Your source for credible news Issue no 035
July, 2021
Rwanda’s troop deployment to Mozambique leaves detractors reeling, with envy
NEWS
Covid-19 ravages remnants of FDLR in another body blow to the terror group Page 2
NEWS
Uganda authorities dump 11 Rwandan nationals at Kagitumba Page 3 OP - ED
A crude piece of anti-Rwanda misinformation by CMI-paid troll falls flat Page 6 OP - ED
Rwanda, at the request of the Government of Mozambique has started deploying 1,000-strong forces to Mozambique to help the country combat worsening violence in the northern Cabo Delgado Page 4 province. Get a free copy of our e-paper
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In attempt to tarnish Rwanda, CMI’s online misinformation outlets concoct fiction of Rwandans allegedly intercepted at Uganda’s borders Page 7
NEWS
Issue no 035 July 2021
2
Covid-19 ravages remnants of FDLR in another body blow to the terror group By Fred Gashema Things continue to fall apart within the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) main base in Nyamuragira Locality from Rutshuru region. The Covid-19 pandemic is laying waste the ranks of the terrorists amid continued routs by the Congolese army (FARDC) which is determined to get rid of this group that has been a factor of regional instability for the last 27 years. Reports say it’s been two months since the pandemic erupted in the terrorists’ hideouts, and it has since claimed the lives of scores of the FDLR fighters. The pandemic within FDLR has roots in Uganda where most of the rebel militia’s leaders have families who reportedly are always guarded by the country’s
security forces. It has emerged that the pandemic was brought into the terrorists’ circles by some “senior officers” who had visited their families in Uganda, according to our sources. The pandemic blitzed the genocidal terrorist group at the same time as hundreds of its fighters were either getting killed, or captured and sent back to Rwanda by FARDC during continued operations to dismantled negative groups on Congolese territory. Those killed include the group’s top commander “Gen” Sylvestre Mudacumura whom the Congolese army gunned down in an operation in September 2019 and dozens of others. Our sources have intimated that FDLR has so far recorded more than 50 fatalities. This is while its senior leaders such as the com-
mander “Gen.” Pacifique Ntawunguka alias Omega, his deputy “Maj. Gen.” Tedeum Kolomboka Uzabakiriho, “Col.” Emile Terimbere who is in charge of administration, and “Col.” Bernard Hitimana Manzi among other higher militia rank holders are reported to be critically ill. “The pandemic may end up finishing the work of FARDC as per the surge in new infections in the terrorist ranks,” noted our informant who preferred to speak on condition of anonymity, adding: “Something bizarre is that the FDLR fellows have resorted to praying and fasting as the best way to contain the pandemic. This hasn’t helped them as they are dying like flies!” The source went on to say that FDLR sent numerous requests appealing for relief assistance
such as drugs and qualified medics to the United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUSCO). But Monusco told the rebels to surrender first before it can come to their rescue, reports indicate. Our source remarked: “The so-called General Omega and his small band of rebels might have survived the fire of the FARDC, but they won’t survive that together with this virus.” Also, remnants of the anti-Rwanda terrorist group have for years been embroiled in incessant infighting with top leaders killing each other in power struggles characterized by sectarianism, betrayal, and counter-accusations.
Some of the FDLR fighters in their main base in Nyamuragira Locality. Covid-19 blitzed the genocidal terrorist group at the same time as hundreds of its fighters were either getting killed, or captured and sent back to Rwanda by FARDC. Courtesy Photo.
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NEWS
Issue no 035 July 2021
3
Uganda authorities dump 11 Rwandan nationals at Kagitumba
Some of the Rwandans that Ugandan authorities dumped at Kagitumba.
By Patience Kirabo Ugandan authorities Friday, 08 July, at around 13:00 hours unceremoniously dumped 11 Rwandan nationals at Kagitumba border post. The dumped victims, who include ten men and one woman, arrived very exhausted and emotionally drained at the border following illegal incarceration when they were arbitrarily arrested at different periods. This fate isn’t new for Rwandans
in Uganda. The country’s security forces have been brutally abducting innocent Rwandans and wrongfully detaining them, incommunicado, in despicable conditions. The luckier ones mostly suffer the fate of getting dumped at the borders following torture and other abuses while in CMI-run dungeons. Following a familiar pattern of behavior by Ugandan authorities the 11 most recent victims arrived with nothing to their names, except the clothing on their
bodies.
between the two countries.
Their release, like many before is a development preceded by tireless efforts by the government of Rwanda to get her nationals released, or who Uganda still retains thousands, whom they never try in court to prove any case against them. Rwanda made release of any of its nationals in illegal custody a condition to Uganda, following the memorandum of understanding signed in 2019 by both heads of state, to restore normalcy in relations
Uganda however has continued to break the law with behavior that includes such dumping of innocent people, with no recourse to justice. The victims took a COVID-19 testing and received first aid in isolation, for further monitoring. This is a developing story with more details to follow.
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OP-ED
Issue no 035 July 2021
34
Rwanda’s troop deployment to Mozambique leaves detractors reeling, with envy By Robert Rutoma Rwanda, at the request of the Government of Mozambique has started deploying 1,000-strong forces to Mozambique to help the country combat worsening violence in the northern Cabo Delgado province. However, a group of Rwanda’s most vicious detractors, for reasons best known to them, are gnashing their teeth in a combination of embarrassment and indignation. Rwanda’s deployment is based on the good bilateral relations between the Republic of Rwanda and the Republic of Mozambique, following the signing of several agreements between the two countries in 2018, and is hinged on Rwanda’s commitment to the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) doctrine as well as the 2015 Kigali Principles on the Protection of Civilians. When news started coming out
that such an arrangement was in the offing, the detractors of Rwanda predictably went into overdrive, spreading false propaganda, and even inventing non-existent diplomatic decisions and sentiments that fitted their malicious wishes. Among some of these invented issues was that “the South African Development Community (SADC) was against the deployment of Rwandan troops to Mozambique.” Without batting an eyelid, some of these individuals even quoted imaginary “intelligence sources” from Mozambique who allegedly intimated to them that “the deal was off”, and that “SADC had categorically turned down the offer by Rwanda to send troops to Mozambique.” Suspiciously, they gave no reasons to give an ounce of believability to their allegations. Soon however facts intruded into their false narrative. Rwanda did indeed undertake the deployment, sending a thousand of its
troops to Mozambique who already are in Cabo Delgado ready to save lives, in a move lauded by the AU. The naysayers have been left with egg on their face. Rwanda of course is no stranger to falsehoods, of all kinds, peddled against her every action and policy, but has never strayed from its objectives. Owing to its dark history, Rwanda made a solemn commitment contribute to peace and stability wherever called upon, limited resources notwithstanding. This contribution is well known globally. Rwanda has never been found wanting whenever and wherever the country was called upon to provide peacekeepers. This is among the myriad of reasons that make the naysayers act as if they’ve lost their collective minds, exhibiting the tendency of working like a poorly selected choir. The conductor, laughably, is none other than David Himbara, a person that was given
the chance to serve his country, badly failed, and left ignominiously. In a case reminiscent of the proverbial one-eyed man leading a bunch of blind men, Himbara sets the rhythm by inventing misinformation, which Kampala-based propagandists parrot without questioning. One consequence for them is that they’ve endured episodes of awkward embarrassment at every turn. Their southern-Africa RNC brethren too have been dancing to the tune, echoing the myth of the supposed non-welcome of Rwandans in Mozambique. They looked funny peddling a piece of misinformation that could so easily backfire. Truly it reflects desperation of the highest level. Sure enough their lie has been busted, spectacularly. On to the next one!
The deployment of Rwandan troops in Mozambique has left naysayers with egg on their face.
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OP-ED
Issue no 035 July 2021
5
CMI peddler of misinformation Ruhima defends his anti-Rwanda propaganda, by piling up more lies By Jean Gatera Recently one Jonah Ruhima, a propagandist on the payroll of Uganda’s Chieftaincy of Military Intelligence (CMI) attacked Rwanda with a crude piece of propaganda. His article was a patchwork of long debunked lies of the kind CMI feeds its misinformation outlets in their anti-Rwanda propaganda campaign, mixed with the talking points of genocide negationists that are always attempting to distort history with claims that the RPF caused genocide – another long disproven bald faced-lie. We debunked his misinformation. Then he wrote another piece whining that we “did not challenge his facts,” but since when are concocted smears “facts”? We disproved his claim that “Rwanda is unstable”, and showed how it’s the regime that he serves which is on the brink of exploding. We linked video of Dr. Simiyu Werunga, a Kenyan regional security expert showing how Museveni is the common denominator of insecurity in the region. Those are indisputable facts. We showed how Ruhima usually pushes the propaganda of genocidaires, and raised the possibility he has shared goals with them. Shamelessly, Ruhima then shifts the goalposts, this time with accusations that “Rwanda doesn’t act in a Panafrican spirit.” Well, you can be sure that the very thing he is accusing Rwanda of is exactly what Museveni is guilty of. What is “Panafrican” about the activities of Museveni whose military looted the DRC, raped, and inflicted other atrocities, to the extent the International Court of Justice ordered the Museveni regime to pay US$ 10 billion in damages?, observers wonder. Ruhima makes many claims about the Ugandan regime boss’s alleged Panafricanism none of which hold any water.
Ugandan ruler Museveni
After we debunked his smears Ruhima whined that “he has been attacked by ‘the Rwandan propagandist’”, and that “we have used Nazi Germany tactics on him.” But only he, and his fellow Kampala merchants of misinformation use Nazi propaganda methods against Rwanda. A favorite tactic, as we showed in our last article, is to accuse someone of the very thing of which you are guilty. The most infamous example of this is whenever their own security agents assassinate Ugandans: Muslim sheikhs; former police spokesperson Andrew Kaweesi; former Arua MP Ibrahim Abiriga; former Buyende DPC Muhammad Kirumira; up to the recent attempt on Gen. Katumba Wamala that took his daughter, and others. Every time such an assassination happens, there is a coordinated campaign in CMI-controlled websites and social media accounts to blame Rwanda. Museveni’s propaganda brigade trots out stories that “a neighboring country” is behind the assassination – meaning Rwanda. They kill their own people then accuse Kigali. It is simple to see. How can a state fail to conduct one successful investigation and show its outcomes?, people ask.
Year after year, decade after decade, going back to the death of Andrew Kayiira in 1987? Then there is Kampala’s habit of accusing Rwanda of “wanting to destabilize Uganda.” This is gaslighting on another level. It is Uganda that hosts, works with, and facilitates groups bent on violent insurrection against Rwanda – the main one being Kayumba Nyamwasa’s RNC, but also FDLR, RUD-Urunana, FLN and others. Kigali has shown demonstrable proof how the Museveni regime works with these anti-Rwanda negative groups. Rwanda hosts not one similar group, and has never intended to. The likes of Ruhima also are good practitioners of another Nazi propaganda technique: when you tell a big lie often enough people will end up believing it. One such lie is that “Rwanda closed the border”, which sure enough Ruhima alludes to in his piece. Obviously he won’t talk of the thousands of innocent Rwandans that Ugandan security forces have victimized in a campaign of abductions, illegal detentions (incommunicado), torture, and other gross abuses of the human rights of Rwandan nationals. CMI
agents would level trumped up accusations such as “espionage”, or “illegal weapons possession”, none of which they ever proved. But no Rwandan was ever given a chance to defend themselves. Rwanda through diplomatic channels, with many notes verbale, protested the constant abuse of her citizens. Ugandan authorities just ignored them. When nothing worked, Kigali after a time issued a strong advisory to Rwandans against travel to Uganda, as their safety could not be guaranteed. After that, Rwanda closed her borders to heavy Ugandan commercial trucks. All other traffic was free to come and go as it pleased. Rwanda’s position, according to the authorities in Kigali, is that you can’t have free trade without freedom of movement. In other words it’s nothing other than Uganda’s activities that closed the border. CMI could torture Rwandan citizens and harass them with impunity, but Kampala could forget access to the Rwandan market. What Ruhima and his bosses can’t seem to understand is that they can’t have it both ways.
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OP-ED
Issue no 035 July 2021
36
A crude piece of anti-Rwanda misinformation by CMI-paid troll falls flat By Jean Gatera An article has appeared on the Commandonepost website, under the names of a Kampala hate monger called Jonah Ruhima, that is full of crude fabrications mixed with countless old and debunked anti-Rwanda smears. Because of course that’s the mission of propagandists under the control of Ugandan Military Intelligence (CMI). Ruhima begins with claims that “Rwanda is the unstable partner” in the EAC – a lie that only those so shamelessness as to work for Museveni’s propaganda machine are capable of. Uganda is on the verge of anarchy. The population is on the verge of revolting due to a combination of volatile factors: the mass violence suffered before, during, and after recent elections; the corruption-fuelled debacle of the mismanaged Covid-19 pandemic resulting in the deaths of multitudes of Ugandans from lack of vaccines, oxygen, and ICU beds; insecurity that is so out-of-control that even the country’s ministers, generals, and their families aren’t safe from gunmen, and so on.
Students of history will recognize this as a technique perfected by Nazi chief propagandist Josef Goebbels, which is to accuse someone of the very thing you are guilty of. Only Museveni is guilty of destabilizing other countries in this region – from Somalia, via South Sudan, to DRC. Respected analysts of the region such as Dr. Simiyu Werunga, president of the Geneva Center for Africa security and strategic studies, have pointed to Museveni as “the common denominator of insecurity in the region.” This isn’t something new. Since 1986 when Museveni took power, almost all Uganda’s neighbors, at some point or other have accused him of supporting armed militias, terrorist, and insurrectionist groups against neighbors. Currently, UN reports on DRC Congo cites Kampala as a key route for illicit arm trafficking, human trafficking, natural resources trafficking and other associated cross-border criminal activities. With Kenya, Museveni almost
provoked war when he tried to snatch Migingo Island. Other than that, Uganda is always embroiled in trade conflicts with Kenya. The most well known case however is how DR Congo sued the Museveni regime for its military’s plundering of the DRC’s minerals and other natural resources, rape, and other crimes against humanity. Uganda has to pay its neighbor US$ 10 billion in damages, which it hasn’t since 2005 when the International Court of Justice made the ruling. Against Rwanda, Museveni as early as 1998 already was plotting to destabilize it, planning to install a puppet regime. Gérard Prunier narrates how Museveni’s brother Salim Saleh worked with the likes of Seth Sendashonga to start armed militia attacks in Rwanda. At the same time Kampala was facilitating the movements of major genocidaires, issuing passports to individuals like Ignace Murwanashyaka, former head of the FDLR terrorist outfit.
Asked about his quarrels with Rwanda, Museveni told the late Julius Nyerere, “the problem is that they don’t want to listen to me”, prompting Nyerere to retort that Rwanda was a sovereign state. Next Museveni would turn to sabotage of Rwandan trade and infrastructure development. He blocked truckloads of Rwandan milk bound for Kenya. He blocked Rwandair from loading on transit in Entebbe. He stymied Rwanda’s importation of Ethiopian electricity by hamstringing construction of pylons through Uganda. He diverted the railway line from Mombasa so that it would not go to Rwanda. “Other than being the single biggest impediment to peace, Museveni has always been the one obstacle to EAC integration,” a Kigali security commentator remarked. Kampala propagandists think, even with all the demonstrable evidence, that they can dupe the world. “So laughable,” commented a Twitter account.
“Yet a CMI-paid liar has the audacity to point a finger at Rwanda to claim that it’s the one that is unstable?” asked a reader in wonderment. The Commandonepost article, incoherently headlined “Rwanda a Red Herring” also repeats a lot of talking points normally associated with exiled genocidaires – including the lie that “RPF caused genocide because it shot down Habyarimana’s plane.” “In fact going by the opinions of Ruhima, it is a safe bet to say either he is one of the genocidaires in Uganda enjoying Museveni’s protection, or he works with genocidaires in shared goals,” said a social media observer. The CMI talking points Ruhima gives prominence is that “it is Rwanda destabilizing the region.”
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OP-ED
Issue no 035 July 2021
7
In attempt to tarnish Rwanda, CMI’s online misinformation outlets concoct fiction of Rwandans allegedly intercepted at Uganda’s borders By Jean Gatera Misinformation outlets of Uganda’s Chieftaincy of Military Intelligence (CMI), have invented another lie about Rwanda: that “Ugandan security forces are intercepting many Rwandan nationals everyday that are illegally entering Uganda.” According to a story posted this Thursday on Chimpreports, the propaganda outlet most infamous for publishing fictions about Rwanda, “20 Rwandan nationals are being arrested every day entering Uganda through illegal entry points.” In the story, they quote Maj. Gen. Francis Takirwa of the UPDF Second Division who has made the astonishing revelation that security forces in Uganda arrest and deport big numbers of Rwandan nationals, though there is no record of such people anywhere. “Of course the Ugandan propaganda machine is always desperate enough to invent incidents in its paid-for work to tarnish Rwanda,” said a security analyst, adding, “this
kind of thing is no longer surprising with the volume of lies the likes of Chimpreports have been peddling.” Immigration officials on the Rwandan side were baffled by the revelations. “Since when is UPDF, the armed forces, involved in arrests and deportations?” an immigration lawyer reacted. The expert also noted that deportation is a legal process with records, “Apart from the fact that UPDF is not legally allowed to arrest and deport, who did they hand over the so-called deportees to?” wondered the lawyer. On the other hand Ugandan security forces have long become notorious for gross mistreatment of Rwandan nationals in Uganda, then concocting accusations against them. Several media stories the past four years have revealed the criminal nature of CMI’s operations against Rwandan nationals, either visiting, or resident in Uganda. Countless Rwandans fell victim to a wave of harassment by CMI operatives working hand in hand with
Kayumba Nyamwasa’s terrorist RNC. The harassment included detention incommunicado, denial of consular visits, torture and physical abuse that left many with unlikely to heal injuries, and psychological trauma. After Rwanda had issued protests to Kampala against all the mistreatment of her nations, Kigali then issued an advisory to citizens against crossing to Uganda. “So which Rwandan is risking his or her life to go to a country where they are likely to be harassed and abducted, leave alone these alleged “20 Rwandans a day intercepted by UPDF?” laughed a social media commentator. “These Chimpreports people and their CMI bosses are so childish in their lies!” Furthermore, others observed: “in recent times every time Museveni’s regime dumps abused and tortured Rwandans at the border, Rwandan authorities are on hand to receive the victims, and the
media covers it.” The question arises: why not these twenty that UPDF Second division is alleged to be intercepting daily? The answer is that they are just another tall tale by Chimpreports. Kampala is still smarting from the recent incident when a UPDF soldier trespassed into Rwanda, forcing Uganda to apologize to secure his release. But then they tried to backtrack on the apology after the soldier was back in Uganda. Chimpreports had been at the forefront of a toxic fake news campaign, that “Rwanda had kidnapped the UPDF soldier, Pte. Baluku Muhuba.” That propaganda failed. Now they are trying to get a new anti-smear going. It too will fail, going by the record of all the others.
Rwandan military authorities hand over Ugandan soldier, Pte. Bakuru Muhuba (center with a bald head) to the RDC of Uganda’s Kisoro District. Kampala outlets of misinformation have been trying to smear Rwanda with falsehoods that RDF “abducted Muhuba”.
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