Dr Theogene Rudasingwa (R) with Condo Gervais are the ones meeting FDLR commanders in Tanzania on behalf of RNC
Two founding members of the Rwanda National Congress (RNC) including Dr Theogene Rudasingwa are meeting in Dar es Salaam with top FDLR rebel commanders at the private residence of Tanzanian president Jakaya Kikwete, say our sources.
The two delegations arrived at the Dar es Salaam venue on Thursday (23rd January), according the sources in Tanzania. RNC coordinator Dr Theogene Rudasingwa and adviser Condo Gervais are representing RNC. FDLR is being represented by its executive secretary Lt Col Wilson Irategeka and Col Hamadi, the operations commander.
Lt Col Wilson Irategeka is the current public face of the Rwandan FDLR rebels very often appearing in media interviews. However, these are not his real names, as he is called Ndagijimana. Both Dr Rudasingwa and Condo are based in Washington.
The FDLR officers are travelling on Tanzanian passports, which is how FDLR emissaries have travelled previously. It is not entirely clear if the passports are provided officially by the State of Tanzania, or have been obtained via the backdoors by an elite faction to avoid public scrutiny.
As News of Rwanda reported this past week, former prime minister Faustin Twagiramungu was in Tanzania on the same mission since 19th January. However, he left Tanzania on Thursday for Lyon (France) where there was to preside over a scheduled delegates conference of his political group RDI Rwanda RWIZA on Saturday. Twagiramungu left before the RNC team arrived.
Meanwhile, Twagiramungu was also supposed to be at the same Dar es Salaam venue with RNC and FDLR, but had to leave for Lyon. News of Rwanda has not been able at this point to establish why exactly Twagiramungu chose to stay away. However, what is publicly known is that the former PM does not want to ever again go into a political marriage with a group involving the four RNC founders.
As the first post genocide prime minister, Twagiramungu resigned from government barely a year later. The ex-PM remains bitter with especially Dr Theogene Rudasingwa and Kayumba Nyamwasa for making his job impossible for him until he threw-in the towel. The two men were very senior officials wielding enormous political and military power.
Twagiramungu and several other Rwandan extremist groups have vowed never to go into political alliance with people who formed the establishment back in Rwanda, only to fall out of favour. For example, many of the exiled extremist politicians accuse former prosecutor general Gerald Gahima of witching-hunting them with fabricated genocide charges. Many say they had to buy their freedom even when they were innocent just to keep Gahima away from their tracks.
According to our sources, it is not the first time RNC emissaries representing its founder Kayumba Nyamwasa, have met FDLR rebels. As recent as around 20th December 2013, the same Lt Col Wilson Irategeka and Col Hamadi travelled on Tanzanian passports to Mozambique for clandestine talks with the RNC emissaries.
As has been reported, Tanzania’s insider establishment is providing the base for organization and facilitation for travel to the FDLR rebels. Around mid-last year, FDLR deputy commander General Stanislas Nzeyimana (aka Izabayo Bigaruka) was announced to be in Tanzania. But weeks later, news surfaced that he had disappeared – prompting questions as to why he was in Tanzania in the first place.
In Tanzania, the opposition is not impressed with President Kikwete’s overtures to the FDLR. Back in August last year, CHADEMA, the biggest opposition party in Tanzania, accused President Kikwete of not walking the talk back home but interfering in internal affairs of Rwanda.
“There is no prudence in President Kikwete’s statement that Rwanda should have talks with the FDLR” militia group which has been in the DR Congo jungles since 1994, said Dr. Wilbroad Slaa, CHADEMA’s General Secretary at the time.
“How come President Kikwete cannot negotiate with opposition here at home,” Dr Slaa reportedly said at a CHADEMA Youth conference for economic and employment (BAVICHA) in Dar es Salaam.
He added: “… [President Kikwete] has not taken any measure against the murderers of journalist Daudi Mwangosi…He (Kikwete) was advised to take measures against police commander in Iringa Region (Province) Michal Kamuhanda but instead he has promoted him.”
Source: http://www.newsofrwanda.com/english/22074/rnc-fdlr-holding-talks-at-president-kikwete-residence/