President Kagame said that is not how a government does business.
Unconfirmed reports claim Land Forces Chief Gen. Charles Kayonga is under house arrest over plans to topple his boss. The President claimed the information is baseless rumours.
“Why surveillance when they can jail you with handcuffs…,” he said. “Government has no problem with openly jailing anybody.”
He repeated his call made at a March press conference for the Rwandan population to go about their business without fear of any security concerns.
Workers at Guinea RUSAL refinery continue to block production.
Mineweb
6 April 2010
Workers at RUSAL's (0486.HK: Quote) Friguia alumina refinery in Guinea blocked production for the sixth day in a row on Tuesday after initial negotiation efforts failed and the government threatened to send in security forces.
The plant, the largest industrial project in the fractious West African nation, has a capacity to produce around 640,000 tonnes of alumina per year, which the Russian firm then ships around the world to be refined further into aluminum.
"The entrance to the plant is still blocked by heavy machines. Production is still shut," said a RUSAL official on Tuesday on condition of anonymity.
Guinea sent two government ministers late on Monday to negotiate with members of the union, who are seeking a 50 percent pay hike to compensate for rising fuel prices, and Prime Minister Jean Marie Dore said he would call in security forces if the blockade did not end soon.
"It is imperative that those occupying the refinery leave without delay before I call on security forces to go in carefully and to liberate workers and ensure the security of the plant's equipment," he said late Monday on state television.
The RUSAL official said on Tuesday the workers' union had sent delegates to the capital Conakry to resume talks.
The Friguia refinery employs about 1,080 people.
(Reporting by Saliou Samb; writing by Richard Valdmanis)
6 April 2010
Workers at RUSAL's (0486.HK: Quote) Friguia alumina refinery in Guinea blocked production for the sixth day in a row on Tuesday after initial negotiation efforts failed and the government threatened to send in security forces.
The plant, the largest industrial project in the fractious West African nation, has a capacity to produce around 640,000 tonnes of alumina per year, which the Russian firm then ships around the world to be refined further into aluminum.
"The entrance to the plant is still blocked by heavy machines. Production is still shut," said a RUSAL official on Tuesday on condition of anonymity.
Guinea sent two government ministers late on Monday to negotiate with members of the union, who are seeking a 50 percent pay hike to compensate for rising fuel prices, and Prime Minister Jean Marie Dore said he would call in security forces if the blockade did not end soon.
"It is imperative that those occupying the refinery leave without delay before I call on security forces to go in carefully and to liberate workers and ensure the security of the plant's equipment," he said late Monday on state television.
The RUSAL official said on Tuesday the workers' union had sent delegates to the capital Conakry to resume talks.
The Friguia refinery employs about 1,080 people.
(Reporting by Saliou Samb; writing by Richard Valdmanis)
Secretary Clinton and Nigerian Secretary Ahmed to Inaugurate the U.S.-Nigeria Binational Commission on April 6.
United States Department of State - Office of the Spokesperson
6 April 2010
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Nigerian Secretary to the Government of the Federation Yayale Ahmed will inaugurate the U.S.-Nigeria Binational Commission on Tuesday, April 6 at 3:00 p.m., in the Treaty Room at the Department of State.
The U.S.-Nigeria Binational Commission is a strategic dialogue designed to expand mutual cooperation across a broad range of shared interests. The Commission is a collaborative forum to build partnerships for tangible and measurable progress on issues critical to our shared future. We have agreed that the Commission will operate working groups on Good Governance, Transparency, and Integrity; Energy and Investment; Food Security and Agriculture; and, Niger Delta and Regional Security Cooperation. These working groups will meet in either Washington or Abuja over the coming months.
The event will be open to credentialed members of the press.
Pre-set time for cameras: 2:00 p.m. at the 23rd Street Entrance.
Final access times for journalists and still cameras: 2:30 p.m. at the 23rd Street Entrance.
6 April 2010
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Nigerian Secretary to the Government of the Federation Yayale Ahmed will inaugurate the U.S.-Nigeria Binational Commission on Tuesday, April 6 at 3:00 p.m., in the Treaty Room at the Department of State.
The U.S.-Nigeria Binational Commission is a strategic dialogue designed to expand mutual cooperation across a broad range of shared interests. The Commission is a collaborative forum to build partnerships for tangible and measurable progress on issues critical to our shared future. We have agreed that the Commission will operate working groups on Good Governance, Transparency, and Integrity; Energy and Investment; Food Security and Agriculture; and, Niger Delta and Regional Security Cooperation. These working groups will meet in either Washington or Abuja over the coming months.
The event will be open to credentialed members of the press.
Pre-set time for cameras: 2:00 p.m. at the 23rd Street Entrance.
Final access times for journalists and still cameras: 2:30 p.m. at the 23rd Street Entrance.
For April 6, 1994.
04 April, 2010
Rwandan Twa (pygmies) fading into oblivion from exclusion and persecution.
AFP
4 April 2010
Rwanda's rapidly dwindling Twa pygmies, considered the original inhabitants of this central African nation, now live on the fringes, facing squalor, discrimination and general exclusion.
A small community eking out a frugal living on the flank of an impossibly steep hill in Bwiza in the centre of the country embodies the problems they face in Rwanda.
Bwiza's residents came to look for a field, having lost the land their families owned decades back.
They are plagued by alcoholism, lose up to two children for every one born, and have little or no access to health care.
"A lot of children die. I used to have nine, now I have three," said Jowas Gasinzigwa, leaning on a crude walking stick.
There are 46 families and just 50 children in the hamlet, 15 of whom attend school. All this in a country where most women produce five or six children.
"I now have three and I used to have six," said Celestin Uwimana, 38. "Many die of malaria because they don't go to hospital when they have it. Others get meningitis."
The nearest health centre is a two-hour walk away. The Twa live in leaf huts and respiratory diseases are a major scourge due to leaky roofs and damp.
Zephirin Kalimba, the head of an organisation that helps Twa communities through development projects, says they make up between 33,000 and 35,000 of Rwanda's 10 million people.
Whereas the overall population of Rwanda is on the rise, the number of pygmies is declining, a development likely linked to their displacement from their original forest lands and the end of their traditional hunter-gatherer lifestyle.
Though Twa used to own land, more than 40 percent of Twa households in Rwanda are today landless. They were forced out of forests which were turned into natural parks. It was only after eviction from their ancestral land that they turned to farming in fits and starts.
In Bwiza, the men, in gumboots or plastic sandals, sit in the shade complaining. It is the women who hoe a nearby field belonging to a Twa widow who inherited it from her late non-Twa husband, babies strapped to their backs in the blazing sun.
Both groups occasionally burst into laughter, start dancing and make up a song as they go along: about how "the minister said the Twa need iron sheets for the roofs of their houses" and how "Rwanda has many doctors, but none near Twa villages".
Kalimba said the community should be afforded the same benefits given to handicapped people or women in Rwanda. Instead, the Twa are excluded from government poverty alleviation measures, he claimed.
The pygmies even had to change the name of their organisation, the Community of Indigenous Rwandans, as the government claimed their identification along ethnic lines contributed to the 1994 genocide.
The first recorded reference to pygmies appears to be in a letter written in 2276 BC by the boy pharaoh Pepi II. More recently the French-American explorer Paul du Chaillu wrote at length about his encounter with pygmies in the rainforests of Gabon in 1867.
Present day Twa are forced to eke out a living from casual labour and pottery.
When the Twa, who are also found in neighbouring Burundi, Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda, can get work it, is usually on their neighbours' land and the pay is a pittance.
They complain of persecution both at work and in school.
"If we go to look for labour where someone is building a house, they'll only take us if there are no non-Twa workers," Uwimana said.
"When we earn some money cultivating a communal field ... and we try to put it into the bank, we go to the bank counter and they say, 'Ha, you're a Twa' and refuse to open an account," he added.
In despair, some of them have turned to drink.
Asked if the same holds true in schools, 14-year-old Justin Nzabandora said the main Twa children so often drop out of school is because "they get tired of having other children point to them saying 'look it's a Twa'."
4 April 2010
Rwanda's rapidly dwindling Twa pygmies, considered the original inhabitants of this central African nation, now live on the fringes, facing squalor, discrimination and general exclusion.
A small community eking out a frugal living on the flank of an impossibly steep hill in Bwiza in the centre of the country embodies the problems they face in Rwanda.
Bwiza's residents came to look for a field, having lost the land their families owned decades back.
They are plagued by alcoholism, lose up to two children for every one born, and have little or no access to health care.
"A lot of children die. I used to have nine, now I have three," said Jowas Gasinzigwa, leaning on a crude walking stick.
There are 46 families and just 50 children in the hamlet, 15 of whom attend school. All this in a country where most women produce five or six children.
"I now have three and I used to have six," said Celestin Uwimana, 38. "Many die of malaria because they don't go to hospital when they have it. Others get meningitis."
The nearest health centre is a two-hour walk away. The Twa live in leaf huts and respiratory diseases are a major scourge due to leaky roofs and damp.
Zephirin Kalimba, the head of an organisation that helps Twa communities through development projects, says they make up between 33,000 and 35,000 of Rwanda's 10 million people.
Whereas the overall population of Rwanda is on the rise, the number of pygmies is declining, a development likely linked to their displacement from their original forest lands and the end of their traditional hunter-gatherer lifestyle.
Though Twa used to own land, more than 40 percent of Twa households in Rwanda are today landless. They were forced out of forests which were turned into natural parks. It was only after eviction from their ancestral land that they turned to farming in fits and starts.
In Bwiza, the men, in gumboots or plastic sandals, sit in the shade complaining. It is the women who hoe a nearby field belonging to a Twa widow who inherited it from her late non-Twa husband, babies strapped to their backs in the blazing sun.
Both groups occasionally burst into laughter, start dancing and make up a song as they go along: about how "the minister said the Twa need iron sheets for the roofs of their houses" and how "Rwanda has many doctors, but none near Twa villages".
Kalimba said the community should be afforded the same benefits given to handicapped people or women in Rwanda. Instead, the Twa are excluded from government poverty alleviation measures, he claimed.
The pygmies even had to change the name of their organisation, the Community of Indigenous Rwandans, as the government claimed their identification along ethnic lines contributed to the 1994 genocide.
The first recorded reference to pygmies appears to be in a letter written in 2276 BC by the boy pharaoh Pepi II. More recently the French-American explorer Paul du Chaillu wrote at length about his encounter with pygmies in the rainforests of Gabon in 1867.
Present day Twa are forced to eke out a living from casual labour and pottery.
When the Twa, who are also found in neighbouring Burundi, Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda, can get work it, is usually on their neighbours' land and the pay is a pittance.
They complain of persecution both at work and in school.
"If we go to look for labour where someone is building a house, they'll only take us if there are no non-Twa workers," Uwimana said.
"When we earn some money cultivating a communal field ... and we try to put it into the bank, we go to the bank counter and they say, 'Ha, you're a Twa' and refuse to open an account," he added.
In despair, some of them have turned to drink.
Asked if the same holds true in schools, 14-year-old Justin Nzabandora said the main Twa children so often drop out of school is because "they get tired of having other children point to them saying 'look it's a Twa'."
New Energy War in West Africa? Tension Builds in the Gulf of Guinea.
OilPrice.com
4 April 2010
by Philip H. de Leon
The strategic framework and the correlation of forces in the Gulf of Guinea — one of the most significant and growing energy resource regions of the world — is changing rapidly. A new era in security arrangements for the region is beginning.
The region is moving from an area of low technology defense and security systems, and minimal command and control at national levels, to one of growing sophistication, higher mobility, and the potential for military confrontation.
The five-year, $250-million Equatorial Guinea maritime security program - essentially the build-up of an integrated naval and air capability - announced on February 24, 2010, signalled the start of a re-defined strategic architecture in West Africa . It has brought a coherent military-security framework into life, highlighting issues which are vital to the welfare of the regional states in a way in which some earlier boundary disputes were not.
Given the strategic maxim that military planning must be based to a large degree on the capabilities, rather than the stated intent, of neighboring or competing states, the move by Equatorial Guinea serves as a focus for response and activities by regional strategic planners. Capabilities take years to develop; intent can change in moments. This means that Equatorial Guinea ’s neighbours must address changing realities.
Gen. Ashfaq Kayani, Pakistan ’s Chief of Army Staff, is fond of saying that it takes 30 years to develop an army up to corps level, whereas political realities can change a nation’s intent overnight. This means that defense planners must develop capabilities over the long term to be ready for any rapidly-emerging eventuality. In the Gulf of Guinea context, the Equatorial Guinea Government of Pres. Brig.-Gen. (rtd.) Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, has, in fact, been quietly shaping its defense capabilities over the past few years, particularly as its offshore energy assets come on stream and produce revenue surpluses. This has given Equatorial Guinea profoundly more wealth than, say, two decades ago. As well, the offshore Equatorial Guinea oil and gas producing areas are often contestable — or at least close enough to cause friction — with neighbors (Gabon, Nigeria, Cameroon).
Equatorial Guinea, too, has often had a fractious relationship with its major neighbor, Nigeria, even though Malabo has depended on Abuja for subsidies and even military training and security coverage.
Equatorial Guinea’s contract with the MPRI subsidiary of the US defense corporation, L3, made public in late February 2010 (but actually shaping up well before that), highlights the reality that Equatorial Guinea intends to be a major player in Gulf of Guinea security; that it has the capacity to influence sea lane security to and from Nigeria and Cameroon; and that it will not be a passive participant in the region. A number of incidents have occurred in recent years to indicate that Equatorial Guinea forces - components of the Guardia Nacional de Guinea Ecuatorial (GNGE) - will take aggressive action with regard to what they feel might be penetrations or violations of Equatorial Guinea ’s sovereign space or economic zone.
Part of this activist stance is based on the reality that there is - or has been - no cohesive and professional command and control structure in place in Equatorial Guinea , other than personal links between arbitrarily-ranked colleagues of Pres. Obiang, all of who are ethnic Fang, as is the President. The ranking of the Minister of Defense, Antonio Mba Nguema, and the Vice-Minister of Defense, Anthonio Ndong, as a lieutenant-generals, for example, is arbitrary when the total manpower strength of the GNGE is only in the neighborhood of 3,500, including a significant number of foreign nationals in key slots (such as aircrew and maintenance). The rank of lieutenant-general implies command of a corps-sized unit, or an Army, with numbers in the region of 20,000 or more.
The substance of the latest agreement with MPRI/L3, however, is significant, especially as MPRI - which is undertaking the latest Equatorial Guinea military expansion - had been called in, at the insistence of the then US Administration of Pres. Bill Clinton, in 2000 to “democratize” and “professionalize” the Nigerian Army, even while it was working on a contract initiated with Equatorial Guinea in 1998 to help train the Equatorial Guinea military. The MPRI training package with the Nigerian Army did not go well, especially as the Nigerian Army had just emerged from successfully fighting a range of wars and peacekeeping operations in Africa with few resources and yet remarkable success.
[Lt.-Gen. Victor Leo Malu, the Nigerian Chief of Army Staff, questioned MPRI’s plan to reduce the size of the Nigerian military from 100,000 to 50,000, and MPRI’s need to have access to sensitive military information. GIS/Defense & Foreign Affairs has first-hand knowledge that the then-Nigerian Government of Pres. Olusegun Obasanjo was warned at the time, by external advisors, that MPRI had questionable capabilities and motives, as well as ill-suited background, for training the Nigerian Army, and the Nigerian Government was warned as well of MPRI’s legally questionable rôle in providing actual combat operational command to Croatian forces engaged in ethnic cleansing in the Krajina area of what is now Croatia, during the Yugoslav break-up in the 1990s. Nonetheless, Pres. Obasanjo, unwilling to alienate the Clinton Administration, dismissed Gen. Malu rather than resist the MPRI demands.]
Now, however, MPRI is engaged in helping a state which has, arguably, potential concerns with Nigeria , making it difficult for MPRI to re-engage in Nigeria , even if the Nigerian Army was so inclined.
But the new MPRI/L3 initiative with Equatorial Guinea is - as its title suggests - maritime-oriented. Even though the MRPI contract with Equatorial Guinea was announced in March 2010, the company was recruiting for former US military personnel in December 2009 to meet the contract. It sought personnel in security, search and rescue, detainee processing, information technology, logistics/maintenance, and administration, with hirings to begin in “the early months of 2010”. Experience in maritime security, with a background of employment in the US Navy or Coast Guard was desired, along with some trainer skills.
L3’s announcement on February 24, 2010, was that MPRI had been awarded a $58-million firm-fixed-price task order with the Government of Equatorial Guinea to establish a Maritime Security Enhancement Program (MSEP). This task order was the first part of a multi-year contract, with a potential value of approximately $250-million. The MSEP was designed to provide nationwide coastal surveillance coverage for Equatorial Guinea.
Jim Jackson, general manager for MPRI’s International Group, noted: “This important contract award represents a strategic opportunity to contribute not only to the vital maritime security of Equatorial Guinea , but also provides a thoughtful approach toward establishing long-term stability for the entire region.”
The MSEP contract envisions completion of a surveillance site network and operations centers in Equatorial Guinea within three years. This would be followed up by two years of sustainment and maintenance support for an estimated contract total of five years.
In fact, the emphasis of the contract - given the hiring pattern - implies a greater emphasis on physical security, rather than merely the integrated surveillance system, although that is clearly part of the program. GIS/Defense & Foreign Affairs sources in Malabo said that new Equatorial Guinea program would include AIS (automatic identification system), radar, and command and control. The program could expand to include L3’s Raytheon/Beech King Air-based aerial surveillance systems, as well as light patrol vessels. MPRI was also to train oil workers in anti-piracy tactics as part of the contract.
Significantly, the new Government of Nigeria under Acting Pres. Goodluck Jonathan is known to have begun looking at an integrated national surveillance and response system, linked through a command and control function with all the Armed Services, the Intelligence Community (IC), Police and Customs. The concept had been proposed a year earlier, but the Government of Pres. Umaru Musa Yar’Adua was even then becoming paralyzed politically for a number of reasons.
Equatorial Guinea , Nigeria , Gabon , and São Tomé and Príncipé all recognize that they have common security threats, quite apart from any potential friction between them, and with other neighbors such as Cameroon (with which Nigeria recently concluded a difficult dispute over the sovereignty of the Bakassi Peninsula ).
Freedom Onuoha, a research fellow at the African Centre for Strategic Research and Studies at the National Defence College in Abuja, writing in African Security Review, Vol. 17, No. 3, published by the South Africa-based Institute for Security Studies in 2008, cited a “recent study commissioned by Royal Dutch/Shell” as saying that between 100-million and 250-million barrels of oil was stolen each year by bunkerers or vandals, putting the cost, at an average US$60 a barrel, at around US$15-billion a year. This was, he said, in addition to other costs to the Nigerian State due to oil pipeline sabotage, and other related activities. As well, the Nigerian Government Inter-agency Maritime Security Task Force on Acts of Illegality in Nigerian Waters (IAMSTAF) was told on December 5, 2008, by President of the Nigerian Trawler Owners Association (NITOA), Mrs Margaret Orakwusi, that the rising spate of piracy, sea robberies, poaching, bunkering, and other illegal operations in Nigeria's territorial waters and seas (with the exception of illegal oil bunkering in the Niger Delta region) have cost the country more than N25-billion in less than four years. Mrs Orakwusi told the task force that the country’s fishing industry had witnessed at least 293 documented sea robberies and pirate attacks between 2003 and 2008, which she said had culminated in loss of lives and destruction of vessels and trawlers.
Significantly, and without any increase in budget, the Nigerian Navy literally “bootstrapped” its way back into a reasonable operational capability over recent years, rebuilding ships which had been thought to have been beyond salvage. As a result, and without fanfare, the Nigerian Navy has re-emerged as a factor in the Gulf of Guinea region.
Nigeria , however, faces a far greater challenge than Equatorial Guinea . Its coastline and offshore facilities are in a far more complex situation than those of Equatorial Guinea , and the volume of facilities, pipelines, and traffic are far greater. Moreover, Nigeria continues to address a militant, armed opposition force - MEND: the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta - which has fractured into a number of groups in the oil- and gas-producing Niger Delta region. Acting Pres. Jonathan, as a former Governor of Bayelsa state, one of the major energy-producing Niger Delta states, is highly aware that the legacy of his brief Administration (until the April 2010 Presidential elections) must be to address and bring under control the Niger Delta crisis.
Whereas the Equatorial Guinea forces have been growing, commensurate with the financial surpluses generated by energy exports, the Nigerian Defence Forces have faced growing constraints. Former Pres. Olusegun Obasanjo, although once a military head-of-state in Nigeria and a former Army general, had, as an elected President, fully embraced the US Clinton Administration’s view that the Nigerian military should be suppressed and kept on a reduced budget. Even so, the Nigerian Armed Forces, as with the Navy’s example, were able to adapt to the situation.
The new security paradigm, however, implies that the Nigerian Government will now be forced to act rapidly if it is to contain its own security concerns and also retain its dominance of the Gulf of Guinea . The Nigerian National Security Advisor during the Obasanjo Administration, Lt.-Gen. (rtd.) Aliyu Mohammed Gusau (who is now back in that role with the Jonathan Administration) successfully draft the framework for a Gulf of Guinea Commission to begin developing offshore security modalities from the immediate Gulf of Guinea region down to Angola and South Africa.
Abuja may now need to revive that, while it also deals with its own approach to development a strategic asset protection program to safeguard pipelines, installations, sea routes, and so on. This will be significantly larger in scale and in conceptual thinking than the Equatorial Guinea approach.
But, as noted above, Equatorial Guinea has expanded its military capabilities considerably in recent years, relying heavily on foreign contractors and mercenary military personnel. During the past decade, the Guardia Nacional de Guinea Ecuatorial (GNGE)’s Naval Division has obtained two lightly-armed (Typhoon G mounting of an Oerlikon 20mm cannon with electro-optical guidance) 24.8m (LOA) Shaldag Mk.II fast patrol vessels (acquired 2005) from Israel Shipyards Ltd.; the Air Wing has obtained at least two new Enstrom 480B Guardian turbine helicopters which are used on maritime duties (delivered 2007); the Air Wing has also acquired a steady supply (now totaling six) of Ukraine-surplus Mil Mi-24V Hind helicopter gunships (deliveries in 2001, 2004, and 2007), and at least one Mil Mi-172 utility helicopter; the Air Wing has also obtained four Su-25 strike aircraft variants (two Su-39s, Su-25TM second generation variants, transferred from Ukraine and possibly carrying Kopyo (Russian: Spear) radar for air-engagement combat, along with RVV-AE/R-77 air-to-air missiles, and Kh-31 and Kh-35 anti-shipping missiles), along with two Su-25UB trainers. The Air Wing also obtained one Antonov An-32 twin-turboprop VIP transport, which was lost, with all hands, in April 2008; it has two Czech Aero L-39 advanced jet trainer/strike aircraft, and possibly one An-26 transport aircraft. The Presidential flight has one Agusta A109 VIP helicopter, a Dassault Falcon 50 and/or a Falcon 900, a Yak-40 executive jet, and the one Mi-172 helicopter, and an Embraer ERJ145EP executive jet. Virtually all of these rely on foreign aircrew and maintenance personnel, and mostly operate from Malabo airfield, where the bulk of the Air Wing operates.
One helicopter, at least, is based at the airfield at Bata, the northernmost of the two major towns on the mainland coast.
Much of the Equatorial Guinea hydrocarbon wealth has been derived from fields around Bioko Island , the seat of Government and the capital, Malabo . However, the mainland region — until recently fairly neglected apart from its timber resources — borders at the Atlantic on areas claimed by Cameroon and Gabon. A dispute between Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea over an island off the mouth of the Ntem River in Cameroon remains unresolved. A dispute with Gabon over sovereignty over the Gabon-occupied Mbane area and its associated islands is under United Nations mediation. The potential for disputes over rights to the coastal waters remains high, and could lead to confrontation in the oil and gas producing Corisco Bay area.
Equatorial Guinea faces a significant geographic challenge to its limited, albeit growing, maritime and air forces. It is a challenge which can only be met through the application of tight coordination and high technology. As well, it will require significant support from Equatorial Guinea ’s very limited policy planning and diplomatic resources. Indeed, the lack of forward-looking planning and diplomatic resources makes the likelihood of clashes over disputed areas and assets more likely, particularly if accidental or provocative cross-border movements by neighbors stimulate reaction by Equatorial Guinea forces.
[Significantly, Bioko, the main island territory of Equatorial Guinea , and Río Muni , the mainland territory, were never historically a single country. Spain, which was the colonial power controlling both territories, brought the two areas under a single administration, as two provinces, in 1956. The United Nations asked Spain , in 1963, to grant independence to the provinces, and this was done in 1968. At the time, Spain did not wish to give separate independence to each of the two provinces, because Madrid was in the throes of attempting to push Britain into handing Gibraltar over to Spanish control. To have allowed self-determination in Bioko and Río Muni separately was perceived to have opened the door to Britain allowing the Gibraltans to entertain a separate vote on whether to opt for Spain or opt for sovereign independence. The Fang population, which now controls Equatorial Guinea , is from Río Muni, and has gradually subordinated and reduced the Bioko population, comprised mostly of Bubi ethnicity. Some Fang migration to Bioko began in 1924, when a labor shortage caused the Catholic Church to indent workers from the mainland for cocoa production. The Fang migrants proved unsuitable, but a significant Fang population remained on Bioko .]
Nigeria, by contrast, has a more concentrated area of concern around the Niger Delta, but still has a large exclusive economic zone (EEZ) to monitor — as does Equatorial Guinea and Cameroon— with regard to illegal fisheries. But the Nigerian situation has greater challenges because of the complexity of the onshore energy assets, including pipelines, coupled with an historical pattern of ethnic and political differences, both within the Niger Delta region and with regard to the Delta states’ relationship with the Nigerian Federation.
Nigeria , unlike Equatorial Guinea, has developed a defense and security framework over five decades of independence and a century of modern military structures as a component of the British military system. The current dynamic, however, has been characterized by rising capabilities and ambitions by the Equatorial Guinea forces, and severely constrained capabilities in the Nigerian Armed Forces due to budgetary constraints and Continent-wide military responsibilities in peacekeeping.
Nigeria has, in the past decade, begun a process of using technology in its civil sector - particularly telecommunications - to leapfrog moribund and paralyzed structures. Nigeria’s revived approach to integrated, national-level real-time security intelligence coupled to command and control would, if it is adopted, help re-assert Abuja’s strategic leadership in the region. Despite its population size — at around 150-million - Nigeria has, like most sub-Saharan African states, devoted relatively little of its GDP to defense.
The following comparative statistics [derived from World Bank and GIS/Defense & Foreign Affairs archives] — while not entirely like-for-like — are significant in helping shape a balanced view of the region:
Cameroon: Population est. (2008) 18.9-million; GDP (2008) $23.4-billion; Defense expenditure (2001) $211.1-million.
Equatorial Guinea: Population est. (2008) 660,000; GDP (2008) $18.53-billion; Defense expenditure (2004) est. $126.2-million.
Gabon: Population est. (2008) 1.45-million; GDP (2008) $14.43-billion. Defense expenditure (1996) $91-million.
Nigeria: Population est. (2008) 151.32-million; GDP (2008) $212.08-billion; Defense expenditure (2007) $979.3-million.
São Tomé and Príncipé: Population est. (2008) 160,000; GDP (2008) $170-million; Defense expenditure (2004) est. $126.2-million.
These are static snapshots, and do not reflect the dynamics of the region, the respective economic potential versus overhead responsibilities of each society, or the relative inertia of each government, but they do indicate latent capability to some extent. What is emerging, because of the evolving discovery and exploitation of hydrocarbon deposits in the region, is a more strategically mobile and competitive framework. Many of the old boundary issues, as well as the prospect for the movement of societies as a result of wealth opportunities (not evenly distributed), mean that stability can no longer be guaranteed.
A more competitive regional environment, in which very tangible economic resources such as hydrocarbon deposits are at stake, coupled with growing wealth, will demand the kind of increasing reliance on technological solutions to security challenges which are now beginning to emerge.
Analysis from GIS sources in Malabo and elsewhere in the region.
4 April 2010
by Philip H. de Leon
The strategic framework and the correlation of forces in the Gulf of Guinea — one of the most significant and growing energy resource regions of the world — is changing rapidly. A new era in security arrangements for the region is beginning.
The region is moving from an area of low technology defense and security systems, and minimal command and control at national levels, to one of growing sophistication, higher mobility, and the potential for military confrontation.
The five-year, $250-million Equatorial Guinea maritime security program - essentially the build-up of an integrated naval and air capability - announced on February 24, 2010, signalled the start of a re-defined strategic architecture in West Africa . It has brought a coherent military-security framework into life, highlighting issues which are vital to the welfare of the regional states in a way in which some earlier boundary disputes were not.
Given the strategic maxim that military planning must be based to a large degree on the capabilities, rather than the stated intent, of neighboring or competing states, the move by Equatorial Guinea serves as a focus for response and activities by regional strategic planners. Capabilities take years to develop; intent can change in moments. This means that Equatorial Guinea ’s neighbours must address changing realities.
Gen. Ashfaq Kayani, Pakistan ’s Chief of Army Staff, is fond of saying that it takes 30 years to develop an army up to corps level, whereas political realities can change a nation’s intent overnight. This means that defense planners must develop capabilities over the long term to be ready for any rapidly-emerging eventuality. In the Gulf of Guinea context, the Equatorial Guinea Government of Pres. Brig.-Gen. (rtd.) Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, has, in fact, been quietly shaping its defense capabilities over the past few years, particularly as its offshore energy assets come on stream and produce revenue surpluses. This has given Equatorial Guinea profoundly more wealth than, say, two decades ago. As well, the offshore Equatorial Guinea oil and gas producing areas are often contestable — or at least close enough to cause friction — with neighbors (Gabon, Nigeria, Cameroon).
Equatorial Guinea, too, has often had a fractious relationship with its major neighbor, Nigeria, even though Malabo has depended on Abuja for subsidies and even military training and security coverage.
Equatorial Guinea’s contract with the MPRI subsidiary of the US defense corporation, L3, made public in late February 2010 (but actually shaping up well before that), highlights the reality that Equatorial Guinea intends to be a major player in Gulf of Guinea security; that it has the capacity to influence sea lane security to and from Nigeria and Cameroon; and that it will not be a passive participant in the region. A number of incidents have occurred in recent years to indicate that Equatorial Guinea forces - components of the Guardia Nacional de Guinea Ecuatorial (GNGE) - will take aggressive action with regard to what they feel might be penetrations or violations of Equatorial Guinea ’s sovereign space or economic zone.
Part of this activist stance is based on the reality that there is - or has been - no cohesive and professional command and control structure in place in Equatorial Guinea , other than personal links between arbitrarily-ranked colleagues of Pres. Obiang, all of who are ethnic Fang, as is the President. The ranking of the Minister of Defense, Antonio Mba Nguema, and the Vice-Minister of Defense, Anthonio Ndong, as a lieutenant-generals, for example, is arbitrary when the total manpower strength of the GNGE is only in the neighborhood of 3,500, including a significant number of foreign nationals in key slots (such as aircrew and maintenance). The rank of lieutenant-general implies command of a corps-sized unit, or an Army, with numbers in the region of 20,000 or more.
The substance of the latest agreement with MPRI/L3, however, is significant, especially as MPRI - which is undertaking the latest Equatorial Guinea military expansion - had been called in, at the insistence of the then US Administration of Pres. Bill Clinton, in 2000 to “democratize” and “professionalize” the Nigerian Army, even while it was working on a contract initiated with Equatorial Guinea in 1998 to help train the Equatorial Guinea military. The MPRI training package with the Nigerian Army did not go well, especially as the Nigerian Army had just emerged from successfully fighting a range of wars and peacekeeping operations in Africa with few resources and yet remarkable success.
[Lt.-Gen. Victor Leo Malu, the Nigerian Chief of Army Staff, questioned MPRI’s plan to reduce the size of the Nigerian military from 100,000 to 50,000, and MPRI’s need to have access to sensitive military information. GIS/Defense & Foreign Affairs has first-hand knowledge that the then-Nigerian Government of Pres. Olusegun Obasanjo was warned at the time, by external advisors, that MPRI had questionable capabilities and motives, as well as ill-suited background, for training the Nigerian Army, and the Nigerian Government was warned as well of MPRI’s legally questionable rôle in providing actual combat operational command to Croatian forces engaged in ethnic cleansing in the Krajina area of what is now Croatia, during the Yugoslav break-up in the 1990s. Nonetheless, Pres. Obasanjo, unwilling to alienate the Clinton Administration, dismissed Gen. Malu rather than resist the MPRI demands.]
Now, however, MPRI is engaged in helping a state which has, arguably, potential concerns with Nigeria , making it difficult for MPRI to re-engage in Nigeria , even if the Nigerian Army was so inclined.
But the new MPRI/L3 initiative with Equatorial Guinea is - as its title suggests - maritime-oriented. Even though the MRPI contract with Equatorial Guinea was announced in March 2010, the company was recruiting for former US military personnel in December 2009 to meet the contract. It sought personnel in security, search and rescue, detainee processing, information technology, logistics/maintenance, and administration, with hirings to begin in “the early months of 2010”. Experience in maritime security, with a background of employment in the US Navy or Coast Guard was desired, along with some trainer skills.
L3’s announcement on February 24, 2010, was that MPRI had been awarded a $58-million firm-fixed-price task order with the Government of Equatorial Guinea to establish a Maritime Security Enhancement Program (MSEP). This task order was the first part of a multi-year contract, with a potential value of approximately $250-million. The MSEP was designed to provide nationwide coastal surveillance coverage for Equatorial Guinea.
Jim Jackson, general manager for MPRI’s International Group, noted: “This important contract award represents a strategic opportunity to contribute not only to the vital maritime security of Equatorial Guinea , but also provides a thoughtful approach toward establishing long-term stability for the entire region.”
The MSEP contract envisions completion of a surveillance site network and operations centers in Equatorial Guinea within three years. This would be followed up by two years of sustainment and maintenance support for an estimated contract total of five years.
In fact, the emphasis of the contract - given the hiring pattern - implies a greater emphasis on physical security, rather than merely the integrated surveillance system, although that is clearly part of the program. GIS/Defense & Foreign Affairs sources in Malabo said that new Equatorial Guinea program would include AIS (automatic identification system), radar, and command and control. The program could expand to include L3’s Raytheon/Beech King Air-based aerial surveillance systems, as well as light patrol vessels. MPRI was also to train oil workers in anti-piracy tactics as part of the contract.
Significantly, the new Government of Nigeria under Acting Pres. Goodluck Jonathan is known to have begun looking at an integrated national surveillance and response system, linked through a command and control function with all the Armed Services, the Intelligence Community (IC), Police and Customs. The concept had been proposed a year earlier, but the Government of Pres. Umaru Musa Yar’Adua was even then becoming paralyzed politically for a number of reasons.
Equatorial Guinea , Nigeria , Gabon , and São Tomé and Príncipé all recognize that they have common security threats, quite apart from any potential friction between them, and with other neighbors such as Cameroon (with which Nigeria recently concluded a difficult dispute over the sovereignty of the Bakassi Peninsula ).
Freedom Onuoha, a research fellow at the African Centre for Strategic Research and Studies at the National Defence College in Abuja, writing in African Security Review, Vol. 17, No. 3, published by the South Africa-based Institute for Security Studies in 2008, cited a “recent study commissioned by Royal Dutch/Shell” as saying that between 100-million and 250-million barrels of oil was stolen each year by bunkerers or vandals, putting the cost, at an average US$60 a barrel, at around US$15-billion a year. This was, he said, in addition to other costs to the Nigerian State due to oil pipeline sabotage, and other related activities. As well, the Nigerian Government Inter-agency Maritime Security Task Force on Acts of Illegality in Nigerian Waters (IAMSTAF) was told on December 5, 2008, by President of the Nigerian Trawler Owners Association (NITOA), Mrs Margaret Orakwusi, that the rising spate of piracy, sea robberies, poaching, bunkering, and other illegal operations in Nigeria's territorial waters and seas (with the exception of illegal oil bunkering in the Niger Delta region) have cost the country more than N25-billion in less than four years. Mrs Orakwusi told the task force that the country’s fishing industry had witnessed at least 293 documented sea robberies and pirate attacks between 2003 and 2008, which she said had culminated in loss of lives and destruction of vessels and trawlers.
Significantly, and without any increase in budget, the Nigerian Navy literally “bootstrapped” its way back into a reasonable operational capability over recent years, rebuilding ships which had been thought to have been beyond salvage. As a result, and without fanfare, the Nigerian Navy has re-emerged as a factor in the Gulf of Guinea region.
Nigeria , however, faces a far greater challenge than Equatorial Guinea . Its coastline and offshore facilities are in a far more complex situation than those of Equatorial Guinea , and the volume of facilities, pipelines, and traffic are far greater. Moreover, Nigeria continues to address a militant, armed opposition force - MEND: the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta - which has fractured into a number of groups in the oil- and gas-producing Niger Delta region. Acting Pres. Jonathan, as a former Governor of Bayelsa state, one of the major energy-producing Niger Delta states, is highly aware that the legacy of his brief Administration (until the April 2010 Presidential elections) must be to address and bring under control the Niger Delta crisis.
Whereas the Equatorial Guinea forces have been growing, commensurate with the financial surpluses generated by energy exports, the Nigerian Defence Forces have faced growing constraints. Former Pres. Olusegun Obasanjo, although once a military head-of-state in Nigeria and a former Army general, had, as an elected President, fully embraced the US Clinton Administration’s view that the Nigerian military should be suppressed and kept on a reduced budget. Even so, the Nigerian Armed Forces, as with the Navy’s example, were able to adapt to the situation.
The new security paradigm, however, implies that the Nigerian Government will now be forced to act rapidly if it is to contain its own security concerns and also retain its dominance of the Gulf of Guinea . The Nigerian National Security Advisor during the Obasanjo Administration, Lt.-Gen. (rtd.) Aliyu Mohammed Gusau (who is now back in that role with the Jonathan Administration) successfully draft the framework for a Gulf of Guinea Commission to begin developing offshore security modalities from the immediate Gulf of Guinea region down to Angola and South Africa.
Abuja may now need to revive that, while it also deals with its own approach to development a strategic asset protection program to safeguard pipelines, installations, sea routes, and so on. This will be significantly larger in scale and in conceptual thinking than the Equatorial Guinea approach.
But, as noted above, Equatorial Guinea has expanded its military capabilities considerably in recent years, relying heavily on foreign contractors and mercenary military personnel. During the past decade, the Guardia Nacional de Guinea Ecuatorial (GNGE)’s Naval Division has obtained two lightly-armed (Typhoon G mounting of an Oerlikon 20mm cannon with electro-optical guidance) 24.8m (LOA) Shaldag Mk.II fast patrol vessels (acquired 2005) from Israel Shipyards Ltd.; the Air Wing has obtained at least two new Enstrom 480B Guardian turbine helicopters which are used on maritime duties (delivered 2007); the Air Wing has also acquired a steady supply (now totaling six) of Ukraine-surplus Mil Mi-24V Hind helicopter gunships (deliveries in 2001, 2004, and 2007), and at least one Mil Mi-172 utility helicopter; the Air Wing has also obtained four Su-25 strike aircraft variants (two Su-39s, Su-25TM second generation variants, transferred from Ukraine and possibly carrying Kopyo (Russian: Spear) radar for air-engagement combat, along with RVV-AE/R-77 air-to-air missiles, and Kh-31 and Kh-35 anti-shipping missiles), along with two Su-25UB trainers. The Air Wing also obtained one Antonov An-32 twin-turboprop VIP transport, which was lost, with all hands, in April 2008; it has two Czech Aero L-39 advanced jet trainer/strike aircraft, and possibly one An-26 transport aircraft. The Presidential flight has one Agusta A109 VIP helicopter, a Dassault Falcon 50 and/or a Falcon 900, a Yak-40 executive jet, and the one Mi-172 helicopter, and an Embraer ERJ145EP executive jet. Virtually all of these rely on foreign aircrew and maintenance personnel, and mostly operate from Malabo airfield, where the bulk of the Air Wing operates.
One helicopter, at least, is based at the airfield at Bata, the northernmost of the two major towns on the mainland coast.
Much of the Equatorial Guinea hydrocarbon wealth has been derived from fields around Bioko Island , the seat of Government and the capital, Malabo . However, the mainland region — until recently fairly neglected apart from its timber resources — borders at the Atlantic on areas claimed by Cameroon and Gabon. A dispute between Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea over an island off the mouth of the Ntem River in Cameroon remains unresolved. A dispute with Gabon over sovereignty over the Gabon-occupied Mbane area and its associated islands is under United Nations mediation. The potential for disputes over rights to the coastal waters remains high, and could lead to confrontation in the oil and gas producing Corisco Bay area.
Equatorial Guinea faces a significant geographic challenge to its limited, albeit growing, maritime and air forces. It is a challenge which can only be met through the application of tight coordination and high technology. As well, it will require significant support from Equatorial Guinea ’s very limited policy planning and diplomatic resources. Indeed, the lack of forward-looking planning and diplomatic resources makes the likelihood of clashes over disputed areas and assets more likely, particularly if accidental or provocative cross-border movements by neighbors stimulate reaction by Equatorial Guinea forces.
[Significantly, Bioko, the main island territory of Equatorial Guinea , and Río Muni , the mainland territory, were never historically a single country. Spain, which was the colonial power controlling both territories, brought the two areas under a single administration, as two provinces, in 1956. The United Nations asked Spain , in 1963, to grant independence to the provinces, and this was done in 1968. At the time, Spain did not wish to give separate independence to each of the two provinces, because Madrid was in the throes of attempting to push Britain into handing Gibraltar over to Spanish control. To have allowed self-determination in Bioko and Río Muni separately was perceived to have opened the door to Britain allowing the Gibraltans to entertain a separate vote on whether to opt for Spain or opt for sovereign independence. The Fang population, which now controls Equatorial Guinea , is from Río Muni, and has gradually subordinated and reduced the Bioko population, comprised mostly of Bubi ethnicity. Some Fang migration to Bioko began in 1924, when a labor shortage caused the Catholic Church to indent workers from the mainland for cocoa production. The Fang migrants proved unsuitable, but a significant Fang population remained on Bioko .]
Nigeria, by contrast, has a more concentrated area of concern around the Niger Delta, but still has a large exclusive economic zone (EEZ) to monitor — as does Equatorial Guinea and Cameroon— with regard to illegal fisheries. But the Nigerian situation has greater challenges because of the complexity of the onshore energy assets, including pipelines, coupled with an historical pattern of ethnic and political differences, both within the Niger Delta region and with regard to the Delta states’ relationship with the Nigerian Federation.
Nigeria , unlike Equatorial Guinea, has developed a defense and security framework over five decades of independence and a century of modern military structures as a component of the British military system. The current dynamic, however, has been characterized by rising capabilities and ambitions by the Equatorial Guinea forces, and severely constrained capabilities in the Nigerian Armed Forces due to budgetary constraints and Continent-wide military responsibilities in peacekeeping.
Nigeria has, in the past decade, begun a process of using technology in its civil sector - particularly telecommunications - to leapfrog moribund and paralyzed structures. Nigeria’s revived approach to integrated, national-level real-time security intelligence coupled to command and control would, if it is adopted, help re-assert Abuja’s strategic leadership in the region. Despite its population size — at around 150-million - Nigeria has, like most sub-Saharan African states, devoted relatively little of its GDP to defense.
The following comparative statistics [derived from World Bank and GIS/Defense & Foreign Affairs archives] — while not entirely like-for-like — are significant in helping shape a balanced view of the region:
Cameroon: Population est. (2008) 18.9-million; GDP (2008) $23.4-billion; Defense expenditure (2001) $211.1-million.
Equatorial Guinea: Population est. (2008) 660,000; GDP (2008) $18.53-billion; Defense expenditure (2004) est. $126.2-million.
Gabon: Population est. (2008) 1.45-million; GDP (2008) $14.43-billion. Defense expenditure (1996) $91-million.
Nigeria: Population est. (2008) 151.32-million; GDP (2008) $212.08-billion; Defense expenditure (2007) $979.3-million.
São Tomé and Príncipé: Population est. (2008) 160,000; GDP (2008) $170-million; Defense expenditure (2004) est. $126.2-million.
These are static snapshots, and do not reflect the dynamics of the region, the respective economic potential versus overhead responsibilities of each society, or the relative inertia of each government, but they do indicate latent capability to some extent. What is emerging, because of the evolving discovery and exploitation of hydrocarbon deposits in the region, is a more strategically mobile and competitive framework. Many of the old boundary issues, as well as the prospect for the movement of societies as a result of wealth opportunities (not evenly distributed), mean that stability can no longer be guaranteed.
A more competitive regional environment, in which very tangible economic resources such as hydrocarbon deposits are at stake, coupled with growing wealth, will demand the kind of increasing reliance on technological solutions to security challenges which are now beginning to emerge.
Analysis from GIS sources in Malabo and elsewhere in the region.
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