For years Paul Kagame, Rwanda’s uncompromising leader, has routinely denied that his country backs Tutsi militias in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, let alone that troops from his own Rwandan army have infiltrated the giant, mineral-rich neighbour.
But since last month when Rwandan-backed M23 rebels marched brazenly into Goma, the biggest city in eastern Congo with nearly 2mn people, no one even pretends to believe him.
Marco Rubio, US secretary of state, told the 67-year-old leader of the tiny, landlocked, central African state last week that the US was “deeply troubled” by M23’s capture of Goma in which nearly 3,000 people have died, according to a senior UN official.
A recent UN report found that, even before the fall of Goma, Rwandan-backed militiamen, supported by up to 4,000 Rwandan troops, were tightening their grip on ever-larger parts of eastern Congo. This week, after abandoning a unilateral ceasefire, M23 took the mining town of Nyabibwe as it advanced further into the province of South Kivu. David Lammy, Britain’s foreign secretary, told Kagame the invasion was jeopardising $1bn of aid.
Rwanda, which has recovered from the genocide of 1994 to become one of the continent’s few development success stories, is now in danger of igniting a regional conflict that could suck in other countries.
Kagame’s apparent carelessness in covering his tracks could put at risk the country’s hard-earned reputation for stability, which has helped establish Rwanda as a tourist and conference destination and attracted investments from the likes of Volkswagen, Qatar Airways and BioNTech, which makes mRNA vaccines.
For a small country, just one-ninetieth the size of resource-endowed Congo, Rwanda has curated a global brand through such successes as well as through sponsorship deals with Arsenal, Bayern Munich and Paris Saint-Germain football clubs and a high-profile partnership with the US’s National Basketball Association. Kinshasa is now pressing for sporting franchises to ditch Kigali.
“The recovery of Rwanda from genocide through the will and leadership of Kagame is one of the small wonders of the world,” said Chidi Odkinkalu, professor at Tufts University’s Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. “But Kagame’s refusal to accept a pacific solution in eastern Congo is going to be a terrible blot on his legacy.”
Some content could not load. Check your internet connection or browser settings.
Rwanda’s leader has long walked a thin reputational line between hero and villain. He has been lauded for his country’s palpable — if allegedly overstated — developmental successes and vilified for the ruthless manner in which he has imposed his will both at home, through political oppression, and abroad, through targeted assassinations — something that Kagame denies.
In the first two decades of this century, Rwanda grew at above 7 per cent annually and added a year of life expectancy every 12 months.
“You can never underestimate the Rwandans’ PR capability nor the desperation of the whole aid industry for a success story,” said Joe Studwell, an academic and author, seeking to explain the willingness of Kagame’s western backers to overlook his authoritarianism and extraterritorial ambitions.
Kagame dismisses what he sees as glib appeals for a western-style democracy as ignoring the realities of a country in which the Hutu majority tried to eliminate his Tutsi minority, butchering 1mn Tutsis and their Hutu sympathisers.
Dele Olojede, who won a Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of the Rwandan genocide and its aftermath, says Kagame’s actions can only be understood in the context of the horrors of 1994. “When you have experienced a genocide, it is fair to say a certain paranoia takes hold,” he said. “The overriding feeling is: ‘Never again’.”
Kagame has until now maintained a careful ambiguity over Rwanda’s “strategic depth” in lawless eastern Congo where more than 100 militia groups vie for control of gold mines and critical metals resources needed for mobile phones and laptops.
But in recent weeks, say analysts, the mask has slipped. When CNN put it to Kagame in an interview this week that he was acting like Russian President Vladimir Putin, Rwanda’s leader seemed to almost relish the comparison. “I may be called anything. What can I do about it?” he replied. “We have to do what we have to do to make sure we survive any storm that blows across our country.”
The UN report says that, in a single year, 150 tonnes of coltan, used in electronics, were “fraudulently exported to Rwanda and mixed with Rwandan production”. Kinshasa claims Congo is losing $1bn in revenue through metals smuggled into Rwanda.
Kagame has accused the Congolese government of “working alongside genocidal armed groups like FDLR which target Rwanda”, a reference to a Hutu armed group with its roots in the genocidaires who fled Rwanda when Kagame’s rebel army marched into Kigali in 1994.
Analysts have downplayed the threat the FDLR poses to Rwanda, but Olojede says that Kagame’s Rwanda, like Israel, will do anything to protect its people both at home and abroad.
While some experts argue that Kagame is overplaying his hand, others say he has correctly calculated that now is the time to raise the stakes. In an era when borders are being threatened from Greenland to Gaza, Rwanda’s leader appears to have concluded that this it is an opportune moment to redraw the colonial map.
Ben Shepherd, a consulting fellow at UK think-tank Chatham House, says Kagame may be taking an intentional gamble that control of Congolese minerals is worth more than dwindling international aid.
“Maybe this is Kagame reading the room accurately,” he said. “Getting in there early and creating facts on the ground — regardless of costs to Congolese civilians and regional stability.”
Cartography by Steven Bernard