Rwanda President Paul Kagame
Rwandan President Paul Kagame came out strongly against long-standing claims that his country profited from the unrest in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo [DRC] by extracting minerals.
Speaking in Kigali at the 20th annual Umushyikirano, a constitutional forum where people interact directly with their leaders, Kagame said his country’s economy would improve if the assertions were accurate.
“If we were really in the Congo for minerals, Rwanda would be a hundred times richer than it is,” he said.
A United Nations report claims Rwanda has been mining in North Kivu, DRC.
The DRC claims the same at every turn it gets to speak about strained relations with Rwanda.
Some sections of the international community have taken what DRC’s president Felix Tshisekedi says about Rwanda as the gospel truth.
That at times annoys Kagame, whose country is one of the fastest growing economies in the world.
“These people from the international community, I think, take things literally. Imagine the amount of threats we come under daily! ‘We will do this if you don’t do this, we will do that if you don’t do that’. Sometimes you feel choked.
“Instead of being choked by all that, I will be choked by just being defiant and telling you to go to hell,” he added.
Kagame said DRC created its own problems, but instead of dealing with them, they blame Rwanda.
The problem for Rwanda in this context is that fighting in eastern DRC hurts its side of the country.
This threatens its security through border insecurity, regional diplomatic tensions, disrupting cross-border trade and straining resources due to refugee inflows.
The conflict also creates economic instability, increases costs and endangers environmental conservation efforts, such as protecting mountain gorilla populations that straddle the border.
That’s why, according to Kagame, “defensive measures” are necessary.
He added that he won’t accept blame for the crisis.
“You can’t create problems for me and at the same time come and blame me for these problems and then start threatening me,” he said.
Kagame said he also had issues with the DRC and they are linked to Kinshasa’s support for the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda [FDLR] rebels.
“The problem that Rwanda has with the Congo is mainly about the FDLR presence there, security threats, as well as the genocidal ideology,” he said.
In December last year, the United States brokered a peace deal between Rwanda and DRC known as the Washington Accords for Peace and Prosperity.
The key provisions are a permanent ceasefire, the withdrawal of Rwandan troops from the DRC within 90 days and the neutralisation of the FDLR by the DRC.
However, due to the slow process in meeting targets, as diplomatic outreach continues, security measures lag.
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