Uganda, Pt. 1: Nakivaale

Ladies and gentlemen, get ready for a long one. Our two weeks in Uganda were jam packed. We learned a lot, saw a lot of interesting things and places, and spent A LOT of time on the bus, but, for the sake of your sanity and mine, all of those stories will be spread across multiple blog posts, most of which will hopefully go up today or tomorrow.

And now, to begin.

We left Kigali Monday morning and drove all day, crossing the border around noon and reaching our hotel in Mbarara (wondering how to pronounce that? Yeah, me too) just in time for dinner. On Tuesday we visited the Nakivaale refugee settlement, where we met with a group of Rwandan refugees. Even though the violence ended more than 15 years ago, there is still a significant population of Rwandan refugees in Nakivaale and other refugee camps in the region. Many of them are genocide perpetrators who fled after the RPF ended the genocide, some fearing that they would be punished for their crimes and others fearing that the new, Tutsi-dominated government would take revenge on the Hutus after the genocide. Others left because they feared that the families of those they had killed would take revenge on them. However, not all Rwandan refugees are genocide perpetrators. There are many Tutsi who simply never returned to the country, but perhaps the largest percentage of the Rwandan refugees is made up of people who have left more recently for political reasons, which I will discuss at another time. While we didn't get to hear the stories of everyone we spoke to, the group of Rwandans we met with in Nakivaale seemed to be made up of all of the above, and after months of hearing the official government narrative about how everything is great now, it was refreshing, challenging, and enlightening to hear the refugee's side of the story. However, it was important while listening to them not to forget that they, just like the government, had political motivations behind what they said, and that not everything they would say would be true. And they certainly made some extreme claims: revenge killings and massacres of Hutu by the RPF, government persecution of Hutu, etc. After visiting them I wrestled with how much of what they said was true and how much was false, and, if they were false, were the refugees lying or were they just misinformed? It's hard to get accurate information about live in a country you haven't seen in years and have little contact with, but a refugee cannot retain refugee status if they admit that the country they don't want to go back to is peaceful now. However, whether their fears are actual or perceived, one thing was very clear: this people are terrified of returning to Rwanda. They are convinced that they will not be safe if they go back, to the extent that they have chosen the hard life of eking out survival in a refugee camp rather than risk returning to their homes. But they are being forced to return. The UN has determined that Rwanda today is safe, and that there is no more need for these people to live as refugees. In June 2013, the Cessation Clause will take effect, leaving the refugees with three options: return to Rwanda, apply for citizenship in Uganda (or whatever country is hosting them), or apply for refugee status on an individual basis. It is unlikely that more than a handful of people will be able to take advantage of the second or third options; the RPF was founded by a group of Rwandan refugees in Uganda in 1990, and since then they have invaded Rwanda, defeated the previous government in a civil war, and taken over the country. To them, a large refugee population is a serious political risk, and they are pushing hard to have all refugees repatriate. Even though they will not be forced to leave Nakivaale until next year, pressure is already being put on the refugees to return to Rwanda. Where once all refugees were allowed a plot of land to supplement their rations from the UN Food Program, Rwandan refugees have had their land taken away in order to pressure them to return. Instead they have chosen to survive on their meager rations. They told us also that whenever they go to camp officials with a problem, a need for medicine or some other supplies, they are told simply that their country is safe now, and if they were to return to Rwanda they would have those things. So far most of the refugees have resisted and refuse to go back, but eventually they will be forced to leave the camp. Whether or not their fears will be realized when they return remains to be seen.