By Arnold Gakuba
He was called ‘’enemy of the country’’. This is a true and hurtful story of how RPF, the rolling party in Rwanda, headed by Paul Kagame is violating rights of Rwandans. The testimony was given to The Rwandan to be published in order to reveal how Rwandans are threatened, tortured and frightened to develop.
It was in 2013, when Muhire ‘’a given name’’ for the sake of his life, lost his job in public service-he was a primary teacher. With the little amount of money he saved, remember that a primary teacher has a salary not exceeding 30,000 Rwandan francs a month; he started diligently and happily maize farming in Ruhuha sector, Bugesera District in order to fight for his survival. Did he achieve his objective?
Muhire began his project with dedication and commitment. When the maize plantation reached the corn husks level, the planation was so amazing and beautiful that people admired them. This was a good start which would make Muhire to move to another level of life and start seriously entrepreneurship sector. However, he came across barriers. Where did they come from?
One day, Muhire received a phone call from unknown person who asked him to sell his maize plantation to him even if they were not yet to reach the harvesting period. That time, there was in Rwanda a famine called “Nzaramba” in his area. Muhire refused to sell his maize. The next day, he was called by another person asking him the same question and he replied with the same answer. Not later than a week, the Executive secretary called him at the sector office and forced him to sell his maize plantation to person told by him. Muhire replied “I have no plan to sell my maize plantation”. He would like to harvest and sell them at a good price. From then, Muhire started a struggle with people he did not known and did not even know their intention. Innocently, he thought to be in the right way as he did not offense any public rule. It is surprisingly that the government officials were behind that issue stopping him to develop while they had the duty of helping him to change positively his life as a Rwandan. What was really behind that attack towards Mr. Muhire?
In Rwanda, there are maize processing factories, mostly owned by prominent people in the RPF or by the RPF itself. This system headed by Paul Kagame has accumulated all the wealth of the nation at the level of even taking that of the very poor person like a primary teacher. Therefore, Muhire is a typical example of a Rwandan from the poor class who was forbidden to develop.
Muhire was among people who thought to be independent and have right on his properties; what is not true. Even people who read this article may not accept because it has not yet happened to them. Failing to force Muhire to sell his maize plantation, the government officials (RPF agents), let him angrily continue his project up the harvest. He harvested, packed maize in bags of 100kgs each, and hired a full truck to transport them to home for storing and sell them at a good price. He did not know that he was monitored by RPF agents who pretend to work for the people while they are not.
While driving to his home, the truck full of maize bags was stopped by people in a district pick up; it was driven about 3km from the plantation. The district officials asked for documents authorizing Muhire to do business. Innocently, he explained to them that he was not a business person, but harvested his maize and was going to store them at his home; but in vain as they had another plan against him
The government officials ordered the driver to drive to the District office in order to sort out this case and the truck was parked there. Muhire had been told to pay truck hiring fee every day and also the police charged him the parking fee for every day. Therefore, Muhire decided to unpack the bags of corns and let the truck go because he had first to give convincing explanation to the district officials. Unknowingly, Muhire thought he was going to come out that issue. What a bad system!
It was the time of heavy rain and the rain could damage Muhire’s maize. He planned to buy sheeting’s to cover the bags and all the time found them removed/stolen the following day. Ten days after, they ordered him to pack again his bags full of corns and go, while all of them were already spoiled. All his investments and efforts were turned to zero. He was left with nothing. As he had no other option, he flew the country and went in another country to start a new struggle for life. This happened to many Rwandans who are now dispersed in many countries of the world without any distinction. The RPF system does not work for Rwandans but serves the interests of a small group of people headed by Paul Kagame.
Finally, by God’s grace, Muhire is now living in one of the countries far from Rwanda, where he can work freely and develop himself. He is paying taxes to build that country while he was refused to do it in his own country. These are the people RPF calls ‘’enemies of Rwanda’’. The truth is that the government of Rwanda ‘’RPF’’ headed by Paul Kagame is the one to be enemy of the development of Rwanda, enemy of the nation, enemy of Rwandans. Are Rwandans living inside the country as outside the country going to continue observing that? Is the international community going to continue close its eyes on these cruel actions perpetrated by RPF? Is the whole world going to accept the continuous lies of RPF and his leader Paul Kagame? It is time to act.
