Some years ago I attended a panel discussion on poverty in Geneva, Switzerland. One of the panelists argued that in any community in time and space you will find a group of poor and another of rich people living side by side. This happens, the panelist argued, because those who become rich exploit, marginalize and impoverish those who ultimately become poor. This argument has presented an analytic framework for understanding the co-existence of poverty and wealth in the great lakes region (Burundi, Rwanda and southwest Uganda).
By way of introduction, by and large, in colonial Africa the whites became rich while the Africans became poor because the whites occupied the best land, got the best education and the best jobs and received government assistance in their development efforts. On the other hand, Africans were pushed onto marginal land, prevented from growing export crops, became cheap laborers, lacked good education and could not get good jobs. In areas where Africans as in Uganda were allowed to own land and grow export crops, they obtained low prices and were heavily taxed.
The whites who were equipped with modern weapons of war like the maxim gun and fighting experience were able with the assistance of some Africans (in Uganda and Ghana for example) to crush African resistance. Those African tribes who collaborated with whites in ‘pacification’ wars or looked physically like Europeans (e.g. Tutsi) were rewarded in one form or another and formed a class of privileged people. The rest were impoverished thereby beginning a process that made some ethnic groups rich and others poor. The point being stressed here is that the differences in wealth and poverty are not genetic or an act of God. It is a creation of historical and policy circumstances as outline below with reference to the great lakes region.
In the great lakes region as defined above, Batutsi, Bahima and Bahororo (Batutsi from Rwanda in Uganda) are generally wealthier than Bahutu of Rwanda and Burundi and Bairu of southwest Uganda.
About 3000 years ago, the Bantu speaking (Bahutu and Bairu) people entered the great lakes region with cows, sheep and goats and technology and an efficient governance system based on clans. They had kings, chiefs and council of elders who maintained law and order and settled disputes when they arose. Thus, contrary to popular belief Bantu people were not stateless. They grew a wide range of crops, herded livestock and manufactured many products. They sold surplus goods in local and regional markets and became wealthy. They lived in relative peace and therefore lacked fighting experience and sophisticated weapons.
About 600 years ago, poverty-stricken Nilotic Luo-speaking people from southern Sudan moved into the great lakes region with long horn cattle and fighting experience (the hostile nomadic environment forced them to engage in regular fighting over scarce pasture and water supply). They fought the relatively rich Bantu people, defeated them and redistributed Bantu wealth to themselves. In Rwanda they (Batutsi) took all the land from Bahutu and turned the once rich Bahutu people into serfs. Bahutu were denied ownership of cattle (a source of rich food and capital accumulation etc) and paid heavy tribute especially the wealthy Bahutu to their new rulers. The relationship between Batutsi and Bahutu in Burundi was more or less the same although Rwanda was an extreme case where pronounced classes existed under a feudal system.
Exploitative relations similar to those in Burundi and Rwanda also existed in southwest Uganda between Bahima and Bairu in Ankole and later on Bahororo and Bairu in Rujumbura. This is how the once rich Bairu and their Bahutu counterparts were reduced to poverty, hunger and disease and dispossessed of their assets – land and cattle.
To make matters worse, the Belgians and British indirect rule system used Batutsi, Bahima and Bahororo as their appointed chiefs who got salaries from taxes and continued to extract tribute from Bahutu and Bairu. Bahutu and Bairu also paid colonial taxes in cash, contributed free labor on public works and paid church tithes. Wealth was siphoned from Bairu and Bahutu to colonial masters and their Batutsi, Bahima and Bahororo agents. As in medieval Europe, Bahutu and Bairu were urged by priests not to worry about earthly exploitation and poverty because their rewards including wealth were in heaven. This kind of preaching intensified the exploitation and impoverishment of Bahutu and Bairu and has continued since then.
In Burundi where Batutsi retained power after independence in 1962, the pre and colonial exploitation of Bahutu continued through taxation and other charges. But what is worse is that Batutsi government emphasized the development of urban areas where the overwhelming majority of Batutsi lived and neglected the rural areas where the overwhelming majority of Bahutu resided. In this way wealth was concentrated in urban areas particularly in the capital city of Bujumbura and was enjoyed by Batutsi while poverty increased in rural areas where the overwhelming majority of Bahutu lived. This was not an act of God but a deliberate human policy decision.
Likewise in Rwanda since Batutsi under the leadership of Paul Kagame came to power in 1994, economic progress has been concentrated in the capital city of Kigali where the majority of Batutsi live while the rural areas where the majority of Bahutu are concentrated have been neglected. Michael Mann (2005) reported that “Tutsis dominate the government, the towns, and the monetized economy; Hutus have been mostly forced back into subsistence agriculture” on reduced land and are now being urged or forced to reduce their population size because they are nine times the size of Batutsi.
The donor community – which rhetorically preaches justice, human rights and equal opportunity of all citizens – is fully behind Paul Kagame’s regime. It has deliberately praised the Rwanda government for the impressive rapid economic growth taking place in Kigali the capital city of Rwanda where the majority of Tutsi lives and enjoys the benefits of urban growth derived in large part from looted resources of DRC. This looting of DRC resources was confirmed during my mission to DRC, Burundi and Rwanda early in 2010. The donor community is relatively silent about the subsistence economy situation and impoverishment of Hutu people. The major assistance being offered to Bahutu is birth control through contraception. Parliament rejected setting targets at national and couple levels which will likely be achieved through advocacy and invisible including arm twisting methods such as denying maternity leave or absence from work to attend to a sick child etc forcing Bahutu to reduce fertility rates.
Thus in Burundi under Tutsi domination and in Rwanda since 1994 under Tutsi domination, the Tutsi people have become rich while Hutu people have become poor. This is not due to genetic differences between Tutsi and Hutu but a deliberate exploitative policy since poor Batutsi came into contact with wealthy Bahutu 600 years ago. Through exploitation and domination the poor and rich groups have switched sides. The once poor Tutsi have become rich and the once rich Hutu have become poor. This has happened whether Batutsi and Bahutu live on the same hill, speak the same language, are overwhelmingly Catholics or share the same culture.
The Bahororo-led Uganda government under Yoweri Museveni (a Muhororo) which came to power in 1986 with a comprehensive development blue print contained in the ten-point program soon realized that in order for Bahororo and their Bahima cousins to become rich they had to revise their political and economic development agenda. The Museveni government switched from comprehensive development strategy to one based on development of the capital city of Kampala where the majority of Bahororo and Bahima live and earn their livelihood. Consequently 70 percent of Uganda’s income is derived from activities in the capital city. The rural areas where Bantu/Bairu and other ethnic groups live have been neglected. Agriculture receives less than four percent of budget allocation and much of this tiny allocation never gets spent there!
Like in Rwanda the donor community has deliberately focused on economic growth which is urban-based with a concentration in the capital city. Rarely does the donor community address the issues of rising poverty, disease, illiteracy, unemployment, violence and crime that afflict urban and rural population made up of non-Bahororo and non-Bahima people.
Batutsi in Burundi and Rwanda and Bahororo and Bahima in Uganda have realized that – possibly erroneously – in order to dominate Bahutu, Bairu and other ethnic groups in Uganda in perpetuity the latter groups must be impoverished. As a first step to this ultimate goal, Batutsi and Bahororo/Bahima have decided to dominate the political field because political control guarantees access to economic opportunity. That is why Kagame a Tutsi in Rwanda and Museveni a Muhororo (Tutsi from Rwanda) in Uganda are determined to cling to power by any means. The rush to consolidate the East African Economic Community particularly through population mobility and employment, the imperative of Africans learning to live together, the desire for radical land reform and redrawing of colonial borders and municipality boundaries in Uganda, as well as the formation of a political East African federation is designed to prepare the foundation for a Tutsi empire with foreign backing for their geopolitical reasons. It is much easier for foreigners to rely on minority and vulnerable groups like Batutsi, Bahima and Bahororo. The minority has also learned that to survive it is better to pursue policies favored by donors whether they bring benefits to the majority of the population or not.
As an aside, it is important to underscore that Batutsi, Bahima, Bahororo and Banyamulenge cousins have worked together and supported one another. For example, “a former Burundian government minister now living in Europe says that when Museveni was trying to establish himself militarily in Uganda, the [Tutsi] government of Burundi, through its cotton board, COTEBU, advanced him $8 million for military uniforms (Forbes Media Critic Fall 1994). During Museveni’s guerrilla war against an elected government of Uganda, his guerrilla force included some 25 percent of Batutsi. Other Batutsi contributed financial and other forms of help. Museveni’s payback was to allow the Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF) and its army to operate from Uganda without restraint (Forbes Media Critic Fall 1994).
“In 1990, when the PRF invaded Rwanda across its northern border with Uganda, more than half its initial guerrillas and most of its officers were drawn from Uganda’s army. Uganda also provided an array of small arms and other weapons systems, including recoilless cannons and Soviet-made Katyusa multiple-rocket launchers” (Foreign Affairs September/October 1994). Uwe Freisecke added that “The military leaders of the RPF were all high-ranking officers in Museveni’s army. So it would be fair to say, that on 1 October 1990, the Ugandan army invaded Rwanda, even if they called themselves ‘rebels’” (New African November 2002).
The fear in the Great Lakes region that the Tutsi were planning the creation of a Tutsi empire was primarily the reason that Mugabe and other leaders in the area supported Kabila during the Tutsi waged war of 1998/99. “Zimbabwe President Mugabe, despite considerable criticism from his own cabinet as well as opposition figures , saw the danger of Tutsi empire in the middle of Africa” (Josepth N. Weatherby 2003). Mugabe persuaded Angola and Namibia to join him (Martin Meredith 2003).
By way of conclusion, let us return to our story of poverty and wealth distribution in the great lakes region. The good news is that non-Batutsi, Bahima and Bahororo in Burundi, Rwanda and Uganda are beginning to understand why they are poor and the underlying mechanisms and main players. They have begun to talk and to write about it emphasizing that their poverty is not an act of God and are not going to tolerate further exploitation. The earlier Batutsi, Bahima and Bahororo and their external backers realize this change in perception and take corrective steps the better for all. Short of that the region is bound to experience another spell of ugly and deadly confrontations. Working together we can prevent it.