A Rwandan government program to stop people living in thatched houses as part of a plan to alleviate poverty left hundreds of Batwa Pygmy families homeless, according to advocacy groups including Survival International.
The eradication of the dwellings, which began in 2008, stepped up this year after the federal budget for the project more than doubled to 4 billion Rwandan francs ($6.7 million), said Augustin Kampayana, chairman of the Rural Resettlement Taskforce. Since 2009, the state eliminated 116,000 thatched houses and will remove the remaining 8,000 by July, he said.
“The biggest problem is that the Batwa were not told their houses would be destroyed,” said Kalimba Zephyrin, director of Communaute des Potiers du Rwanda, an advocacy group that works to protect the interests of Batwa Pygmies. “It was done without preparation or communication.”
Pygmy peoples, whose average height is less than 5 feet, have lived as hunters and gatherers in forests across central Africa for thousands of years, according to Survival International, the London-based advocacy group. The traditional habitats of pygmies, who number about 500,000, are being destroyed by logging, war and famine, displacing their communities, the group says.
“Rwanda’s Batwa continue to face racism and discrimination on a daily basis,” Survival said in a May 25 e-mailed statement. “Most eke out a meager living as wage laborers or potters after their communities were forced from their forest homes to create national parks free from human habitation.”
“There is a lot people gain by living in villages rather than scattered around in those houses that are not decent,” he said in a May 27 interview in Kigali, Rwanda’s capital.
Of the 8,000 Batwa families in fixed homes in Rwanda, as many as 80 percent were living in thatched houses last year, according to Zephyrin. Most of those people have been given replacement homes or news roofs, he said in a May 25 interview. Many others were forced to evacuate their homes without the resources to find a new place to live, he said.
“At first, they refused, but then they were forced by police, army and local security forces,” he said. “The Batwa are all poor, so they had nowhere to go.”
In Bidudu, a small cluster of houses occupied by Batwa people in the countryside outside of Kigali, residents including Cecilia Nyiranteziryayo, a 29-year-old mother of five, said most of their houses were destroyed or damaged when local authorities removed the thatched roofs off their mud and stone homes in February. And while the structures still standing were given sheet metal roofs, those that fell remain piles of rubble.
When asked if the Batwa people were being treated differently than the majority of people who are either ethnic Hutu or Tutsi, Kampayana said that the Rwandan government neither recognizes ethnicities, nor discriminates against them.
Since Rwanda’s genocide in 1994, when 800,000 ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus died in a 100-day slaughter by extremist Hutus, the government has instituted a justice and reconciliation program that includes eliminating the formal acknowledgement of ethnicity. The Batwa Pygmies are known as a “historically marginalized people” in the country.
“For us, as a government, we are all one person,” he said. “We are all Rwandese.”
To contact the reporter on this story: Heather Murdock in Kigali via Nairobi at pmrichardson@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Paul Richardson at pmrichardson@bloomberg.net.
The eradication of the dwellings, which began in 2008, stepped up this year after the federal budget for the project more than doubled to 4 billion Rwandan francs ($6.7 million), said Augustin Kampayana, chairman of the Rural Resettlement Taskforce. Since 2009, the state eliminated 116,000 thatched houses and will remove the remaining 8,000 by July, he said.
“The biggest problem is that the Batwa were not told their houses would be destroyed,” said Kalimba Zephyrin, director of Communaute des Potiers du Rwanda, an advocacy group that works to protect the interests of Batwa Pygmies. “It was done without preparation or communication.”
Pygmy peoples, whose average height is less than 5 feet, have lived as hunters and gatherers in forests across central Africa for thousands of years, according to Survival International, the London-based advocacy group. The traditional habitats of pygmies, who number about 500,000, are being destroyed by logging, war and famine, displacing their communities, the group says.
“Rwanda’s Batwa continue to face racism and discrimination on a daily basis,” Survival said in a May 25 e-mailed statement. “Most eke out a meager living as wage laborers or potters after their communities were forced from their forest homes to create national parks free from human habitation.”
Snake Bites
The program being carried out by the Rwandan government aims to alleviate poverty by moving people into organized villages, allowing farmers to increase production on consolidated, fertilized lands and improve the health and safety of communities, Kampayana said. Thatched houses, he said, are prone to fires and leaks and residents are vulnerable to bites from insects and snakes.“There is a lot people gain by living in villages rather than scattered around in those houses that are not decent,” he said in a May 27 interview in Kigali, Rwanda’s capital.
Of the 8,000 Batwa families in fixed homes in Rwanda, as many as 80 percent were living in thatched houses last year, according to Zephyrin. Most of those people have been given replacement homes or news roofs, he said in a May 25 interview. Many others were forced to evacuate their homes without the resources to find a new place to live, he said.
“At first, they refused, but then they were forced by police, army and local security forces,” he said. “The Batwa are all poor, so they had nowhere to go.”
‘Cramped’ Housing
Most moved into “cramped” government housing or temporary residences provided by international organizations, Zephyrin said. About 450 families continue to camp in the open, waiting for new government homes, he said.In Bidudu, a small cluster of houses occupied by Batwa people in the countryside outside of Kigali, residents including Cecilia Nyiranteziryayo, a 29-year-old mother of five, said most of their houses were destroyed or damaged when local authorities removed the thatched roofs off their mud and stone homes in February. And while the structures still standing were given sheet metal roofs, those that fell remain piles of rubble.
When asked if the Batwa people were being treated differently than the majority of people who are either ethnic Hutu or Tutsi, Kampayana said that the Rwandan government neither recognizes ethnicities, nor discriminates against them.
Since Rwanda’s genocide in 1994, when 800,000 ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus died in a 100-day slaughter by extremist Hutus, the government has instituted a justice and reconciliation program that includes eliminating the formal acknowledgement of ethnicity. The Batwa Pygmies are known as a “historically marginalized people” in the country.
“For us, as a government, we are all one person,” he said. “We are all Rwandese.”
To contact the reporter on this story: Heather Murdock in Kigali via Nairobi at pmrichardson@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Paul Richardson at pmrichardson@bloomberg.net.
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