REVIEW OF NOVAT NINTUNZE'S BURUNDI 1972. MASSACRE DES TUTSIS DANS LE SUD. SOUVENIRS ET TEMOIGNAGES (Bujumbura, Iwacu, 2019, 212 pages)
[Disponible en français]
By Emmanuel Nkurunziza,
Toronto, Ontario.
The book bears witness to the genocide that befell the ethnic Tutsis of Burundi in 1972, focusing on the southern part of the country. Burundi 1972 looks like a series of fragments, but which read coherently. One needs to underscore from the onset that it bears a considerable dose of repetition. This is something quite understandable, if not predictable, given that repetition is listed among “the various factors affecting the testimony and the transmission.”[1] Thus, since Nintunze’s book comprises no less than 12 oral testimonies, repetition is understandably a frequent feature. A look at the actors (perpetrators and victims) is the other key element in bringing to surface Burundi 1972’s contribution to the writing of the history of the country.
The Tutsis as targeted victims
With regard to the victims, it is essential to note that the book unequivocally explains where that status comes from: the Tutsi are the target of a genocide intended to wipe them out from the face of earth. Burundi 1972 identifies a sub-category that was targeted particularly, i.e. members of the order of Abashingantahe.[2] As well, one ascertains through Burundi 1972 the trans-border nature of the genocide under discussion. There are Tanzanian Tutsis who were killed alongside their Burundian kinsmen (152).[3]
Still within the depiction of the victimhood of the Tutsi community of Burundi, equally meaningful is the cruel targeting of cows during the 1972 campaign of killing, which Nintunze mentions briefly in his book (152). Yet, although the author seems to have refrained from developing the lyrical link between Tutsi people and their cattle, it is a fact that later tragedies, especially in 1993 and in the years that followed, produced further evidence of cruelty against those animals which are sometimes perceived as Tutsi symbols. To anyone who is familiar with the special relation link that the Tutsi people are said to entertain with cows, it is hard to grasp Burundi 1972’s limited focus on that nearly-agreed upon symbol of “Tutsiness.”[4]
The category of victims comprises also what some might term collateral damages pertains chiefly to the ethnic Hutus who were killed by their fellow kinsmen for not participating in the killings their Tutsi neighbors. There are scores of other Hutus who were killed because they had refused to kill the Tutsi from the beginning. Ironically, though, some others Hutus within this particular group of victims had participated in making victims in the ranks of Tutsi peasantry early in the campaign to grow tired or having second thoughts (114).
The killers and their helpers
As there cannot be a victim of a crime without a perpetrator, it is compulsory to look at the killers and their helpers as presented in Burundi 1972. One thing that transpires throughout Nintunze’s book is how their identity is very well documented. Some might find this to stem from the particular context under which these testimonies are published. The book’s precise documentation of the whereabouts of killers of nearly fifty years ago is a plus. A fact not to be minimized is how it runs counter to the prevailing rhetoric of reconciliation. In the current trends, people are encouraged to not mention or, least of all, claim reparation for the killings of their loved ones.[5] No matter how adverse this may seem to the forgiveness rhetoric, this single aspect of Burundi 1972 could qualify as keystone to its unique contribution to the writing of Burundi’s history (quod vid). Possibly, it can be inferred that the availability of details on the identity of the killers comes from the fact that most of them were neighbors to their would-be victims.
The killers' attitude
Burundi 1972 provides a lot of information about the ways in which the victims were put to death. In addition to the emblematic machete, the other techniques resorted to include the burning of victims with dried banana leaves (106).
The killers’ conduct or attitude towards the victims is another aspect that is revealed in the book. The reader is struck by the deployment of cynicism in its most advanced form. For example, victims are given the ultimate favor of choosing between being hacked with a machete or thrown in a burning house as their mode of death (160). Nintunze’s book is commendable for its precision in the description of the arrogance of the killers when they threaten the designated Tutsi victims. Although the killers are described in some instances as being guided both by the desire to eliminate ethnic Tutsis and to loot their riches, there is a good supply of coded and uncoded expressions of the perpetrators’ assurance in their utterance of threat throughout (119-132).
Beside killers and victims, Burundi 1972 isolates two categories of actors who could qualify both as perpetrators and as victims judging from their actions. The first particular group is the leadership of the JRR youth movement, which some of the literature pertaining to the killings of 1972 characterizes as the backbone of the repression machine. Yet, Nintunze’s book identifies whole areas in the southern Province of Makamba where the JRR leadership not only consisted of Hutus exclusively but also coordinated the killing campaign against the Tutsi (122).
The other group is what can be called the just among nations. Burundi 1972 gives account of some Hutus who were at first reluctant to kill their friends or acquaintances in neighborhood (103).[6] Nonetheless, one asks oneself whether it is advisable to bestow on them the prestigious qualifier on this category, given that some of them did indeed save lives, but ended up returning to the odious exercise of killing innocent people (153).[7]
Kindness to some Tutsi women as disguised gendercide
The analysis of actors in Burundi 1972 would not be complete if one does not find out why some Tutsi people were preserved in the middle of that killing frenzy that was meant to annihilate that ethnic group. No one reader can fail to notice what appears to be mercy for some Tutsi women, who were sometimes spared death by the very killers who would put to death the husbands and male kids under their eyes. Instead of magnanimity, this is rather another way of assuring the annihilation of the targeted group.[8] In other words, in such a patrilineal society like that of Burundi, the group (ethnicity, clan, etc.) is perpetuated by sons, not by daughters: once married, women adopt the clan of their in-laws. Thus, rather than a sign of compassion, the apparent kindness to some Tutsi women was a ruse to disguise gendercide against the male component, which would be itself a surer way to achieve the genocide of the whole community.
A book of remembrances and acknowledgements
As would be expected from most autobiographies, Burundi 1972 features memories, some good, others bad; with the author hammering on some a bit more than he does on others. Thus, Nintunze uses Burundi 1972 to acknowledge the benefactors who contributed considerably to his achievements especially in his youth (36-37). The author’s memories are not limited to his youth. Remembrance, if not commemoration of major historical events, is present. A case in point is the 1997 massacre of Junior Seminarists at Buta (50).[9]
One other major point raised in Burundi 1972 is the extent of the dissemination and implementation of the genocide ideology against the Tutsi. Throughout this book, we discover that the violence against the Tutsi in 1972 not only reached an unprecedented level, but as well, the perpetrators reached a point of self-confidence unheard of so far. For instance, some do not hesitate to go around with severed body parts of their Tutsi victims. This has left marks in the memories of many witnesses.[10]
Burundi 1972 brings also to surface the involvement of religious figures. The book informs the reader about the distribution of the various roles of the criminal plan in general, and it sheds light on why adherence to the genocidal ideology reached those abysmal heights that we know: the movement got a boost from the participation of such respected figures as preachers of religion. Among other things revealed by this book in this regard, is how the Protestant clerics in Makamba played a more significant role in the sensitization to the genocidal plan. One notes, however, that their involvement was limited to the early stages, which required absolute secrecy lest the plan would be discovered Burundi intelligence services. It is their renowned sobriety that made them preferable for this mission. According to Nintunze’s book, though the Roman Catholics Hutus were not privy to the secret plan, they are the ones who carried most of the killings.
Reproduction of cliches
Nintunze’ book transpires pronounced influences from the current state of political affairs in Burundi and in the world at large. Though writing from the USA, a part of the world on which the subject matter of his writing has supposedly no ascendance, the author still reproduces part of the media and political discourses that are normally characteristic of the press in Burundi. He refers to the 1972 killers as “insurgés hutu” (Hutu insurgents), and to some extent, reflects the amalgamation between Tutsi and Ganwa that we come across in the available literature on Burundi history.[11] It is worth noting, though, that this has been prevailing unchallenged for decades as reflected in the small portion of Burundi contemporary history that happens to be written --notwithstanding some timid attacks by a few critics and activists. Despite Nintunze’s stand in his book, which seems to proceed from the fact that in all the violence that Burundi has experienced since regaining its independence in 1962, the Ganwa have traditionally been assimilated with the Tutsi and were therefore killed alongside members of the latter group.[12]
A unique contribution
The primary achievement of Burundi 1972 is to have covered the grey area left by the grand narratives of the killings 1972 whose common core is to portray the targeted Tutsi victim as the kliller. With its incontrovertible factual information, the book challenges already existing publications while compelling the authors of the emerging brand of memory-writers and critiques alike to take into account his emblematically resisting piece from now on.
As a book belonging to Iwacu’s “Collection Témoins,” Burundi 1972 sets itself apart from the others thanks to its detailed genealogies. They are in considerable supply in Nintunze’s book, but they are nearly inexistent in most books of the memory and testimony the series.[13]
Burundi 1972’s unique input remains, by far, the contribution to the missing stone in the Burundi history edifice -- and only God knows how badly the latter needs completing. Though the story in Nintunze’s book is a personal account of events that he experienced mainly as a young boy in 1972, it connects to the rest of narratives, especially when it comes to the author's reference and discussion of macrocosmic facts.
As a story produced by a Tutsi in order to count the plight of his people whose 1972 genocide runs the risk of being overwhelmed in the grand narratives, Burundi 1972 may qualify as resistance narratives that displays “historically specific analyses of the ideological and material conditions out of which they are generated.”[14] It is no exaggeration either to state that Novat Nintunze’s Burundi 1972. Massacres des Tutsi dans le Sud. Souvenirs et Temoignages” is in the resistance category. It was published in a context of “conflicting voices that dramatize the authoritarian manipulation.”[15]As well, Nintunze’s narrative can be a reliable historical account worth considering in the edification of Burundi history. The book passes any credibility test launched from a memory-study standpoint. It is also immune from failing in any oral-testimony based test.[16]
Unsuspected potential
Burundi 1972 should be commended because it goes beyond supplying the parts that were missing to the history of Burundi. Rather than limiting itself to the inevitable lyrical idealization of one’s birthplace (32), the book introduces the reader to the categories of the Makamba population, whereby the main identification measures seems to be not only clans but also (the level of) wealth and religious creed. The protestants are said to have been the most well to do as compared to Roman Catholics (26).
From a linguistic perspective, the author is to congratulate for his careful orthography of Rundi toponyms, as well as for his treatment of loanwords. The book is also commendable for its representation of anthroponyms.[17] Reading the book, one cannot fail to notice that care was taken to ensure top quality for the written language.
In lieu of a conclusion
It would be inaccurate to affirm that Burundi 1972 is flawless. The book bears a number of errors of typographical nature, chiefly layout or language-form related. Obviously, this category of errors is quite benign, but there are few others that are potentially misleading for an untrained eye. One such example is the fuzzy identification of the 1972 killers.[18]
Despite its considerable supply of unknown, unsuspected facts about the 1972 genocide against the Tutsi, Burundi 1972 leaves us with a number of unanswered questions. About these ones, though, one needs to be fair with Burundi 1972’s and acknowledge that no historical book dealing with war is complete.
OVERALL, Nintunze’s book contributes to the writing of the 1972 Tutsi genocide that has been distorted for so long. And given its content, and considering the period of its publication, Burundi 1972 explains today’s situation in light of that past that still refuses to pass.Up to the informed reader to mind the two ditches of under interpretation and over-interpretation running parallel to the testimony lane on both sides.
Novat Nintunze, Burundi 1972. Massacre des Tutsis dans le Sud. Souvenirs et Témoignages, Bujumbura, Éditions Iwacu, 2019, 212 pages.
----------------------------------------
[1] For the role of repetition is an indication factor in memories and oral testimony, see Jan Vansina. Oral Tradition: a Study in Historical Methodology. Translated. by H.M. Wright. Chicago: Aldine Publishing, 1965, pages 43- 47
[2] A traditional institution whose members were wise men incorporated through a rigorous process that would ensure that they are imbued with values of fairness, equity, justice, etc. The author suggests that Ntamuheza (Burundi 1972, pages 124-125) was such an example
[3] Numbers between brackets refer to pages in Burundi 1972.
[4] Save one laconic mention on page 152. Interestingly enough, during the presentation of Burundi 1972 [May 19th, 2019 in Ottawa, Canada] the editor joked about the Tutsi who returned to his burning house to detach and save a calf that was inside; it was referred to as a sign of presence of humour in Nintunze’s book.
[5] In my understanding, to grant forgiveness for a past wrong, one needs to know first and foremost the perpetrator and the circumstances surrounding the premeditation and the commission of the crime. Burundi 1972 provides just a few instances
[6] Later, in 1993, those methods would be improved
[7] This connects to the account of survivors of the 1993 genocide in the Province of Karuzi. They were hidden and protected by a neighbor but who would come back home every evening with his machete covered with blood of people he had been killing.
[8] The UN Investigation Commission was careful enough in pointing out that detail, namely, that the killing of Tutsi men and boys proceeds from the very foundations of the genocide crime itself. (UN, Security Council Report S/1996/682, paragraph 481). The most accurate illustration of what Réné Lemarchand terms selective genocide elsewhere and for other purposes.
[9] The author refers to the whose perpetrators as “combatants.”
[10]For example, the driver who went around with the severed head of his victim is found in more than one fragment. See Burundi 1972, pages 64 and 115
[11] In my opinion, it not all accurate to call “insurgents” the perpertrators of the 1972genocide against the Tutsi. Their attacks were not targeting any defense or security force infrastructures or other government building as experienced in modern-time insurgency in Syria, Irak, or Afghanistan, etc.
Concerning the ganwa-Tutsi amalgamation, please refer to Burundi 1972, pages 44, 64, 89.
[12] Most Burundian analysts believe that nowadays, though, many members of the Ganwa aristocracy are experiencing increasing favors and overtures from the ruling Hutu, to which they responding rather positively.
[13] For instance, compared to Antoine Kaburahe’s Hutsi. Au Nom de Tous les Sangs, a biography published alongside Burundi 1972 at the same publishing house. In Kaburahe’s book, the protagonist just shares his own experience and that of his nuclear family members, whereas Nintunze’s, which provides details to the point of appearing as the voice of thousands of Tutsi victims. It is possible, though, that the absence of genealogies in Kaburahe’s Hutsi may be due the author’s desire to protect the identity of some of the people he is writing about. For examples of detailed genealogies in Burundi 1972 samples can be found on pages 113, 136, etc.
[14] Barbara Harlow, Resistance Literature, New York: Chapman and Hall, 1987, 102
[15] Equally true is the fact that the situation that is prevailing when the book is published is characterized, among other things, by “language of violence [and], a discourse of power which suppresses the voices of its victims.”Idem, page (Barbara Harlow, Resistance Literature, page 112)
[16] Namely, Jan Vansina, who suggests that sources be examined according to the usual canons of historical methodology whereby an intertextual cross-examination is required if anyone wants to establish the extent to which they have suffered through failure of memory. (Vansina, Jan. Oral Tradition: a Study in Historical Methodology. Transl. by H.M. Wright. Chicago: Aldine Publishing, 1965, page 8).
[17] For loanwords, a case in point is saa sita or “twelve o’clock,” imported from Swahili; for anthroponyms, see for instance Rwaje (Burundi 1972, pages 78 and 107).
For this, whether it is sensitivity to the mother tongue, arising from nostalgia, or an otherwise unsuspected linguistic flair on the part of an author whose field of expertise is very far from meeting the linguistic science, remains an open question.
[18] Examples of benign errors can be seen on pages 183 and 196; for instance. As for incomplete description of killers, an example would be page 109 where one of them is said to be in “South America” (without any further precision); the same is true of the headmaster who availed his house for the preparation meetings that took place before the killing campaign, though he did not participate in them himself (page 117).
By Emmanuel Nkurunziza,
Toronto, Ontario.
The book bears witness to the genocide that befell the ethnic Tutsis of Burundi in 1972, focusing on the southern part of the country. Burundi 1972 looks like a series of fragments, but which read coherently. One needs to underscore from the onset that it bears a considerable dose of repetition. This is something quite understandable, if not predictable, given that repetition is listed among “the various factors affecting the testimony and the transmission.”[1] Thus, since Nintunze’s book comprises no less than 12 oral testimonies, repetition is understandably a frequent feature. A look at the actors (perpetrators and victims) is the other key element in bringing to surface Burundi 1972’s contribution to the writing of the history of the country.
The Tutsis as targeted victims
With regard to the victims, it is essential to note that the book unequivocally explains where that status comes from: the Tutsi are the target of a genocide intended to wipe them out from the face of earth. Burundi 1972 identifies a sub-category that was targeted particularly, i.e. members of the order of Abashingantahe.[2] As well, one ascertains through Burundi 1972 the trans-border nature of the genocide under discussion. There are Tanzanian Tutsis who were killed alongside their Burundian kinsmen (152).[3]
Still within the depiction of the victimhood of the Tutsi community of Burundi, equally meaningful is the cruel targeting of cows during the 1972 campaign of killing, which Nintunze mentions briefly in his book (152). Yet, although the author seems to have refrained from developing the lyrical link between Tutsi people and their cattle, it is a fact that later tragedies, especially in 1993 and in the years that followed, produced further evidence of cruelty against those animals which are sometimes perceived as Tutsi symbols. To anyone who is familiar with the special relation link that the Tutsi people are said to entertain with cows, it is hard to grasp Burundi 1972’s limited focus on that nearly-agreed upon symbol of “Tutsiness.”[4]
The category of victims comprises also what some might term collateral damages pertains chiefly to the ethnic Hutus who were killed by their fellow kinsmen for not participating in the killings their Tutsi neighbors. There are scores of other Hutus who were killed because they had refused to kill the Tutsi from the beginning. Ironically, though, some others Hutus within this particular group of victims had participated in making victims in the ranks of Tutsi peasantry early in the campaign to grow tired or having second thoughts (114).
The killers and their helpers
As there cannot be a victim of a crime without a perpetrator, it is compulsory to look at the killers and their helpers as presented in Burundi 1972. One thing that transpires throughout Nintunze’s book is how their identity is very well documented. Some might find this to stem from the particular context under which these testimonies are published. The book’s precise documentation of the whereabouts of killers of nearly fifty years ago is a plus. A fact not to be minimized is how it runs counter to the prevailing rhetoric of reconciliation. In the current trends, people are encouraged to not mention or, least of all, claim reparation for the killings of their loved ones.[5] No matter how adverse this may seem to the forgiveness rhetoric, this single aspect of Burundi 1972 could qualify as keystone to its unique contribution to the writing of Burundi’s history (quod vid). Possibly, it can be inferred that the availability of details on the identity of the killers comes from the fact that most of them were neighbors to their would-be victims.
The killers' attitude
Burundi 1972 provides a lot of information about the ways in which the victims were put to death. In addition to the emblematic machete, the other techniques resorted to include the burning of victims with dried banana leaves (106).
The killers’ conduct or attitude towards the victims is another aspect that is revealed in the book. The reader is struck by the deployment of cynicism in its most advanced form. For example, victims are given the ultimate favor of choosing between being hacked with a machete or thrown in a burning house as their mode of death (160). Nintunze’s book is commendable for its precision in the description of the arrogance of the killers when they threaten the designated Tutsi victims. Although the killers are described in some instances as being guided both by the desire to eliminate ethnic Tutsis and to loot their riches, there is a good supply of coded and uncoded expressions of the perpetrators’ assurance in their utterance of threat throughout (119-132).
Beside killers and victims, Burundi 1972 isolates two categories of actors who could qualify both as perpetrators and as victims judging from their actions. The first particular group is the leadership of the JRR youth movement, which some of the literature pertaining to the killings of 1972 characterizes as the backbone of the repression machine. Yet, Nintunze’s book identifies whole areas in the southern Province of Makamba where the JRR leadership not only consisted of Hutus exclusively but also coordinated the killing campaign against the Tutsi (122).
The other group is what can be called the just among nations. Burundi 1972 gives account of some Hutus who were at first reluctant to kill their friends or acquaintances in neighborhood (103).[6] Nonetheless, one asks oneself whether it is advisable to bestow on them the prestigious qualifier on this category, given that some of them did indeed save lives, but ended up returning to the odious exercise of killing innocent people (153).[7]
Kindness to some Tutsi women as disguised gendercide
The analysis of actors in Burundi 1972 would not be complete if one does not find out why some Tutsi people were preserved in the middle of that killing frenzy that was meant to annihilate that ethnic group. No one reader can fail to notice what appears to be mercy for some Tutsi women, who were sometimes spared death by the very killers who would put to death the husbands and male kids under their eyes. Instead of magnanimity, this is rather another way of assuring the annihilation of the targeted group.[8] In other words, in such a patrilineal society like that of Burundi, the group (ethnicity, clan, etc.) is perpetuated by sons, not by daughters: once married, women adopt the clan of their in-laws. Thus, rather than a sign of compassion, the apparent kindness to some Tutsi women was a ruse to disguise gendercide against the male component, which would be itself a surer way to achieve the genocide of the whole community.
A book of remembrances and acknowledgements
As would be expected from most autobiographies, Burundi 1972 features memories, some good, others bad; with the author hammering on some a bit more than he does on others. Thus, Nintunze uses Burundi 1972 to acknowledge the benefactors who contributed considerably to his achievements especially in his youth (36-37). The author’s memories are not limited to his youth. Remembrance, if not commemoration of major historical events, is present. A case in point is the 1997 massacre of Junior Seminarists at Buta (50).[9]
One other major point raised in Burundi 1972 is the extent of the dissemination and implementation of the genocide ideology against the Tutsi. Throughout this book, we discover that the violence against the Tutsi in 1972 not only reached an unprecedented level, but as well, the perpetrators reached a point of self-confidence unheard of so far. For instance, some do not hesitate to go around with severed body parts of their Tutsi victims. This has left marks in the memories of many witnesses.[10]
Burundi 1972 brings also to surface the involvement of religious figures. The book informs the reader about the distribution of the various roles of the criminal plan in general, and it sheds light on why adherence to the genocidal ideology reached those abysmal heights that we know: the movement got a boost from the participation of such respected figures as preachers of religion. Among other things revealed by this book in this regard, is how the Protestant clerics in Makamba played a more significant role in the sensitization to the genocidal plan. One notes, however, that their involvement was limited to the early stages, which required absolute secrecy lest the plan would be discovered Burundi intelligence services. It is their renowned sobriety that made them preferable for this mission. According to Nintunze’s book, though the Roman Catholics Hutus were not privy to the secret plan, they are the ones who carried most of the killings.
Reproduction of cliches
Nintunze’ book transpires pronounced influences from the current state of political affairs in Burundi and in the world at large. Though writing from the USA, a part of the world on which the subject matter of his writing has supposedly no ascendance, the author still reproduces part of the media and political discourses that are normally characteristic of the press in Burundi. He refers to the 1972 killers as “insurgés hutu” (Hutu insurgents), and to some extent, reflects the amalgamation between Tutsi and Ganwa that we come across in the available literature on Burundi history.[11] It is worth noting, though, that this has been prevailing unchallenged for decades as reflected in the small portion of Burundi contemporary history that happens to be written --notwithstanding some timid attacks by a few critics and activists. Despite Nintunze’s stand in his book, which seems to proceed from the fact that in all the violence that Burundi has experienced since regaining its independence in 1962, the Ganwa have traditionally been assimilated with the Tutsi and were therefore killed alongside members of the latter group.[12]
A unique contribution
The primary achievement of Burundi 1972 is to have covered the grey area left by the grand narratives of the killings 1972 whose common core is to portray the targeted Tutsi victim as the kliller. With its incontrovertible factual information, the book challenges already existing publications while compelling the authors of the emerging brand of memory-writers and critiques alike to take into account his emblematically resisting piece from now on.
As a book belonging to Iwacu’s “Collection Témoins,” Burundi 1972 sets itself apart from the others thanks to its detailed genealogies. They are in considerable supply in Nintunze’s book, but they are nearly inexistent in most books of the memory and testimony the series.[13]
Burundi 1972’s unique input remains, by far, the contribution to the missing stone in the Burundi history edifice -- and only God knows how badly the latter needs completing. Though the story in Nintunze’s book is a personal account of events that he experienced mainly as a young boy in 1972, it connects to the rest of narratives, especially when it comes to the author's reference and discussion of macrocosmic facts.
As a story produced by a Tutsi in order to count the plight of his people whose 1972 genocide runs the risk of being overwhelmed in the grand narratives, Burundi 1972 may qualify as resistance narratives that displays “historically specific analyses of the ideological and material conditions out of which they are generated.”[14] It is no exaggeration either to state that Novat Nintunze’s Burundi 1972. Massacres des Tutsi dans le Sud. Souvenirs et Temoignages” is in the resistance category. It was published in a context of “conflicting voices that dramatize the authoritarian manipulation.”[15]As well, Nintunze’s narrative can be a reliable historical account worth considering in the edification of Burundi history. The book passes any credibility test launched from a memory-study standpoint. It is also immune from failing in any oral-testimony based test.[16]
Unsuspected potential
Burundi 1972 should be commended because it goes beyond supplying the parts that were missing to the history of Burundi. Rather than limiting itself to the inevitable lyrical idealization of one’s birthplace (32), the book introduces the reader to the categories of the Makamba population, whereby the main identification measures seems to be not only clans but also (the level of) wealth and religious creed. The protestants are said to have been the most well to do as compared to Roman Catholics (26).
From a linguistic perspective, the author is to congratulate for his careful orthography of Rundi toponyms, as well as for his treatment of loanwords. The book is also commendable for its representation of anthroponyms.[17] Reading the book, one cannot fail to notice that care was taken to ensure top quality for the written language.
In lieu of a conclusion
It would be inaccurate to affirm that Burundi 1972 is flawless. The book bears a number of errors of typographical nature, chiefly layout or language-form related. Obviously, this category of errors is quite benign, but there are few others that are potentially misleading for an untrained eye. One such example is the fuzzy identification of the 1972 killers.[18]
Despite its considerable supply of unknown, unsuspected facts about the 1972 genocide against the Tutsi, Burundi 1972 leaves us with a number of unanswered questions. About these ones, though, one needs to be fair with Burundi 1972’s and acknowledge that no historical book dealing with war is complete.
OVERALL, Nintunze’s book contributes to the writing of the 1972 Tutsi genocide that has been distorted for so long. And given its content, and considering the period of its publication, Burundi 1972 explains today’s situation in light of that past that still refuses to pass.Up to the informed reader to mind the two ditches of under interpretation and over-interpretation running parallel to the testimony lane on both sides.
Novat Nintunze, Burundi 1972. Massacre des Tutsis dans le Sud. Souvenirs et Témoignages, Bujumbura, Éditions Iwacu, 2019, 212 pages.
----------------------------------------
[1] For the role of repetition is an indication factor in memories and oral testimony, see Jan Vansina. Oral Tradition: a Study in Historical Methodology. Translated. by H.M. Wright. Chicago: Aldine Publishing, 1965, pages 43- 47
[2] A traditional institution whose members were wise men incorporated through a rigorous process that would ensure that they are imbued with values of fairness, equity, justice, etc. The author suggests that Ntamuheza (Burundi 1972, pages 124-125) was such an example
[3] Numbers between brackets refer to pages in Burundi 1972.
[4] Save one laconic mention on page 152. Interestingly enough, during the presentation of Burundi 1972 [May 19th, 2019 in Ottawa, Canada] the editor joked about the Tutsi who returned to his burning house to detach and save a calf that was inside; it was referred to as a sign of presence of humour in Nintunze’s book.
[5] In my understanding, to grant forgiveness for a past wrong, one needs to know first and foremost the perpetrator and the circumstances surrounding the premeditation and the commission of the crime. Burundi 1972 provides just a few instances
[6] Later, in 1993, those methods would be improved
[7] This connects to the account of survivors of the 1993 genocide in the Province of Karuzi. They were hidden and protected by a neighbor but who would come back home every evening with his machete covered with blood of people he had been killing.
[8] The UN Investigation Commission was careful enough in pointing out that detail, namely, that the killing of Tutsi men and boys proceeds from the very foundations of the genocide crime itself. (UN, Security Council Report S/1996/682, paragraph 481). The most accurate illustration of what Réné Lemarchand terms selective genocide elsewhere and for other purposes.
[9] The author refers to the whose perpetrators as “combatants.”
[10]For example, the driver who went around with the severed head of his victim is found in more than one fragment. See Burundi 1972, pages 64 and 115
[11] In my opinion, it not all accurate to call “insurgents” the perpertrators of the 1972genocide against the Tutsi. Their attacks were not targeting any defense or security force infrastructures or other government building as experienced in modern-time insurgency in Syria, Irak, or Afghanistan, etc.
Concerning the ganwa-Tutsi amalgamation, please refer to Burundi 1972, pages 44, 64, 89.
[12] Most Burundian analysts believe that nowadays, though, many members of the Ganwa aristocracy are experiencing increasing favors and overtures from the ruling Hutu, to which they responding rather positively.
[13] For instance, compared to Antoine Kaburahe’s Hutsi. Au Nom de Tous les Sangs, a biography published alongside Burundi 1972 at the same publishing house. In Kaburahe’s book, the protagonist just shares his own experience and that of his nuclear family members, whereas Nintunze’s, which provides details to the point of appearing as the voice of thousands of Tutsi victims. It is possible, though, that the absence of genealogies in Kaburahe’s Hutsi may be due the author’s desire to protect the identity of some of the people he is writing about. For examples of detailed genealogies in Burundi 1972 samples can be found on pages 113, 136, etc.
[14] Barbara Harlow, Resistance Literature, New York: Chapman and Hall, 1987, 102
[15] Equally true is the fact that the situation that is prevailing when the book is published is characterized, among other things, by “language of violence [and], a discourse of power which suppresses the voices of its victims.”Idem, page (Barbara Harlow, Resistance Literature, page 112)
[16] Namely, Jan Vansina, who suggests that sources be examined according to the usual canons of historical methodology whereby an intertextual cross-examination is required if anyone wants to establish the extent to which they have suffered through failure of memory. (Vansina, Jan. Oral Tradition: a Study in Historical Methodology. Transl. by H.M. Wright. Chicago: Aldine Publishing, 1965, page 8).
[17] For loanwords, a case in point is saa sita or “twelve o’clock,” imported from Swahili; for anthroponyms, see for instance Rwaje (Burundi 1972, pages 78 and 107).
For this, whether it is sensitivity to the mother tongue, arising from nostalgia, or an otherwise unsuspected linguistic flair on the part of an author whose field of expertise is very far from meeting the linguistic science, remains an open question.
[18] Examples of benign errors can be seen on pages 183 and 196; for instance. As for incomplete description of killers, an example would be page 109 where one of them is said to be in “South America” (without any further precision); the same is true of the headmaster who availed his house for the preparation meetings that took place before the killing campaign, though he did not participate in them himself (page 117).