Mukize’s four-year journey to SA on foot from Rwanda
|Published
Johannesburg - After embarking on a four-year journey to South Africa by foot from Rwanda and finally entering South Africa through Mozambique, Hesron Mukize, said he saw the face of human rights.
Mukize has been living in South Africa for the last 20 years, he is married with three children, and survives through informal trading and what he describes as hustling in Hillbrow.
He told the panel discussion on Human Rights on the continent hosted by the Higher Education Media Services, that for those living in war-torn countries on the continent, human rights were an unimaginable ideal.
Mukize said he went through several countries to get to South Africa. These included Uganda, Congo, Tanzania and Mozambique.
“While today people take a four-hour plane to come to South Africa from Rwanda, I took a four-year walk. I was just wandering from country to country. I finally got here in 1998,” he said.
Mukize said he fled Rwanda because of the ethnic genocide that was taking place. Two tribes were at war with each other - the Hutu and the Tutsi. The war was so bad that children’s lives were not spared, women were raped and neighbours turned on each other. There were bodies at every corner of every village.
“I did not know the dates and I did not know what time it was - all I knew was each day when the sun goes down, I have to fend for my life and when the sun is up, I need to find the next place where I will be safe,” he said.
Yet the land of human rights that Mukize had yearned to be in, has not always been kind to him. He is still struggling to receive permanent citizenship in South Africa, all his children were born in South Africa yet his children’stheir birth records still dub them as, “stateless”.
“While I have issues with South African Home Affairs, what should I do? Even when these xenophobia things come and people say we must go back to our countries, I say why should we do that; we also want to taste this freedom that you have,” he said.
Mukize said when he got to Swaziland before reaching South Africa, he could not speak a word of English. Immigration officers in that country told him to walk back to Rwanda because there was a language barrier.
“I was coming from a French-speaking background. When they said go, I said where should I go I cannot walk back to Rwanda? ” Mukize said.
He said what he liked about South Africa was the warmth of its people. He then walked to the border of Swaziland and South Africa and was welcomed by South African soldiers who gave him food and water.
“One of them spoke Swahili so he asked me where I was going, I said Durban.”
Panellists at the seminar, which was held in Johannesburg, delved into discussions concerning the forces and elements that were interfering in the continents’ enjoyment of abundance of Human Rights, It was clear from the panellists that the remnants of colonialism and post liberation investment into African countries were major factors in Human Rights issues on the continent. The Star’s Editor Sifiso Mahlangu was among the panellists.
Human Rights Lawyer Magdalene Moonsamy told the seminar that she had a particular concern about free and fair elections on the continent. Many African states are known to for vote rigging and grabbing power by force after colonial rule; this came with a number of human rights violations.
“If one can prove to me an uncontested and free and perfect election that would be the day I have nothing to say, I must ask myself whether the state of human rights in South Africa does not come before the consideration that this continent was going to be mutilated, desecrated and violated by a whole bunch of Europeans who had their own barbarism. They understood a hegemony, the hegemony that is understood is not a hegemony that is understood in Africa,” she said.
Amir Sheikh from the Africa Diaspora Forum told the seminar that there was a concern with the handing over of power in post-colonial Africa. There were many scenarios were the presidency of a country would become a family dynasty. There were also issues of politicians milking the resources of their respective countries through the help of external forces.
“They say power goes to the head and absolute power corrupts and that is true. Another thing is the emergence of dictators on the continent,” Sheikh said.
The Deputy Minister of Corporative governance and Traditional Affairs, Obed Bapela, said there were efforts to deal with the lack of visionary leadership practices on the continent.
“When we see African leaders get together we no longer see that inspiration that we should get, I think we are in a phase that is maybe too cautious or too diplomatic.”
Bapela said that whilst there were many contemporary African leaders who were committed to changing Africa’s image as corrupt and without vision, but are unable to act due to resistance from vested interest groups and interference from the West.
It’s therefore understandable that young people are losing patience with the current crop of African politicians, he said.
“The young people are now saying you old people must move because we want to push.”
The Star