|
|
Bluebag Media
The greatest tragedy
is life without purpose
GREENVILLE – The stage had been set. Theo Makombe said the Hutus were
planning genocide even during peace talks in 1990. “The U.N. (United
Nations) began to notice this… or something, but they couldn’t get
other (member) nations to respond.”
Makombe, a member of the Rwanda Tutsi tribe, said the Hutus used the
radio for a campaign of hate propaganda. They referred to Tutsis as “a
plague, cockroaches, monsters.” He noted instructions on what to do
were even broadcast. “The U.N. refused to scramble the air waves,
saying it was free speech.”
Then on April 6, 1994, President Juvenal Habyarimana’s plane was shot
down. The Hutus blamed the Tutsi and it began. “Within hours they began
broadcasting it was time to start. By that morning, thousands were
dead,” Makombe said. The 1994 Rwanda genocide had begun.
Makombe was one of only 300 survivors of a slaughter that killed nearly
50,000 people. He was 14 years old at the time. Twenty years later, on
Nov. 13, the young man spoke to a packed room at the Greenville Public
Library about the experience, the book he wrote and a special message
to Americans…
“You have a beautiful country,” he said. “My country is beautiful, too.
Now it is peaceful. It has been peaceful for 20 years. Rwanda is small,
about the same size as Ohio.” He added today Rwanda is the fastest
growing country in Africa… the safest, cleanest and it’s still making
big changes...
Read the rest of the article at Bluebag Media
|
|
|
|
