Gacaca: Building a lasting peace

I am spending three days with our Rwandan partner, The Justice and Peace Commission (CEJP Rwanda), who work to bring lasting peace to communities affected by the 1994 genocide when over 800,000 people were slaughtered in just 100 days. On my first afternoon, we travelled to Butare – Rwanda’s second largest city – in the midst of very heavy rain. We stayed overnight in a monastery called Gihindanuyaga.

Today, we went to a church hall in the parish of Rugango to see how CEJP is helping communities to overcome the horrors of the genocide. CEJP work with communities across Rwanda, bringing together genocide survivors with those who carried out the killings so that they can be reconciled. We met a group of people who shared their experiences of the genocide and spoke about how CEJP Rwanda had supported them and helped them to live in peace and unity.

I met three people who had played an active role in the genocide and had killed their neighbours. They told their stories, talking about why they had taken part in such a horrific event and process of making peace with the families of their victims families. The women who had forgiven their husband’s murders also spoke about the process of reconciliation. The group then talked about their current situation – the hunger, poverty and lack of economic opportunity.

CEJP are also involved in Gacaca – community courts based on the traditional Rwandan justice system. There are over 8,000 Gacaca courts in Rwanda where people who took part in the genocide talk about the crimes they committed and ask for forgiveness from their victims before being sentenced to time in prison. The Gacaca trials are designed to promote healing and help communities move on from the crisis.

Reconciliation is a long process. Poverty makes this process so much harder but SCIAF is working with all our partners in the Great Lakes region to bring about a lasting peace.