The Role Of Belgian Imperialism In Rwanda

Three groups stood in Rwanda, Hutu which took up a majority of the population about 85%, Tutsi around 14% of the population, and Twa 1%. Around the time of the 1880’s the first group of missionary European explorers set foot in Rwanda. It became a part of East Africa in 1899. After World War I in 1923, Rwanda was under the League of Nations authority of Belgian. Belgian ended up causing Tutsi, Hutu, and Twa to divide into three groups. It was never their intention to have the three groups divide and then go against one another. They just thought that they were three distinct groups. So therefore the groups were each given different ethnic identities. Belgian placed Tutsi at a higher rank than Hutu and Hutu at a higher rank than Twa. Each group
Due to the power the Hutus were being handed, this began to scare off the Tutsis. A Hutu sub-chief was assaulted by a couple of the Tutsi people. This broke out a fight between the Hutu and Tutsi people. Unfortunately, the Belgians didn’t interfere in time before hundreds of Tutsi and Hutu people were killed. The Belgians then replaced quite a few of the Tutsi officials with Hutu officials. Even more Tutsi began to flee from Rwanda. This was known as the Rwandan Revolution or the “wind of destruction”. The Tutsi monarchy was hoping that they would be able to hold onto the power they hold while finding a resolution to the conflict between the Tutsi and the Hutu people. In 1961, the Tutsi monarchy was wiped out. Rwanda would either become a republic or they would remain a kingdom. After the final decision was made Rwanda was, for the first time ever, a republic. They also gained their independence from Belgium in 1962. Gregoire Kayibanda became the president of
Making the issues between Tutsi and Hutu worse than it was before. The exiles from Rwanda created a group known as the Rwandan Patriotic Front. This group was mainly composed of the Tutsi. The Tutsis in Rwanda were all seen as traitors and people who were secretly working for the Rwandan Patriotic Front from Uganda. By 1991 only about 8.4% of the population was Tutsi due to the amount of Tutsis who fled to neighboring countries. Rwanda’s president, Juvenal Habyarimana was killed in a plane crash while going back and forth to try to achieve some peace between the Tutsi and the Hutu people. It was thought that the Tutsi were the ones who shot the president's plane down. This became a sign that massive violence may soon break out. Hutus took out all the moderate leaders of Rwanda. Any Tutsis and those who had contact with them were also taken out by the Hutu. Other countries including the United States were aware of the genocide that was going on between the Hutu and the Tutsi. The United States used the excuse that it was not there place to intervene with the war between the ethnic groups. During this time Bill Clinton was the President of the United States. They believed that if they were to intervene that the United States would then be eliminated. It wasn’t just the United States who refused to intervene with what was going on it was whole world who didn’t want to have anything to do with the genocide. A little while after the genocide came to