The PANAFRICAN Review
assassination is clearly paying off . For Pan-Africans to play our part in this journey to diplomatic harmony , we must establish what the defence of the humanity of the genocide victims will require .
Efforts must remain invested in the tireless retelling of our truths in precise , consistent and accurate language and leave the ambiguity to our oppressors . If repetition was such a powerful tool in the spreading of misinformation on the oppressed populations in Nazi Germany , Apartheid South Africa , pre- and post-Jim Crow America and ethnic conflicts in the Great Lakes region , it is the very weapon we must use against the lies surrounding our history and culture . We must also pursue the establishment of encouraging precedence , which can form a unit or country ’ s defining of its code of ethics and core values and how they can hope to be perceived by the persons whose welfare they desire .
No Distracting Cloud Over Good Judgment
Consider the case of Paul Rusesabagina , whose comfort in boarding a plane to the country within a half hour ’ s flight of the nation he betrayed speaks of strange overconfidence . It is no wonder that Rusesabagina ’ s daughter opted to create a more respectable fiction around her dad ’ s arrival in Rwanda ; the idea that he was gagged , bound and carried onto a plane is more consistent with Rusesabagina and friends ’ depiction of the man as a victim than the sociopathic comfort with which he willingly flew halfway across the world to a region where he funded deadly terrorist attacks and the forced recruitment of 82 children into a terrorist organisation .
These are the lies we must tirelessly expose for what they are ; manipulations that bear a determination to cast the butchers of Rwandans as those worthy of power and support while their victims are demonised . Lie factories aren ’ t just the consequence of collective dishonesty and foolishness – they are powerful , intentionally-built distraction machines . By the time a lie , such as that of President Paul Kagame playing a part in the shooting down of Habyarimana ’ s plane ( an established myth the Duclert Rapport confirmed France intentionally allowed to fester ) is deconstructed and defused , a new lie , with the same underlying message , is unleashed , typically by western media machines with ties to genocidaires and negationists . The trendy deception these days is the implication that Rusesabagina , who went from being violently kidnapped to , self-admittedly being tricked using his own obscure intentions to return to the region , is being mistreated by Rwandans . This lie has been dispelled by Rwandan authorities , who , in all fairness and rationality , should be established as a more credible source than the false hero admitting to having played a part in terroristic activities , or the family that reiterated a lie around his arrest .
If we are constantly distracted from the truth of Rusesabagina ’ s true intentions in willingly returning to the region he has terrorised , we might overlook the scale of what is at play here . If Osama Bin
Laden had calmly boarded a plane to Canada or Mexico post-9 / 11 , not only would we have questioned the intentions of his proximity to the US – at the risk of capture – but quite frankly , most would have expected to hear his assassination proudly announced by Barack Obama as he did Gaddafi ’ s death , or as Donald Trump described ISIS terrorist Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi ’ s murder by the American military on foreign soil . “ He died like a dog ,” stated Trump , the president of the free world and biggest financier to the UN . The world did not blink , and why should it , when the undeniable truth remains that terrorists must be stopped by the leaders who care about their countries and people . This is the precedence Rwanda is determined to establish : killers of Rwandans will not be allowed to prevail .
The Importance of Humanising Tales
When Emmanuel Macron was first elected in France , he expressed a desire to improve France-Afrique relationships by confronting the horrors of colonisation , which he deemed a crime against humanity in an early-term speech in Algeria . This statement was cast as an affront to France and French history by several French politicians , academics and political commentators . Nevertheless , despite being accused of playing race politics by a country that has barely ever confronted the racism of its past ( and some present ) foreign policy towards Africa , Emmanuel Macron has chosen to participate in the humanising of non-whites , a people who his nation has victimised for decades .
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