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-Behind The Presidential Curtains: Once A good Mother now a killer
– Jeannette Kagame who once acted as a role model to children turned into a killer like husband. She encouraged singer Kizito Mihigo to come home and build his nation only to then plan his arrest, get him tortured in a safe house and later charged with terrorism She did all of this because of a single song to reconcile and heal our hearts as Rwandans
In the early 1990’s when I met the First Lady of Rwanda Jeanette Kagame, I believed that she was a mother figure to all Rwandese. She always appeared to care for us and would ask us how we were doing. I remember one day around 1997 she asked me if I had a girl friend, it was a bit funny because that time I had no girl friend, for some reason she focused on relationships, outings and clubbing, in most of her conversations with any driver who was on duty. She turned up with some interesting questions whenever we drove her out; I believed that she was so innocent. At that time, she was attending Kigali institute of technology (KIST) we would drive her over for her lectures. Those days she used to experience the insults and abusive language from her husband Paul Kagame like all of us did. Even when Kagame was in a relationship with someone, I do not want to mention today, Mrs Kagame who, we normally called Mama Ivan never found out until late, because she was an oblivious woman who was confused.
At times, we used to feel sorry for her because sometimes she would ask us to drive her to her mother’s house in Kimihurura whenever Paul Kagame was in a bad mood, or after beating her up. At times she used to ask us to take her to Kayumba’s home due to a good friendship she had with Rosette Kayumba the wife of Gen Kayumba.
Jeanette Kagame continued to live as a house wife while experiencing domestic violence from her husband Paul Kagame till the end of 2002 when Kagame started falling out with his trusted circles. During these days, Kagame had betrayed so many people that he was left with no one to trust apart from those who believed the same way as him of shedding blood such as Gen Jack Nziza, and other Killing machines.
During these days Jeanette Kagame started investing in projects and in even hijacking other projects from individuals, who started the idea before she thought of it. This was because she had started to understand that she could also do something as a first lady. Mrs Kagame worked tirelessly making sure that the Kayumba’s fell out permanently with Kagame’s so that she could take all of Rosette Kayumba’s shares she had invested in the school they shared.
She became friends with Gen Jack Nziza, who is Kagame’s right hand man, and well known for arresting and killing anyone who is believed to not support the current regime. Since then Mrs Kagame has been involved in a number of planned killings of different people together with Kagame’s intelligence network.
Mrs Kagame has also involved herself in assisting and helping the victims of genocide, and this was the time when she encouraged a young talented Kizito Mihigo to leave Belgium and come back to build his motherland of Rwanda.
Upon his arrival, Kizito Mihigo continued progressing and singing his lovely music of uniting Rwandans. Although, contrary to Kagame’s regime, Kizito Mihigo’s songs looked at uniting all Rwandan’s even though the Kagame’s wanted him to only sing genocide of Tutsis and not including anyone else who died before, during and after genocide.
The song which has caused a lot of problems to Kizito Mihigo, and a number of young men in Rwanda, is Igisobanuro Cy’urupfu, in English (THE DEFINITION OF DEATH) in this song Kizito explains that he remembers those who died not only genocide but even violence, revenge, and any death that happened during the war unexpectedly. He goes on say in his song that Humanism should come first before talking about being Rwandan.
Even though Kizito Mihigo was very close to Mrs Kagame due to the projects he had much role in developing by singing the healing songs for unity and reconciliation it did not stop Mrs Kagame from giving him away and getting him arrested. He was put into safe house where he had been for the last few days before being charged of collaborating with RNC/FDRL.
Prior to Kizito Mihigo’s arrest, President Paul Kagame was heard as saying in his speech ‘’I am not a singer to please both sides’’ this was the time when Kizito Mihigo’s song was causing uncertainty in the country due to how all ethnicities welcomed the importance of the meaning of the song and the contribution it meant on reconciliation.
Something the ruling government never appreciated and then the intelligence network connected to Mrs Kagame started arresting anyone connected to Kizito Mihigo, and later Kizito Mihigo himself.
Kizito Mihigo’s Biography
Kizito Mihigo is an organist and composer, was born Saturday, July 25th, 1981 at Kibeho, a sector of Nyaruguru district, in the former Gikongoro province, currently located in the Southern Province. Son of Augustin Buguzi and Ilibagiza Placidia, Kizito grew up in a Catholic Christian educational environment. At the age of 9, he began to compose small songs, and five years later, when he was a secondaryschool student in the « Petit Seminaire de Butare », he became the most popular liturgical organist composer in the Catholic Church of Rwanda.
In April 1994, when he was almost 13 years old, the young Mihigo survived the genocide against the Tutsis, in which more than eight hundred thousand Tutsis were murdered during including his own father.
A few years later, this tragedy inspired the young talent to become the organist-singer-author and composer of the most popular songs in Rwanda.
One year after the genocide, Kizito Mihigo composed hundreds of liturgical compositions which were rapidly exploited in several parishes in Rwanda.
In 2000, (when he was 19 years old), Kizito Mihigo were already author and composer of over 200 (two hundred) liturgical songs, sung in all the parishes of Rwanda.
In 2008, he received the postgraduate diploma (DFE) at the “Conservatoire de Musique in Paris”.
From 2008-2010, after his graduation, he was a music teacher in Belgium.
In 2010 he founded the KMP (Kizito Mihigo for Peace) a non-profit foundation with the mission of using Art in PEACEBUILDING.
In 2011, Imbuto Foundation, the organization of the First Lady of Rwanda, gives to Kizito Mihigo the price CYRWA (Cerebrating Young Rwandan Archivers), in recognition of his artistic activities for Peace and Reconciliation.
By Noble Marara
Edite by Jennifer Fierlberg