Genocide looms in DR Congo as government incites violence against Congolese Tutsis with hate speech

Authorities of the Democratic Republic of Congo have publicly been stoking hate against Kinyarwanda-speaking, Tutsi citizens of that country. The result is gruesome incidents of violence that are escalating into genocide. All is the doing of the government of Felix Tshisekedi.

The hate speech campaign against Rwanda, which within Congo specifically targets Congolese Tutsis, is amplified on Congolese social media accounts as well as in the domestic media. Video and audio clips have gone viral in which senior Congolese officials are heard inciting genocide against Congolese whose only crime is that they were born Tutsi. We know how that goes, and the world ought to sit up and take note!

In one of the clips, a senior police officer, the Provincial Police Commissioner for North Kivi, General Aba Van Ang, while addressing police officers at a fall-in called upon Congolese to take up traditional arms (machetes, spears, hammers) to “kill every Rwandan on Congolese soil.” Important to note is that such incitement is done with the false accusation that Congolese Tutsis are “foreigners” (Rwandans). One wonders how in this day and age such blind hate is possible. Nevertheless, that is the policy of Tshisekedi.

It’s also important to note that DR Congo, a state member of the United Nations, has an obligation to adhere to the Genocide Convention. As stipulated in its Article 2, these are “acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group is a genocide.” The Congolese government not only is in dereliction of this convention, it is actively and deliberately stoking the fires of genocide.

In Congolese towns thousands of hate-fueled people have taken to the streets to close them and hunt down their Tutsi neighbors whom they are persecuting and killing. Armed gangs (encouraged by the rhetoric of senior Congolese officials) maraud with machetes like Interahamwe, hunting for Banyamulenge and other Tutsi people, to massacre them.

The International Community must see these activities for what they are: crimes against humanity for which the government of Tshisekedi is directly responsible.