Rwanda Thirty Years On

Seriously...

BBC

Society & Culture, Documentary

4.1 • 885 Ratings

🗓️ 9 April 2024

⏱️ 29 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Victoria Uwonkunda makes an emotional journey back to Rwanda, where she grew up. It’s the first time she’s visited since the age of 12, when she fled the 1994 genocide with her family.

Victoria retraces her journey to safety out of the capital Kigali, to the border with the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Along the way Victoria speaks to survivors of the violence – both victims and perpetrators – to find out how the country is healing, through reconciliation and forgiveness.

Victoria meets Evariste and Narcisse, who work together on a reconciliation project called Cows for Peace. Evariste killed Narcisse’s mother during the 1994 genocide. Cows are important in the Rwandan culture. Evariste and Narcisse explain their own journeys to forgiveness, healing and reconciliation. And Victoria meets Claudette, who suffered unimaginable horrors at the hands of a man, Jean Claude, sitting next to her as she tells her story.

Victoria Uwonkunda finds that Rwanda, and its people, are healing. There are those who say that the steps Rwanda has taken do not go far enough and question freedom of expression in Rwanda. But Victoria finds hope in the country, a desire to move on for a younger generation – and she finds her own peace with the country that she was born in.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This was an impregnable fortress. The only way you get out was in a wooden box.
0:05.0	The controversial maximum security prison impossible to escape from.
0:09.0	And one of the duties of a political prisoner is the escape.
0:12.0	The IRA inmates who found a way. of a political prisoner is the escape.
0:12.5	The IRA inmates who found a way.
0:14.5	I'm Carlo Gableer and I'll be navigating a path
0:19.5	through the disturbing inside story of the biggest jailbreak in British and Irish history.
0:25.0	The narrative that they want is that this is a big achievement by them.
0:28.5	Escape from the Maze, listen first on BBC Sounds.
0:36.0	BBC Sounds, BBC Sounds, Music Radio Podcasts.
0:40.0	Welcome to Seriously from BBC Radio 4. I'm Vanessa Kasulae. This podcast finds the world's best
0:47.0	audio documentaries and puts them place in my heart. I'm Victoria Wamhunda and
1:06.4	this is Randa 30 years on. After the 1994 genocide I am looking at how far the country has come in its healing journey and how much the country has changed.
1:19.0	It's a personal journey for me as it is the first time I have returned since I fled the violence with my family.
1:27.0	30 years on, how does a country and its people heal from a genocide? What mark does that leave on survivors,
1:37.0	perpetrators and future generations? Yeah.
1:43.0	Hello.
1:45.0	Was somebody here waiting for me?
1:47.0	As I got off the plane, it wasn't closed on me that this was the first time
1:52.0	I had ever landed at Kigali Airport.
1:54.0	I'd visited many times to see off and welcome family and friends,
2:01.0	but I had never set foot outside on the tarmac.
	...

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