Yolande Mukagasana (born 6 September 1954) is a Rwandan writer [1] writing in French who is a survivor of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi. [2]
She was a Tutsi nurse and anaesthetist working at a hospital in Kigali. [2] She fled to Belgium during the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi; her husband, her children and many of the people she knew were killed. In Belgium, her qualifications were not recognized so she worked in a senior's residence. She later adopted some of her nieces whose parents had been killed and other Rwandan orphans. [1]
Mukagasana returned to Rwanda with Greek-Belgian photographer Alain Kazinierakis. Together, they produced the travelling exhibition Les Blessures du silence, witness accounts of the genocide. They also founded Nyamirambo, point d'appui, an organization aimed at rebuilding. With the theatrical group Groupov, she wrote the play Rwanda 94. [1]
She has written two autobiographical works, La mort ne veut pas de moi (1997) and N'aie pas peur de savoir (1999). She has also published a collection of stories, titled De Bouche à oreille (2003). [2] Her first memoir, La mort ne veut pas de moi, was translated into English as Not My Time to Die by Zoe Norridge in 2019.
In 2002, Mukagasana received the Golden Dove for Peace Prize awarded by Archivio Disarmo. [3]
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.
Juvénal Habyarimana was a Rwandan politician and military officer who was the second president of Rwanda, from 1973 until his assassination in 1994. He was nicknamed Kinani, a Kinyarwanda word meaning "invincible".
The Rwandan genocide, also known as the genocide against the Tutsi, occurred from 7 April to 19 July 1994 during the Rwandan Civil War. Over a span of around 100 days, members of the Tutsi ethnic group, as well as some moderate Hutu and Twa, were systematically killed by Hutu militias. While the Rwandan Constitution states that over 1 million people were killed, most scholarly estimates suggest between 500,000 and 662,000 Tutsi died. The genocide was marked by extreme violence, with victims often murdered by neighbors, and widespread sexual violence, with between 250,000 and 500,000 women raped.
Théoneste Bagosora was a Rwandan military officer. He was chiefly known for his key role in the 1994 Rwandan genocide for which he was sentenced to life imprisonment by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR). In 2011, the sentence was reduced to 35 years' imprisonment on appeal. He was due to be imprisoned until he was 89. According to René Lemarchand, Bagosora was "the chief organizer of the killings". On 25 September 2021, he died in a prison hospital in Mali, where he was being treated for heart issues.
Gil Courtemanche was a Canadian progressive journalist and novelist in third-world and international politics. He wrote for the Montreal newspaper Le Devoir.
A Sunday at the Pool in Kigali is the first novel by Montreal author Gil Courtemanche, originally published in 2000.
This is a bibliography for primary sources, books and articles on the personal and general accounts, and the accountabilities, of the 1994 Rwandan genocide.
Jacqueline Mukansonera is a Rwandan nurse. An ethnic Hutu, she saved the Tutsi woman Yolande Mukagasana from being killed during the Rwandan genocide in 1994. Yolande had turned to her for help at the hospital where Jacqueline worked as a nurse, and she was one of the first targets of the Hutu violence because she was seen as a member of the Tutsi intelligentsia. Jacqueline concealed her in the kitchen of her home for 11 days, neither of the two women spoke to one another during the stay out of fear of discovery. Jacqueline later bribed a policeman and managed to provide Yolande with falsified documents which said she was Hutu.
The 1973 Rwandan coup d'état, also known as the Coup d'état of 5 July, was a military coup staged by Juvénal Habyarimana against incumbent president Grégoire Kayibanda in the Republic of Rwanda. The coup took place on 5 July 1973 and was considered by many as a betrayal.
Hollywood Girls : Une nouvelle vie en Californie, or simply Hollywood Girls, is a French soap opera created by Alexandre dos Santos, Jérémy Michalak, and Thibaut Vales for NRJ12. The series features an ensemble cast and follows a groups of French peoples who decided to start a new life in California, but their life is quickly disrupted by the diabolical Geny G and her husband, the Dr. David Moretti.
Noël (Noheli) Hitimana was a presenter (animateur) on the Rwandan radio station Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines (RTLM), which played a significant role in promoting the genocide against the Tutsi. Like the station's other broadcasters, Hitimana incited violence against the Tutsi on the air.
The role of France in the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi has been a source of controversy and debate both within and beyond France and Rwanda. France actively supported the Hutu-led government of Juvénal Habyarimana against the Tutsi-dominated Rwandan Patriotic Front, which since 1990 had been engaged in a conflict intended to restore the rights of Rwandan Tutsis both within Rwanda and exiled in neighboring countries following over four decades of anti-Tutsi violence. France provided arms and military training to Habyarimana's militias, the Interahamwe and Impuzamugambi, which were among the government's primary means of operationalizing the genocide following the assassination of Juvénal Habyarimana and Cyprien Ntaryamira on April 6, 1994.
Marie Béatrice Umutesi is a Rwandan writer, NGO worker, peace activist and refugee living in Belgium.
Scholastique Mukasonga is a French-Rwandan author born in the former Gikongoro province of Rwanda. In 2012, She won the prix Renaudot and the prix Ahmadou-Kourouma for her book Our Lady of the Nile. In addition to being a finalist for the International Dublin Literary Award and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, Mukasonga was rewarded in 2014 with the Seligmann Prize against racism and intolerance and in 2015 with the prize Société des gens de lettres. She currently resides in Normandy, France.
Jean Hatzfeld is a French author and journalist who wrote extensively about the Bosnian War and the Rwandan Genocide in Rwanda.
Carole Umulinga Karemera is a Belgian-born Rwandan actress, saxophone player, theater director, festivals producer and culture policy expert.
In Praise of Blood: The Crimes of the Rwandan Patriotic Front is a 2018 non-fiction book by Canadian journalist Judi Rever and published by Random House of Canada; it has also been translated into Dutch and French. The book describes alleged war crimes by the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), Rwanda's ruling political party, during its ascent to power in the 1990s.
Maggy Corrêa is a Rwandan Swiss autobiographical writer. In her memoir Tutsie, etc. (1998) she recounts how she rescued her mother from the Rwandan genocide against the Tutsi in July 1994.
Charles Auguste Onana is a French-Cameroonian political scientist, investigative journalist, essayist, and publisher. In December 2024, he was convicted of genocide denial.