The Role Of European Imperialism In Rwanda

Between the 15th and 19th century, Europeans began to take some interest in Africa and it was not until the mid-18th century that Europeans took more interest in slave trade and natural resources in the continent of Africa. To exploit African countries from their wealth, Europeans tried to accomplish this goal by overpowering African people and forcing them underneath European control. In later years, without the permission of African countries, European nations split up African territories and colonized them ("Colonialism in Africa"). This was no exception to the African country of Rwanda. In Frantz Fanon book, The Wretched of the Earth, he asserts that there is a need for a violent rebellion from the colonized onto the colonists. He also …show more content…
Rwanda was once underneath the rule of Germany until the end of World War I, where the Belgians then took control (Richard). Under the control of Belgium, inhabitants of Rwanda making up of Hutus, Tutsis, and Twas were “forced to pay taxes and grow cash crops such as coffee” (Richard). From 1926 to 1933, a commonly named reorganization under the Belgian control was the Mortehan reform named after the Belgian, Georges Mortehan. The Mortehan reform caused major economic, political, cultural, and social transformations to Rwanda. For many years, the Belgians continued to rule through the Tutsi king that was already established in Rwanda. By the 1920s, the Belgians removed the Tutsi king while also ignoring the line of succession and picked their own candidate to replace the king. Nevertheless, the Belgians did favorite the Tutsi people because they believed that the Tutsi were more “racially superior to the Hutu ethnic group because the [Tutsis] had more “European” features” (Richard). The Belgians only educated Tutsi males because they believed that they were more intelligence than the other ethnic group, Hutus, which caused administration to allow “Tutsis to attain higher education and hold positions of power” (“The Heart of the Hutu-Tutsi …show more content…
On April 6, 1994, the president of Rwanda, Habyarimana, plane was shot down and he was killed along with many others aboard, leaving no survivors on the plane. This was one of the leading factors that lead to the genocide of the Tutsi in Rwanda. “Within an hour of the plane crash, the Presidential Guard together with members of the Rwandan Armed Forces (FAR) and Hutu militia groups known as the Interahamwe (“Those Who Attack Together”) and Impuzamugambi (“Those Who Have the Same Goal”) set up roadblocks and barricades and began slaughtering Tutsis” (History.com Staff). The genocide was planned and directed by the top levels of government in Rwanda, where in some situations, the “Hutu civilians were forced to murder their Tutsi neighbors by military personnel” (“Rwanda: How the Genocide