Advertisement

UN official: Grow economy and freedoms together

Saturday February 01 2014
kiai

Maina Kiai, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association, addresses a press conference in Kigali on January 27, 2014 after a week-long visit to Rwanda. Photo/Cyril Ndegeya

The United Nations Special Rapporteur on the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association, Maina Kiai, has challenged the government to open up political space and allow more freedoms of speech and assembly.

After a week-long assessment of Rwanda’s state of human rights, The Kenyan-born Geneva-based rights expert acknowledged at a press conference that it has registered good progress and economic growth but said the country needed to ease up and be more tolerant to dissent.

He also cautioned the government against interfering with NGOs and the civil society.

Responding to Mr Kiai’s concerns, Minister for Justice Johnston Busingye said the government is willing to allow peaceful assembly within the provisions of the law and in the interest of the general public.

“The reason the law requires prior authorisation for such gatherings or public marches is to ensure safety for other members of the public who are not part of the event and who might be inconvenienced,” Mr Busingye explained. “It is the duty of the government to ensure that the security of the country or the daily lives of citizens are not disrupted by the actions of one group.”

This was the first visit to an African country by the UN official since he took office in 2010. It came after Rwanda offered to be assessed, which Mr Busingye pointed out as a sign of the government’s willingness to co-operate in improving the state of affairs in Rwanda.

Advertisement

Move on to the next level

Mr Kiai reckoned ahead of the April commemoration of the genocide that, while in 1994 the government had all the reasons to limit some of the freedoms to avoid a similar calamity, the country is now ripe to move on to the next level of democratisation.

“Rwanda favours a political order based on consensus, led by the ruling party,” he observed. “The government and parliament seem to agree that Rwanda needs to be more cautious with political parties than with NGOs, given its recent history.

“But 20 years since the genocide, the successful reconstruction of the Rwandan state should provide confidence to the government that it can, and should, allow peaceful dissent and disagreement. Whether political parties decide to align with the government is their choice; it should not be compulsory.”

Mr Kiai observed that the government is still less tolerant to dissent with most opposition parties struggling to exist alongside the ruling Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF).

“I have observed a lack of space for individuals to express dissenting views,” he said. “The government of Rwanda favours ‘consensus politics’ and discourages public criticism and dissent. I am concerned that there is no genuine pluralistic society.”

“Indeed, it appears that every dissenting political leader who rejects this consensus approach gets into legal trouble, with negation of the genocide, divisionism, sectarianism and even spreading rumours as the favoured charges.”

The renowned human rights activist also noted that freedom of peaceful assembly remained worryingly low in Rwanda, with only peaceful assemblies favoured by the government being authorised.

READ: Increase in human rights denial, abuse angers Rwanda MPs

He cited the case of students who presented a petition to the Prime Minister challenging the new bursary rules and a group of Catholics, Intwarane za Maria na Yesu, who were arrested after they held peaceful marches last year.

Besides peaceful demonstrations staged by genocide survivors on decisions made by courts elsewhere, protests, whether peaceful or violent, are rare in Rwanda, with the majority of the protests seconded or supported by the government.

Mr Kiai said peaceful assemblies should not be feared but encouraged as they were a better way to gauge the citizens’ feelings. He expressed his concern that the government continued to hunt those who fell out with the system or levelled spurious charges against them, saying it sets a bad precedent.

After discussions with officials regarding the recent murder of Col Patrick Karegeya, the former head of external intelligence who was found dead in a Johannesburg hotel on January 1, Mr Kiai said Rwandan officials seemed to be condoning the killing.

Celebrating Karegeya death

“State officials making comments in celebration of the killing of an opposition politician inculcates fear within the opposition,” he said. “Such a message is not useful to the people of Rwanda.”

Several government officials have expressed “no pity” for the “self-declared enemy” of Rwanda. The government has linked the former spy chief and other dissidents, including Lt-Gen Kayumba Nyamwasa, who also lives in South Africa, to the eastern Congo-based genocidal rebel outfit FDLR, which it says is behind frequent grenade attacks in the country.

READ: Rwanda now dismisses murder of ‘sworn enemy’ Karegeya

Mr Kiai also visited jailed opposition politicians Victoire Umuhoza Ingabire and Bernard Ntaganda and held talks with officials of the National Human Rights Commission, among others.