Remaking Rwanda: State Building and Human Rights after Mass Violence

12. The Sovu Trials: The Impact of Genocide Justice of One Community

194  12 The Sovu Trials The Impact of Genocide Justice on One Community max rettig The way forward, I believe, is to make sure that justice is actually seen, felt, and understood by those who need it most: the people of the community. Former U.S. ambassador and ICTR prosecutor Pierre-Richard Prosper Reconciliation is impossible. Reconciliation means nothing to the people of Sovu. Male genocide survivor, Sovu, December 2006 Already we have reconciliation today. We share everything. Female farmer, Sovu, November 2006 Introduction Since 1994 the international community and Rwanda have conducted four types of trials to render justice for the 1994 Rwandan genocide: international trials at the United Nations–sponsored International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in Arusha, Tanzania; transnational trials in Belgium, Canada, Switzerland, the Netherlands, and most recently Finland; military and civilian trials in Rwanda’s domestic courts; and a vast network of M a x R e t t i g 195 community courts called gacaca. Not enough is known about how Rwandans themselves view these trials. Quantitative data gauging Rwandan attitudes toward genocide trials is scant, out of date, and in some cases suspiciously positive given the range of problems the trials have experienced. We are left to wonder which trials, if any, have contributed to truth, justice, and reconciliation. Sovu, in southern Rwanda, provides a unique opportunity to begin to answer this question. This small rural community is one of very few places to have been implicated in all four types of trials. On June 12, 2001, the trial of the so-called Butare Six began before the ICTR. The defendants allegedly led the campaign of genocide that swept Butare Prefecture, which includes Sovu. Also in the dock in Arusha was Aloys Simba, a retired Rwandan military colonel who orchestrated the violence in Butare and neighboring Gikongoro Prefecture. Only three days before the Butare trial began, Sisters Gertrude and Kisito from the Sovu convent were sentenced by a Belgian jury to fifteen and twelve years, respectively, for betraying refugees who had sought safety in the convent and for supplying the gasoline used to incinerate Tutsi refugees at the Sovu health center. Chief Adjutant Emmanuel Rekeraho, the leader of the genocide in Sovu and Simba’s deputy, provided written testimony against the nuns. After the ICTR declined to prosecute Rekeraho, he was tried and sentenced to death by a Rwandan military tribunal; his sentence was commuted to life when Rwanda abolished the death penalty. Finally, Sovu’s gacaca courts, meeting weekly, adjudicated hundreds of cases of accused génocidaires. Drawing on qualitative and quantitative evidence collected during ten months of fieldwork in Sovu in 2006 and 2007, this chapter reveals how four types of genocide trials have impacted one Rwandan community. This chapter uses the reconstruction of social trust as one of the principal metrics for all four types of trials. Of course, trials may aim to achieve other important goals, including sanctioning those responsible for wrongdoing, creating a historical record of past abuses, and establishing the rule of law. However, social trust is key to the longterm security and stability of the community. Furthermore, reconciliation was a stated goal of the ICTR, the trial of Sisters Gertrude and Kisito, and gacaca. Certain clear trends emerge from this study. Sovu residents do not consider themselves well informed about international trials, transnational trials, or Rwanda’s military tribunals. As a result, they expressed uncertainty about the utility of those trials in promoting local reconciliation. While residents are intimately familiar with gacaca, their views about the community trials are mixed, even contradictory. Despite some favorable public opinion data, gacaca also exposed—and perhaps deepened—conflict, resentment, and ethnic disunity in Sovu. In addition, lies, half-truths, and silence limited gacaca’s contribution to truth, justice, and reconciliation. 196 T h e S o v u Tr i a l s As stated, this chapter explores each of the four types of genocide trials and Rwandans’ perceptions of them. But first, for context, it is important to understand the dynamics of the genocide and its legacy in Sovu. Sovu: The Genocide and Its Legacy Sovu is a rural community near Butare town, Rwanda’s intellectual capital and second largest city. It lies in the country’s southern region, not far from Burundi, in what was known in 1994 as Butare Prefecture. Before the genocide, it was one of the most ethnically mixed areas of...