The struggle for independence and the 1959 crisis

1Why this matters

Rwanda became independent on 1 July 1962, a date celebrated every year. But the road to independence was marked by violence against the Tutsi that began in November 1959 and forced hundreds of thousands into exile. That refugee problem shaped Rwandan history for the next 35 years.

2Why Rwandans demanded independence

• Trusteeship. From 1946 the UN required Belgium to prepare Rwanda for self-government, and UN Visiting Missions reported on its progress.
• Africa-wide nationalism. Ghana became independent in 1957, and the Belgian Congo was moving towards independence (achieved on 30 June 1960).
• An educated elite had emerged from mission schools and seminaries.
• The Mwami's leadership. Mutara III Rudahigwa and the High Council pressed for faster self-government.

31957: two documents

• The "Mise au point" (February 1957), from the High Council of the Country, demanded faster moves to self-government and more education.
• The Bahutu Manifesto (24 March 1957), written by nine Hutu intellectuals including Grégoire Kayibanda, described Rwanda's problem as domination by one "race", and asked for the ethnic labels on identity cards to be kept. It raised real social grievances, but framed them in the colonial language of race.

4Political parties (1957–1959)

5The 1959 crisis

• 25 July 1959: Mutara III Rudahigwa died suddenly in Usumbura. The cause of death has never been clearly established; many Rwandans believe he was killed because he was demanding independence.
• 28 July 1959: at his funeral at Mwima (Nyanza), Kigeli V Ndahindurwa was proclaimed Mwami without Belgian approval.
• 1 November 1959: Dominique Mbonyumutwa, a PARMEHUTU sub-chief, was attacked by UNAR youths in Gitarama. False rumours of his death spread, and waves of attacks on Tutsi followed across much of the country: homes were burned, many people were killed and thousands fled.
• Colonel Guy Logiest, appointed to restore order, replaced large numbers of Tutsi chiefs with Hutu ones. Those who had led the attacks were rarely punished.

PARMEHUTU and the Belgian administration called these events a "social revolution". Rwanda today teaches them as the beginning of organised violence against the Tutsi and their mass exile, carried out with the support of the colonial administration.

6From crisis to independence

• June–July 1960: communal elections, held amid insecurity, were won by PARMEHUTU. Kigeli V left the country in July 1960 and was not allowed to return.
• 28 January 1961: at a meeting in Gitarama organised with Belgian support, PARMEHUTU leaders proclaimed the monarchy abolished and Rwanda a republic, with Dominique Mbonyumutwa as provisional president. This is known as the Gitarama coup.
• 25 September 1961: UN-supervised elections and a referendum (kamarampaka) confirmed the end of the monarchy. PARMEHUTU won a large majority, and on 26 October 1961 Kayibanda became president.
• 1 July 1962: Rwanda became independent, and Ruanda-Urundi split into two states, Rwanda and Burundi.

7Consequences

• The monarchy ended and Rwanda became a republic.
• By the mid-1960s more than 300,000 Tutsi were refugees in Uganda, Burundi, Tanganyika and the Congo, and they were refused the right to return.
• Politics and the state were organised along ethnic lines, and violence against Tutsi went unpunished, a pattern that continued after independence.

Worked example: cause and trigger

Question: Was the attack on Mbonyumutwa the cause of the 1959 violence?

It was the trigger, the event that set the violence off. The causes were deeper: decades of colonial "race" teaching and favouritism, the Bahutu Manifesto's ethnic framing, the administration's switch to supporting PARMEHUTU, and the struggle over who would rule after independence. A trigger explains when something happened; causes explain why.

Practice

Solution. It asked for the ethnic labels on identity cards to be kept. This shows that the colonial practice of classifying Rwandans had been absorbed into the politics of the time, and the labels survived into independent Rwanda.

Solution. The Gitarama coup: PARMEHUTU leaders, with Belgian support, proclaimed the monarchy abolished and Rwanda a republic, with Dominique Mbonyumutwa as provisional president.

Solution. The trigger was the attack on Dominique Mbonyumutwa on 1 November 1959. The causes were the colonial race theory and favouritism, the ethnic framing of politics, the administration's switch of support and the struggle for power before independence.

Solution. Any two of: the end of the monarchy; more than 300,000 Tutsi refugees by the mid-1960s, denied return; ethnic politics; unpunished violence against Tutsi that continued after independence.