The creation of the Hutu power movement and the Interahamwe Notes

The Inyenzi attacks

• In the early 1960s, Tutsi exiles known as the Inyenzi (“cockroaches”) launched armed incursions from neighboring countries like Uganda and Burundi, aiming to overthrow the Hutu-led government and reclaim power.
• These attacks, particularly between 1960 and 1963, heightened ethnic tensions and insecurity within Rwanda.
• The government and Hutu militias responded with extreme brutality, viewing all Tutsi civilians as potential collaborators, which led to widespread retaliatory violence and massacres.
• Following Inyenzi attacks, the Rwandan government and local Hutu populations carried out brutal reprisals targeting Tutsi communities.
• One of the most notorious massacres occurred in 1963, when thousands of Tutsis were killed in Gikongoro and other regions.
• The violence was systematic and involved mass killings by militias and government forces, often using machetes and clubs.
• Estimates of deaths vary, but it is widely accepted that tens of thousands of Tutsi civilians were murdered in these retaliations, which deepened ethnic divisions and fear.
• The massacres forced large numbers of Tutsi to flee Rwanda and seek refuge in neighboring countries, forming exile communities.
• These exiled groups maintained strong opposition to the Hutu-dominated government and later formed rebel movements like the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF).

Kayibanda and Political Opponents under Habyarimana

• Repression after the 1973 coup
  • After Juvenal Habyarimana seized power in the 1973 military coup, the political environment in Rwanda became increasingly repressive.
  • Grégoire Kayibanda, Rwanda’s first president and leader of the PARMEHUTU party, was placed under house arrest.
• Suspicious death of Kayibanda
  • Reports indicate that Kayibanda and some close allies died in detention or shortly after.
  • Their deaths were widely believed to be caused by deliberate neglect or denial of medical care.
  • Although no official investigation proved foul play, many historians and eyewitnesses argue that Kayibanda’s death was the result of state-sanctioned neglect, designed to eliminate political rivals and consolidate Habyarimana’s control.
• Targeting of opponents and dissent
  • Beyond Kayibanda, Habyarimana’s regime systematically targeted former political opponents and dissidents through intimidation, imprisonment, and suppression.
  • Repression under the Second Republic aimed to silence opposition, uphold a one-party state under the MRND, and promote Hutu dominance.
  • State security forces were implicated in harsh treatment and neglect of detained opponents, effectively marginalizing dissenters.
  • Ambiguous deaths in custody and lack of transparency suggest that political assassinations and neglect were used as tools to prevent challenges to Habyarimana’s authority.
• Wider impact
  • These practices reinforced political repression and contributed to ongoing ethnic tensions in Rwanda.