This article's lead sectionmay be too short to adequately summarize the key points. Please consider expanding the lead to provide an accessible overview of all important aspects of the article.(March 2022)
A Mulolo (Congo) warrior and his wife from the central Congo regions; Bantu
Ethnic pygmy populations in Central Africa suffer from racialized discrimination from Bantu peoples.[1] Pygmies and Bantus differ physically and genetically due to long lasting evolutionary segregation until the Bantu expansion brought them back into close contact.[2] Pygmies have been targeted for slavery by Bantu populations continuing into the modern age.[1] They are frequently ostracized from participation into the wider society in the various African countries that they live in and are seen as untouchables.[1] Racially-motivated attacks occur on Pygmies including rape and cannibalization.[3][4]
Botswana
Since the mid-1990s the central government of Botswana has been trying to move Bushmen out of the Central Kalahari Game Reserve even though the national constitution guarantees the Bushmen the right to live there in perpetuity. As of October 2005, the government resumed its policy of forcing all Bushmen off their lands in the game reserve using armed police and threats of violence or death.[5] Many of the involuntarily displaced Bushmen live in squalid resettlement camps and some have resorted to prostitution and alcoholism. About 250 others remain in the game reserve, or have surreptitiously returned to the Kalahari to resume their independent lifestyles.[6]
"How can you have Stone Age creatures continue to exist in the age of computers?" asked Botswana's president Festus Mogae.[7] A report released by the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination condemns Botswana's treatment of the 'Bushmen' as racist.[8][9]
Beginning about 1880, Catholic missionaries arrived in the Great Lakes region. Later, when German forces occupied the area during World War I, the conflict and efforts for Catholic conversion became more pronounced. As the Tutsi resisted conversion, the missionaries found success only among the Hutu. In an effort to reward conversion, the colonial government confiscated traditionally Tutsi land and reassigned it to Hutu tribes, igniting a conflict that has lasted into the 21st century.[10]
The area was ruled as a colony by Germany (before World War I) and Belgium. Because Tutsis had been the tradiitional governing elite, both colonial powers kept this system and allowed only the Tutsi to be educated and only they could participate in the colonial government. Such discriminatory policies engendered resentment.
When the Belgians took over the colony, they believed the colony could be better governed if they continued to identify the different populations. In the 1920s, they required people to identify with a particular ethnic group and classified them in censuses. European colonists viewed Africans in general as children who needed to be guided, but noted the Tutsi to be the ruling culture in Rwanda-Burundi.[11] In 1959, Belgium reversed its stance and allowed the majority Hutu to assume control of the government through universal elections after independence. This partly reflected internal Belgian domestic politics, who later saw the discrimination against the Hutu majority as similar to oppression within Belgium suffered from the Flemish-Walloon conflict. They saw the democratization and empowerment of the Hutu as a just response to the Tutsi domination. The Belgian policies wavered and flip-flopped considerably during this period leading up to independence of Burundi and Rwanda.
The Hutu majority had revolted against the Tutsi but was unable to take power. Tutsis fled and created exile communities outside Rwanda in Uganda and Tanzania. Since the nation's independence, more extremist Tutsi came to power and oppressed the Hutus, especially those who were educated.[12][13][14][15][16] Their actions led to the deaths of up to 200,000 Hutus.[17] Overt discrimination from the colonial period was continued by different Rwandan and Burundian governments, including identity cards that distinguished Tutsi and Hutu.
The Belgian-sponsored Tutsi Rwandan monarchy survived until 1959, when Kigeli V was exiled from the colony (then called Ruanda-Urundi). In Burundi, Tutsis, who are the minority, maintained control of the government and military.
In Burundi, a campaign of genocidal violence, known as Ikiza was conducted against the country's Hutu population in 1972,[16][18][19][20][21] and an estimated 100,000 Hutus died.[17] In 1993, Burundi's first democratically elected president, Melchior Ndadaye, who was Hutu, was believed to be assassinated by Tutsi officers, as was the person constitutionally entitled to succeed him.[22] This sparked a period of civil strife between Hutu political structures and the Tutsi military, in which an estimated 500,000 Burundians died.[23] There were many mass killings of Tutsis and moderate Hutus; these events were deemed genocide by the United Nations International Commission of Inquiry for Burundi.[24]
Racism in Ethiopia has traditionally been directed at the country's Nilotic ethnic minorities. Collectively, these groups are locally known as Shanqella or barya, derogatory terms originally denoting slave descent, irrespective of the individual's family history.[25][26]
Historically, the Shanqella constituted most of the slave labour in the ruling local Afro-Asiatic societies.[27] The Abyssinians (Habesha highlanders) were also noted as having actively hunted the Shanqella during the 19th century.[28] Following the abolition of the slave trade in the 1940s, the freed Shanqella and barya were typically employed as unskilled labour.[27] Racial discrimination against the barya or Shanqella communities in Ethiopia still exists, affecting access to political and social opportunities and resources.[25]
Traditionally, racism against perceived barya transcended class and remained in effect regardless of social position or parentage. As a result, former President of Ethiopia Mengistu Haile Mariam was virtually absent from the country's controlled press in the first few weeks of his seizure.[29] By contrast, Mengistu's rise to prominence was hailed by the southern Shanqella groups as a personal victory, with one of their own having made good.[26]
Although other populations in Ethiopia have faced varying degrees of discrimination, little of that adversity has by contrast been on account of racial differences. It is instead more typically rooted in disparities in class and competition for economic status. The often socio-economically disadvantaged Oromo and Gurage are thus not considered by the highlander groups as being racially barya, owing to their similar physical features and common Afro-Asiatic ancestry.[27]
In terms of traditional perceptions, the Shanqella likewise racially contrast themselves from the Afro-Asiatic populations. The Anywaa (Anuak) Nilotes of southern Ethiopia consequently regard the Amhara, Oromo, Tigray and other Afro-Asiatic groups collectively as gaala in contradistinction to themselves.[30]
Ivory Coast
In 2001, Ivory Coast saw a resurgence in ethnic hatred and religious intolerance. In addition to the many victims among the various tribes of the northern and southern regions of the country that have perished in the ongoing conflict, foreigners residing or visiting Ivory Coast have also been subjected to violent attacks. According to a report by Human Rights Watch in 2001, the Ivory Coast government was guilty of fanning ethnic hatred for its own political ends.[31]
In 2004, the Young Patriots of Abidjan, a strongly nationalist organisation, rallied by the state media, plundered possessions of foreign nationals in Abidjan. Rapes and beatings of persons of European and Lebanese descent followed. No deaths were reported. Thousands of expatriates and white or ethnic Lebanese Ivorians fled the country. The attacks drew international condemnation.[32][33]
Slavery in Mauritania persists despite its abolition in 1980 and mostly affects the descendants of black Africans abducted into slavery who now live in Mauritania as "black Moors" or haratin and who partially still serve the "white Moors", or bidhan, as slaves. The practice of slavery in Mauritania is most dominant within the traditional upper class of the Moors. For centuries, the haratin lower class, mostly poor black Africans living in rural areas, have been considered natural slaves by these Moors. Social attitudes have changed among most urban Moors, but in rural areas, the ancient divide remains.[35]
The ruling bidanes are descendants of the SanhajaBerbers and Beni Ḥassān Arab tribes who emigrated to northwest Africa and present-day Western Sahara and Mauritania during the Middle Ages. Many descendants of the Beni Ḥassān tribes today still adhere to the supremacist ideology of their ancestors, which has caused the oppression, discrimination and even enslavement of other groups in Mauritania.[36]
According to some estimates, as many as 600,000 black Mauritanians, or 20% of the population, are still enslaved, many of them used as bonded labour.[37] Slavery in Mauritania was criminalized in August 2007.[38]
The violence eventually led to a genocide of the Herero and Nama people by the Germans, known as the Herero and Namaqua genocide. In total, 24,000 to 100,000 Herero and 10,000 Nama died.[39][40][41][42][43] The genocide was characterized by a high number of deaths from starvation and thirst; the Herero who fled the violence were prevented from returning from the Namib Desert. Some sources also claim that the German colonial army systematically poisoned desert wells.[44][45] The genocide took place between 1904 and 1907 in German South-West Africa (now modern day Namibia), during the Herero Wars.
In 1926, except for archive copies, records of the genocide were withdrawn and destroyed following a decision of the then Legislative Assembly.[46][47]
Survivors, majority of whom were women and children, were eventually put in concentration camps, such as the one at Shark Island, where the German authorities forced them to work as slaves for German military and settlers. All prisoners were categorized into groups fit and unfit for work, and pre-printed death certificates indicating "death by exhaustion following privation" were issued.[48] The British government published their widely known account of the German genocide of the Nama and Herero peoples in 1918.[49]
Many Herero died later of disease, overwork and malnutrition.[50][51] Camps, such as that in Windhoek, had mortality rates as high as 61%[52] The mortality rate in the camps was 45% in 1908.[53] The death rates are calculated to be between 69% and 74%.[54]
Food in the camps was extremely scarce, consisting of rice with no additions.[55] Shootings, hangings and beatings were common,[56] and the sjambok was used by guards who treated the forced labourers harshly. Medical experiments were performed on the Herero and Nama people by the Germans, similar to those performed on the European Jews during the Holocaust. Eugen Fischer, a German anthropologist, came to the concentration camps to conduct medical experiments on race,[57] using children of Herero people and mulatto children of Herero women and German men as test subjects.[57] Other experiments were made by Dr Bofinger, who injected Herero that were suffering from scurvy with various substances including arsenic and opium; afterwards he researched the effects of these substances by performing autopsies on the dead bodies[58]
With the closure of concentration camps, all surviving Herero were distributed as labourers for settlers in the German colony, and from then on, all Herero over the age of seven were forced to wear a metal disc with their labour registration number,[57] and banned from owning land or cattle, a necessity in pastoral society.[59]
In 1985, the United Nations' Whitaker Report classified the aftermath as an attempt to exterminate the Herero and Nama peoples of South-West Africa, and therefore one of the earliest attempts at genocide in the 20th century. The German government recognised and apologised for the events in 2004, but has ruled out financial compensation or land reparation for the victims' descendants.[60] In 2004, there was only minor media attention in Germany on this matter.[61]
About 4,000 commercial land owners, mostly whites, own over 50% of the arable land across the country despite a land reform process undertaken by the Namibian government.[62][63] When the country was known as South West Africa, White Namibians enjoyed a highly privileged position due to apartheid laws enforcing strict segregation and white domination.[64]
Niger
Diffa in Niger
In October 2006, Niger announced that it would deport to Chad the "Diffa Arabs", Arabs living in the Diffa region of eastern Niger.[65] Their population numbered about 150,000.[66][67][68] While the government was rounding up Arabs in preparation for the deportation, two girls died, reportedly after fleeing government forces, and three women suffered miscarriages. Niger's government eventually suspended their controversial decision to deport the Arabs.[69][70]
In Niger, while the practice of slavery was outlawed in 2003, a study has found that more than 800,000 people are still slaves, almost 8% of the population.[71][72] Slavery dates back centuries in Niger and was criminalised after five years of lobbying by Anti-Slavery International and Nigerian human-rights group, Timidria.[73]
Descent-based slavery, where generations of the same family are born into bondage, is traditionally practiced by at least four of Niger's eight ethnic groups. The slave masters are mostly from the lighter-skinned nomadic tribes: the Tuareg, Fulani, Toubou and Arabs.[74] It is especially rife among the warlike Tuareg, located in the wild deserts of north and west Niger, who roam near the borders with Mali and Algeria. In the region of Say on the right bank of the river Niger, it is estimated that three-quarters of the population around 1904–1905 was composed of slaves.[75]
Historically, the Tuareg swelled the ranks of their black slaves by conducting war raids into other peoples’ lands. War was the main source of supply of slaves, although many were bought at slave markets, run mostly by indigenous peoples.[71][76]
Republic of the Congo
In the Republic of Congo, where Pygmies make up 2% of the population, many Pygmies live as slaves to Bantu masters. The nation is deeply stratified between these two major ethnic groups. The Pygmy slaves belong from birth to their Bantu masters in a relationship that the Bantus call a time-honored tradition. Even though the Pygmies are responsible for much of the hunting, fishing and manual labor in jungle villages, Pygmies and Bantus alike say Pygmies are often paid at the master's whim; in cigarettes, used clothing, or even nothing at all. As a result of pressure from UNICEF and human-rights activists, a law that would grant special protections to the Pygmy people is awaiting a vote by the Congo parliament.[77][78]
Beginning about 1880, Roman Catholic missionaries arrived in the Great Lakes region. Later, when German forces occupied the area during World War I, the conflict and efforts for Catholic conversion became more pronounced. As the Tutsi resisted conversion, the missionaries found success only among the Hutu. In an effort to reward conversion, the colonial government confiscated traditionally Tutsi land and reassigned it to Hutu tribes, igniting a conflict that has lasted into the 21st century.[10]
The area was ruled as a colony by Germany (before World War I) and Belgium. Because Tutsis had been the traditional governing elite, both colonial powers kept this system and allowed only the Tutsi to be educated and only they could participate in the colonial government. Such discriminatory policies engendered resentment.
When the Belgians took over the colony, they believed the colony could be better governed if they continued to identify the different populations. In the 1920s, they required people to identify with a particular ethnic group and classified them in censuses. European colonists viewed Africans in general as children who needed to be guided, but noted the Tutsi to be the ruling culture in Rwanda-Burundi. [citation needed] In 1959, Belgium reversed its stance and allowed the majority Hutu to assume control of the government through universal elections after independence. This partly reflected internal Belgian domestic politics, who later saw the discrimination against the Hutu majority as similar to oppression within Belgium suffered from the Flemish-Walloon conflict. They saw the democratization and empowerment of the Hutu as a just response to the Tutsi domination. The Belgian policies wavered and flip-flopped considerably during this period leading up to independence of Burundi and Rwanda.
The Hutu majority had revolted against the Tutsi in 1959 and taken power. Tutsis fled and created exile communities outside Rwanda in Uganda and Tanzania. Since Burundi's independence, more extremist Tutsi came to power and oppressed the Hutus, especially those who were educated.[12][13][14][15][16] Their actions led to the deaths of up to 200,000 Hutus.[17] Overt discrimination from the colonial period was continued by different Rwandan and Burundian governments, including identity cards that distinguished Tutsi and Hutu.
The Belgian-sponsored Tutsi monarchy survived until 1959, when Kigeli V was exiled from the colony (then called Ruanda-Urundi). In Rwanda, the political power was transferred from the minority Tutsi to the majority Hutu.[79]
In Rwanda, a Tutsi rebel group, the Rwandan Patriotic Front, invaded Rwanda from Uganda, which started a civil war against Rwanda's Hutu government in 1990. A peace agreement was signed, but violence erupted again, culminating in the Rwandan Genocide of 1994, when Hutu extremists killed[80] an estimated 800,000 Rwandans, mostly Tutsis.[81] About 30% of the Twa population of Rwanda were also killed.[82]
The Somali Bantu ethnic minority face significant stigmatization in Somali society due to their differing physical appearance and ancestry from the Cushitic-origin majority of Somalia. Racialized epithets targeted at the Somali Bantu community exist such as 'adoon' (slave) similar in connotation to the Arabic term abeed. The marginalization of the Somali Bantu community is primarily based on ethnoracial factors, unlike the marginalization of the Madhiban and other Somali-origin minorities which is primarily based on their status as a socially constructedcaste.[83] Ethnic Somalis and populations of Bantu stock are genetically divergent.[84][85] Racially-motivated attacks on Somali Bantus have occurred.[86][87] Journalists who bring attention to discrimination against Somali Bantus have suffered from death threats and some have fled the country as a result.[88][89]
Racism is still prevalent in South Africa.[91] The end of apartheid might have removed the legal framework allowing institutionalised racism, however, racism in South Africa both predates and encompasses more than just the institutionalised racism of apartheid.
Colonialism
The establishment of the Dutch East India Company settlement at the Cape of Good Hope in 1652 brought with it the established slave labor practices of the company.[92] Many of these slaves were imported from the company's more established settlements in India and the East Indies.[93]
There are many examples of racism and discriminatory practices during the colonial period, such as the allocation of rations during the Siege of Ladysmith:[95]
Apartheid (Afrikaans pronunciation: Afrikaans pronunciation:[aˈpartɦɛit]; an Afrikaans word meaning "separateness", or "the state of being apart", literally "apart-hood") was a system of racial segregation in South Africa enforced through legislation by the National Party (NP), the governing party from 1948 to 1994. Under apartheid, the rights, associations, and movements of the majority black inhabitants and other ethnic groups were curtailed, and white minority rule was maintained. Apartheid was developed after World War II by the Afrikaner-dominated National Party and Broederbond organisations. The ideology was also enforced in South West Africa, which was administered by South Africa under a League of Nations mandate (revoked in 1966 via United Nations Resolution 2145), until it gained independence as Namibia in 1990. By extension, the term is currently used for forms of systematic segregation established by the state authority in a country against the social and civil rights of a certain group of citizens due to ethnic prejudices.
Foreign nationals from other African countries, resident or working in the country, have been subjected to violent xenophobic attacks by black South Africans.[96]
In the Sudan, black African captives in the civil war were often enslaved, and female prisoners were often abused sexually,[97] with their Arab captors claiming that Islamic law grants them permission.[98] According to CBS News, slaves have been sold for US $50 a piece.[99] In September 2000, the U.S. State Department alleged that "the Sudanese government's support of slavery and its continued military action which has resulted in numerous deaths are due in part to the victims' religious beliefs."[100] Jok Madut Jok, professor of history at Loyola Marymount University, states that the abduction of women and children of the south is slavery by any definition. The government of Sudan insists that the whole matter is no more than the traditional tribal feuding over resources.[101]
The United States government's Sudan Peace Act of October 21, 2002 accused Sudan of genocide in an ongoing civil war which has cost more than 2,000,000 lives and has displaced more than 4,000,000 people since the war started in 1983.[102]
During the Second Sudanese Civil War, people were taken into slavery; estimates of abductions range from 14,000 to 200,000. Abduction of Dinka women and children was common.[103]
In 2004, it became publicly known that there was an organised campaign by Janjaweed militias (nomadic Arab shepherds with the support of Sudanese government troops) to get rid of 80 black African groups from the Darfur region of western Sudan. These peoples include the Fur, Zaghawa and Massalit.[104][105]
Mukesh Kapila (United Nations humanitarian coordinator) is quoted as saying: "This is more than just a conflict. It is an organised attempt [by Khartoum] to do away with a group of people. The only difference between Rwanda [in 1994] and Darfur now is the numbers of dead, murdered, tortured and raped involved"[106][107][108][109] A July 14, 2007 article noted that in the past two months up to 75,000 Arabs from Chad and Niger crossed the border into Darfur. Most have been relocated by the Sudanese government to former villages of displaced non-Arab people. Some 2.5 million have now been forced to flee their homes after attacks by Sudanese troops and Janjaweed militia.[110]
Tanzania
Black Tanzanians portray Indian Tanzanians as miserly because of their status as a business minority who owns most businesses in Dar es Salaam. Whereas black Tanzanians are seen as lazy thieves and profiteers who have no culinary taste. In Indian-owned service businesses, it is said that black Tanzanians are served last after Indians, Arabs and white people. Black Tanzanians report to be looked down upon by Indians Tanzanians with the same education level, that Indian Tanzanians do not want to intermingle with black Tanzanians nor learn kiswahili, which they deem to be an inferior language.[111]
The accession of the Almohade dynasty to the throne of the Maghreb provinces in 1146 proved disastrous to the Jews of Tunis. Jews as well as Christians were compelled either to embrace Islam or to leave the country. Abd al-Mu'min's successors pursued the same course, and their severe measures resulted either in emigration or in forcible conversions. Soon becoming suspicious of the sincerity of the new converts, the Almohades compelled them to wear a special garb, with a yellow cloth for a head-covering.[112]
Street plate in Medina of Tunis showing, in Arabic and French, Negroes street.
Mistranslations of Arab scholars and geographers from this time period have led many to attribute certain racial attitudes that were not prevalent until the 18th and 19th century to writings made centuries ago. French translators portrayed groups like Arabs and Berbers as distinct ethnic groups with set characteristics, while Ibn Khaldun and his contemporaries understood them to be diverse and changing in terms of makeup and behavior.[113]
Ibn Khaldun suggests a link between the decline of Ghana and rise of the Almoravids. However, there is little evidence of there actually being an Almoravid conquest of Ghana [114][115]
In 2018, more than seven years after the fall of the Ben Ali regime, Law 50 was introduced to protect black Tunisians from racial discrimination.[116]
The 1968 Committee on "Africanization in Commerce and Industry" in Uganda made far-reaching Indophobic proposals. A system of work permits and trade licenses was introduced in 1969 in order to restrict the role of Indians in economic and professional activities. Indians were segregated and discriminated against in all walks of life. After Amin came to power, he exploited these divisions to spread propaganda against Indians, stereotyping and scapegoating the Indian minority. Indians were stereotyped as "only traders" and so "inbred" to their profession. Indians were attacked as "dukawallas" (an occupational term that degenerated into an anti-Indian slur during Amin's time).[117]
In the 1970s Uganda and other East African nations[which?] implemented racist policies that targeted the Asian population of the region. Uganda under Idi Amin's leadership was particularly virulent in its anti-Asian policies. In August 1972, Idi Amin declared what he called an "economic war", a set of policies that included the expropriation of properties owned by Asians and Europeans. Uganda's 80,000 Asians were mostly Indians born in the country, whose ancestors had come to Uganda when the country was still a British colony.[118][119] Indians were stereotyped as "greedy" and "conniving", without any racial identity or loyalty but "always cheating, conspiring and plotting" to subvert Uganda. Amin used this propaganda to justify a campaign of "de-Indianization", eventually resulting in the expulsion and ethnic cleansing of Uganda's Indian minority.[117] India refused to accept the expelled people.[120] Most of the expelled Indians settled in Britain.[121]
Racism in Zimbabwe first started during the colonial era in the 19th century, when immigrating white settlers started to racially discriminate against Black people in the region. White settlers held full citizenship rights, as well as other significant economic and legal advantages over indigenous African people. Racial division would continue under Rhodesian governance, sparking an armed struggle to overthrow white rule led by the Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU) and the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU). This conflict culminated in the establishment of the modern state of Zimbabwe. The coalition of African forces was fragile, and the government led by Robert Mugabe and the majority-Shona ZANU committed massacres against Northern Ndebele people in ZAPU strongholds, producing resentment between the African ethnic groups.[122]
Following the end of armed conflict, the white minority in Zimbabwe continued to exert disproportionate control over the economy, owned the majority of arable land in Zimbabwe, and maintained racially segregated social circles. White settlers were protected by generous provisions established by the Lancaster House Agreement, and thus continued to exert significant political and legal control over the African population. Wide disparities existed in access to sports, education and housing.[123][122] The ZANU-led government did not engage in significant expropriation of white settlers despite promising land reform to the African population, with one white commercial farmer commenting that Mugabe's government in the early 1980s was "the best government for farmers that this country has ever seen". Dissatisfaction with the slow pace of land reform led to the illegal seizing of white-owned land by African peasants.[122] The government responded with heavy-handed repression against the African peasants.[124] Resentment of continued white control of the economy continued through the 1990s, spurred by the perception that the white business community was disinterested in improving the economic lot of the African population or otherwise changing the status quo.[125]
By 2000, as the ZANU-PF government grew political isolated, it increasingly criticized the white population's segregationism and racism,[122] and began to encourage violent farm invasions against the white population, which drew condemnations from the international community.[124] Zimbabwe today continues to be fractured by enmity along racial lines.[126]
Human occupation of Rwanda is thought to have begun shortly after the last ice age. By the 11th century, the inhabitants had organized into a number of kingdoms. In the 19th century, Mwami (king) Rwabugiri of the Kingdom of Rwanda conducted a decades-long process of military conquest and administrative consolidation that resulted in the kingdom coming to control most of what is now Rwanda. The colonial powers, Germany and Belgium, allied with the Rwandan court.
The Hutu, also known as the Abahutu, are a Bantu ethnic or social group which is native to the African Great Lakes region. They mainly live in Rwanda, Burundi, and Uganda where they form one of the principal ethnic groups alongside the Tutsi and the Great Lakes Twa.
The Tutsi, also called Watusi, Watutsi or Abatutsi, are an ethnic group of the African Great Lakes region. They are a Bantu-speaking ethnic group and the second largest of three main ethnic groups in Rwanda and Burundi.
East Africa, also known as Eastern Africa or the East of Africa, is a region at the eastern edge of the African continent, distinguished by its geographical, historical, and cultural landscape. Defined in varying scopes, the region is recognized in the United Nations Statistics Division scheme as encompassing 18 sovereign states and 4 territories.
The Kingdom of Rwanda was a Bantu kingdom in modern-day Rwanda, which grew to be ruled by a Tutsi monarchy. It was one of the oldest and the most centralized kingdoms in Central and East Africa. It was later annexed under German and Belgian colonial rule while retaining some of its autonomy. The Tutsi monarchy was abolished in 1961 after ethnic violence erupted between the Hutu and the Tutsi during the Rwandan Revolution which started in 1959. After a 1961 referendum, Rwanda became a Hutu-dominated republic and received its independence from Belgium in 1962.
The Kingdom of Burundi, also known as Kingdom of Urundi, was a Bantu kingdom in the modern-day Republic of Burundi. The Ganwa monarchs ruled over both Hutus and Tutsis. Created in the 16th century, the kingdom was preserved under German and Belgian colonial rule in the late 19th and early 20th century and was an independent state between 1962 and 1966.
The individual member states of the African Union (AU) coordinate foreign policy through this agency, in addition to conducting their own international relations on a state-by-state basis. The AU represents the interests of African peoples at large in intergovernmental organizations (IGO's); for instance, it is a permanent observer at the United Nations' General Assembly.
Ubuhake is the name given to the social order in Rwanda and Burundi from approximately the 15th century to 1958. It has been frequently compared to European feudalism. Based on cattle distribution, it was, however, a much smaller system than the one of uburetwa, which affected a much larger segment of the population and was based on land distribution. The Tutsi monarchy used the land distribution system of uburetwa to centralise control of the lands in most of Rwanda in a system called igikingi. Only the northwest of Rwanda, where Hutu land owners refused to submit, were not part of igikingi.
Mass killings of Tutsis were conducted by the majority-Hutu populace in Burundi from 21 October to December 1993, under an eruption of ethnic animosity and riots following the assassination of Burundian President Melchior Ndadaye in an attempted coup d'état. The massacres took place in all provinces apart from Makamba and Bururi, and were primarily undertaken by Hutu peasants. At many points throughout, Tutsis took vengeance and initiated massacres in response.
The Banyarwanda are a Bantu ethnolinguistic supraethnicity. The Banyarwanda are also minorities in neighboring Burundi, DR Congo, Uganda, Tanzania.
The origins of the Hutu, Tutsi and Twa peoples is a major issue of controversy in the histories of Rwanda and Burundi, as well as the Great Lakes region of Africa. The relationship among the three modern populations is thus, in many ways, derived from the perceived origins and claim to "Rwandan-ness". The largest conflicts related to this question were the Rwandan genocide, the Burundian genocide, and the First and Second Congo Wars.
Hutu Power is a ethnic supremacist ideology that asserts the ethnic superiority of Hutu, often in the context of being superior to Tutsi and Twa, and that therefore they are entitled to dominate and murder these two groups and other minorities. Espoused by Hutu extremists, widespread support for the ideology led to the 1994 Rwandan genocide against Tutsi and their family members, the moderate Hutu who opposed the killings, and Twa who were deemed traitors. Hutu Power political parties and movements included the Akazu, Parmehutu, the Coalition for the Defence of the Republic and its Impuzamugambi paramilitary militia, and the governing National Republican Movement for Democracy and Development and its Interahamwe paramilitary militia. The theory of Hutu people being superior is most common in Rwanda and Burundi, where they make up the majority of the population. Due to its sheer destructiveness, the ideology has been compared to historical Nazism in the Western world.
Burundi, officially the Republic of Burundi, is a landlocked country in the Great Rift Valley at the junction between the African Great Lakes region and Southeast Africa. It is bordered by Rwanda to the north, Tanzania to the east and southeast, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the west; Lake Tanganyika lies along its southwestern border. The capital city is Gitega and the largest city is Bujumbura.
Ethnic groups in Burundi include the three main indigenous groups of Hutu, Tutsi and Twa that have largely been emphasized in the study of the country's history due to their role in shaping it through conflict and consolidation. Burundi's ethnic make-up is similar to that of neighboring Rwanda. Additionally, recent immigration has also contributed to Burundi's ethnic diversity. Throughout the country's history, the relation between the ethnic groups has varied, largely depending on internal political, economic and social factors and also external factors such as colonialism. The pre-colonial era, despite having divisions between the three groups, saw greater ethnic cohesion and fluidity dependent on socioeconomic factors. During the colonial period under German and then Belgian rule, ethnic groups in Burundi experienced greater stratifications and solidification through biological arguments separating the groups and indirect colonial rule that increased group tensions. The post-independence Burundi has experienced recurring inter-ethnic violence especially in the political arena that has, in turn, spilled over to society at large leading to many casualties throughout the decades. The Arusha Agreement served to end the decades-long ethnic tensions, and the Burundian government has stated commitment to creating ethnic cohesion in the country since, yet recent waves of violence and controversies under the Pierre Nkurunziza leadership have worried some experts of potential resurfacing of ethnic violence. Given the changing nature of ethnicity and ethnic relations in the country, many scholars have approached the topic theoretically to come up with primordial, constructivist and mixed arguments or explanations on ethnicity in Burundi.
Religion in Burundi is diverse, with Christianity being the dominant faith. Catholicism is the largest Christian denomination in the country.
The largest ethnic groups in Rwanda are the Hutus, which make up about 85% of Rwanda's population; the Tutsis, which are 14%; and the Twa, which are around 1%. Starting with the Tutsi feudal monarchy rule of the 10th century, the Hutus were a subjugated social group. Belgian colonization also contributed to the tensions between the Hutus and Tutsis. The Belgians and later the Hutus propagated the myth that Hutus were the superior ethnicity. The resulting tensions would eventually foster the slaughtering of Tutsis in the Rwandan genocide. Since then, policy has changed to recognize one main ethnicity: "Rwandan".
The Rwandan Revolution, also known as the Hutu Revolution, Social Revolution, or Wind of Destruction, was a period of ethnic violence in Rwanda from 1959 to 1961 between the Hutu and the Tutsi, two of the three ethnic groups in Rwanda. The revolution saw the country transition from a Tutsi monarchy under Belgian colonial authority to an independent Hutu-dominated republic.
The Great Lakes Twa, also known as Batwa, Abatwa or Ge-Sera, are a Bantu speaking group native to the African Great Lakes region on the border of Central and East Africa. As an indigenous pygmy people, the Twa are generally assumed to be the oldest surviving population of the Great Lakes region. Current populations of Great Lakes Twa people live in the states of Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda and the eastern portion of the Democratic Republic of Congo. In 2000 they numbered approximately 80,000 people, making them a significant minority group in these countries. The largest population of Twa is located in Burundi estimated in 2008 at 78,071 people.
The Ikiza, or the Ubwicanyi (Killings), was a series of mass killings—often characterised as a genocide—which were committed in Burundi in 1972 by the Tutsi-dominated army and government, primarily against educated and elite Hutus who lived in the country. Conservative estimates place the death toll of the event between 100,000 and 150,000 killed, while some estimates of the death toll go as high as 300,000.
Relations between Burundi and Rwanda have existed for at least as long as the states themselves. Before contact with Europeans, Rwanda and Burundi were kingdoms competing to gain control over nearby territory. In the 1880s, the two kingdoms were placed under colonial authority, first by Germany, and then by Belgium after 1919.
1 2 Michael Bowen, Passing by;: The United States and genocide in Burundi, 1972, (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1973), p. 49
1 2 René Lemarchand, Selective genocide in Burundi (Report - Minority Rights Group; no. 20, 1974)
1 2 Rene Lemarchand, Burundi: Ethnic Conflict and Genocide (New York: Woodrow Wilson Center and Cambridge University Press, 1996)
Edward L. Nyankanzi, Genocide: Rwanda and Burundi (Schenkman Books, 1998)
1 2 Christian P. Scherrer, Genocide and crisis in Central Africa: conflict roots, mass violence, and regional war; foreword by Robert Melson. Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 2002
↑ Michael Bowen, Passing by;: The United States and genocide in Burundi, 1972, (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1973), 49 pp
↑ René Lemarchand, Selective genocide in Burundi (Report - Minority Rights Group; no. 20, 1974), 36 pp.
↑ Rene Lemarchand, Burundi: Ethnic Conflict and Genocide (New York: Woodrow Wilson Center and Cambridge University Press, 1996), 232 pp.
Edward L. Nyankanzi, Genocide: Rwanda and Burundi (Schenkman Books, 1998), 198 pp.
↑ Christian P. Scherrer, Genocide and crisis in Central Africa: conflict roots, mass violence, and regional war; foreword by Robert Melson. Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 2002.
↑ International Commission of Inquiry for Burundi: Final Report. Part III: Investigation of the Assassination. Conclusions at USIP.org
↑ Colonial Genocide and Reparations Claims in the 21st Century: The Socio-Legal Context of Claims under International Law by the Herero against Germany for Genocide in Namibia, 1904-1908 (PSI Reports) by Jeremy Sarkin-Hughes
↑ Empire, Colony, Genocide: Conquest, Occupation and Subaltern Resistance in World History (War and Genocide) (War and Genocide) (War and Genocide) A. Dirk Moses -page 296(From Conquest to Genocide: Colonial Rule in German Southwest Africa and German East Africa. 296, (29). Dominik J. Schaller)
↑ The Imperialist Imagination: German Colonialism and Its Legacy (Social History, Popular Culture, and Politics in Germany) by Sara L. Friedrichsmeyer, Sara Lennox, and Susanne M. Zantop page 87 University of Michigan Press 1999
↑ Walter Nuhn: Sturm über Südwest. Der Hereroaufstand von 1904. Bernard & Graefe-Verlag, Koblenz 1989. ISBN3-7637-5852-6.
↑ Marie-Aude Baronian, Stephan Besser, Yolande Jansen, "Diaspora and memory: figures of displacement in contemporary literature, arts and politics", pg. 33 Rodopi, 2007,
↑ Samuel Totten, William S. Parsons, Israel W. Charny, "Century of genocide: critical essays and eyewitness accounts" pg. 51, Routledge, 2004,
↑ Dan Kroll, "Securing our water supply: protecting a vulnerable resource", PennWell Corp/University of Michigan Press, pg. 22
↑ Gewald, Jan-Bart (1999), Herereo Heroes: A Socio-Political History of the Herero of Namibia 1890-1923, Ohio University Press, p.242, "Of late it has been claimed that the infamous 'Blue Book' which detailed the treatment of Africans in GSWA was little more than a piece of propaganda put about to further South Africa's territorial ambitions and Britain's position at the negotiating table. Granted that the book was used to strengthen Britain's position vis-a-vis Germany, it must however be borne in mind that the bulk of the evidence contained in the 'Blue Book' is little more than the literal translation of German texts published at the time which were the findings of a German commission of inquiry into the effects of corporal punishment." Thus, when the Blue Book was withdrawn from the public after Germany and England came to an agreement about how to share access to GSWA minerals, this was not censorship; it was just business
↑ The colonising camera: photographs in the making of Namibian history Wolfram Hartmann, Jeremy Silvester, Patricia Hayes, page 118, University of Cape Town Press, 1999
↑ Jan-Bart Gewald, Jeremy Silvester, "Words Cannot Be Found: German Colonial Rule in Namibia: An Annotated Reprint of the 1918 Blue Book (Sources on African History, 1)", Brill Academic Publishers, annotated edition (1 June 2003)
↑ Michael Mann (2004), The Dark Side of Democracy: Explaining Ethnic Cleansing, Cambridge University Press, p.105
↑ Hitler's African Victims: The German Army Massacres of Black French Soldiers in 1940, Cambridge University Press, 2006, p.83
↑ Helmut Walser Smith (2008), The continuities of German history: nation, religion, and race across the Long Nineteenth Century, Cambridge University Press, p.199
↑ Hitler's Black Victims: The Historical Experiences of European Blacks, Africans and African Americans During the Nazi Era (Crosscurrents in African American History) by Clarence Lusane, page 50-51 Routledge 2002
↑ Steinmetz, George, The devil's handwriting, pp 196-216
↑ The practice of war Production, Reproduction and Communication of Armed Violence Edited by Aparna Rao, Michael Bollig and Monika Böck, page 92, Berghahn Books; 2011
↑ Klaas van Walraven (2003), Rethinking resistance: revolt and violence in African history, Brill Academic Publishers, p.282
↑ The Kaiser's Holocaust: Germany's Forgotten Genocide and the Colonial Roots of Nazism, page 225, Casper Erichsen, David Olusoga, Faber and Faber 2010
↑ Rao, Aparna; Bollig, Michael; Böck, Monika (2007). The practice of war: Production, reproduction and communication of armed violence. New York: Berghahn Books. p.89. ISBN978-1845452803.
↑ Eno, Mohamed A. (2008). The Bantu-Jareer Somalis: unearthing apartheid in the Horn of Africa (1sted.). London, UK: Adonis & Abbey Publishers. ISBN978-1905068944. OCLC638660234.
↑ Collins, Robert O., "Civil Wars and Revolution in the Sudan: Essays on the Sudan, Southern Sudan, and Darfur, 1962-2004 ", (p. 156), Tsehai Publishers (US), (2005) ISBN0-9748198-7-5 .
↑ Power, Samantha "Dying in Darfur: Can the ethnic cleansing in Sudan be stopped?", The New Yorker, 30 August 2004. Human Rights Watch, "Q & A: Crisis in Darfur" (web site, retrieved 24 May 2006). Hilary Andersson, "Ethnic cleansing blights Sudan", BBC News, 27 May 2004.
↑ Fouéré, Marie-Aude (2015). ""Indians are Exploiters and Africans Idlers!": Identity formation and socio-economic conditions in Tanzania". In Michel, Adam (ed.). Indian Africa: Minorities of Indian-Pakistani Origin in Eastern Africa. Africae. pp.359–396. ISBN9782957305810.
1 2 3 4 General Amin and the Indian Exodus from Uganda Hasu H. Patel, Issue: A Journal of Opinion, Vol. 2, No. 4 (Winter, 1972), pp. 12-22 doi:10.2307/1166488
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
