I watched as my mother was raped then burnt to death

Alice Kabatesi Ssekamatte is a small woman, a fact emphasised by the short denim skirt and short-sleeved blouse that hugs her chest. From her wide forehead dangles short black curly hair, framing her light-skinned face and falling just short of her prominent eyebrows that rise above the rims of her eye glasses. On Kabatesi, this facial arrangement produces a striking beauty of an unlikely kind.

When she speaks, Kabatesi often pauses to look for the right word and when it does not come easily, she uses a hand gesture instead. English is a language she learnt later in life having grown up in Rwanda, at a time when the country was predominantly French-speaking.

20 years after her loss
From learning new languages to settling in another country and adopting a new culture, Kabatesi’s story is one of a victim’s persistence and often stubborn resilience to regain her sanity, restore her dignity, make a living and reconstruct what was left of her family after the horrors she suffered in the Rwandan genocide.

Born on June 23, 1984 in the northern Rwanda province of Butare to Munyarugezi Emile and Mukakimenyi Venantie, Kabatesi was nine years old in April 1994 at the start of the Rwanda genocide.

It is estimated that this genocide claimed about 800,000 Tutsi and moderate Hutu lives. These lives that were lost included both Kabatesi’s parents and two of her four siblings.

Twenty years since the death of her family today, there remains little photographic evidence of Kabatesi’s early years or of her family since all the family property was either looted or destroyed. The genocide survivor retains only one photo of her mother, given to her in 1998 by a former neighbour.

“My elder sister is in Rwanda. My younger brother and sister, however, died during the genocide. I live with our last born. I have an uncle who raised us. If he wasn’t around, I don’t know where I would have ended up,” recounts Kabatesi, who moved to Uganda at the beginning of 2008 and is married to a Ugandan, Richard Ssekamatte, with whom she has one child.

Tale of death and narrow escapes
When the 1994 Rwandan genocide came to her village, Kabatesi and her mother fled to a place called Sovu Health Centre near Bukavu, about three kilometres from Butare. They stayed there for about a month while the killing went on around them.

Unknown to them, amidst the commotion, Kabatesi’s elder sister and her mother’s two-month-old baby had been whisked off to safety by their Hutu househelp. Her father, younger brother and sister, together with her grandmother’s entire household had not been so lucky. They had been killed.

As Kabatesi recalls, the killers were not in a hurry. “Since the killers knew we were gathered in one place, they took their time. First, they went to our homes where they looted, destroyed the houses and killed the people who were sick or too weak to run,” she recounts.

The day the killers finally came to Sovu Health centre, Kabatesi was in the compound with her baby cousin sister. “I was the first person to see the killers. Men from our group came out with machetes and locked us (women and children) inside the compound.

“People became crazy and started breaking things because they knew we were going to die. First, the killers blew chilli pepper fumes into the compound and then started throwing stones and hand grenades inside and shooting at the gate, in an attempt to get in.

Until that day, I used to fear dead people but what I saw that day…I had never seen before,” Kabatesi sighs and goes on to describe how some helpless women opted to commit suicide, an option that her mother considered too.

“People in a neighbouring house cut electric wires and the house caught fire. Many people walked into the fire and died. My mother suggested that we do the same but I said no,” she explains.

That evening, Kabatesi says the Hutu Catholic nuns in charge of the health centre brought in soldiers who tricked the survivors of the daytime killing into thinking they were being taken to safety. Kabatesi’s mother is one of those who saw through the lie.

“My mother gave me her dark clothes so that I wouldn’t be seen and told me to follow her and not show fear. She was planning for us to jump and disappear from the queue. When we reached a bushy place, she pulled me out of line. The soldiers looked for us but since there was no light, they failed to find us. We hid in a nearby bush and could hear people being killed,” she narrates.

In the end, it was her excessive concern for others that cost Kabatesi’s mother her life. Mother and daughter were caught as they sneaked to check on a relative and her child. The two were captured and made to watch everyone else get killed before the girl’s mother was raped and her body burnt as the daughter watched.

Escaping death
Two decades after the genocide, Kabatesi bears a physical scar that runs along her right collar bone, stretching almost to her midrib. She owes her survival to the age and inexperience of the slayer that saved her life. “I was handed over to a young boy to be killed. But when he swung the machete, he struck my shoulder instead of slashing my neck. When I fell backward, they thought I was dead and moved on to kill others,” she recalls.

Wounded and sick but still able to crawl through the bushes to safety, Kabatesi remained in hiding for over two months in someone’s backyard with another older woman.

The backyard belonged to a Tusti woman married to a Hutu man who occasionally gave them food. “The woman also eventually died though and the two of us remained alone in that backyard until I came across a Hutu family friend who gave me refuge in his home. Those were difficult times but I eventually got news of my uncle who had survived,” she says.

The plot of how she reunites with her two siblings who also survived is thick and complex but ultimately, the three end up with an uncle who continued to take care of them after the genocide.

Meanwhile, her shoulder wound had become infected and smelly in the absence of medical attention. It took a lucky referral to a Russian specialist after three unsuccessful surgical operations, to save her right arm. “My arm had become paralysed. I still feel pain in my armpit when I write continuously for more than 30 minutes or carry a shoulder bag for a long time,” she says.

Dealing with the horrible images of death
“I didn’t even cry when my mother was being killed. My heart was hard and cold because I thought that I was going to die anyway. I only started crying, remembering and seeing the images of the killers after the genocide.

At school, they knew me. When I would begin to act crazy, they would call my uncle to come and take me away. Then I would be sedated, and this had to be done frequently,” recounts Kabatesi, adding that she still passes out at least every two years, owing to what she believes is the side effect of these drugs. “Whenever I collapse, I’m told that my heart pumps very hard and I remain unconscious for about 30 minutes. When I regain my senses, I don’t remember what happens immediately before I pass out,” she explains.

With her uncle’s support, Kabatesi finished school in 2004 in Kigali, qualifying as a nurse. She spent the next four years working in Butare and Kigali, but she did not earn much. To survive, she had to learn English and share a house with a prostitute, among other things.

It was a chance encounter with prominent Rwandese musician, Mihigo Francois Chou Chou, which changed her life. With Chou Chou’s help, she got enough money to rent her own house and make connections that eventually led her to Uganda.

The journey to Uganda
Through the efforts of an old school friend to get her into Belgium, Kabatesi ended up in a Ugandan-based Rwandese traditional dancing troupe. “I went to live with the troupe in Kyebando. I started learning how to dance and became part of the troupe for nine months,” she says. In 2011, she met Richard Ssekamatte, the man she refers to as “my father, my husband and the man who is treating my wounds”.

“Last year when I returned to Sovu with my husband, I was paralysed. They have cleaned the place now but I remember how the place was filled with blood then,” she says of her attempts to make peace and move on.

From Butare to Kigali and finally Kampala, Kabatesi’s is a long tale of loss and survival, one that took more than three hours to tell.
Still, even in the darkest parts of the interview, Kabatesi does not shed a single tear.

And yet, there is a great sadness in her voice as she speaks of her attempts to fill the empty spaces in her family by adopting as many friends as she can. However, it is the continuous longing for her mother, a topic that comes up several times during the interview, which gives one a glimpse into the soul of an orphaned little girl still shedding tears for her mother, 20 years on.

QUICK FACTS
Born to Munyarugezi Emile and Mukakimenyi Venantie on June 23, 1984 in Butare, Rwanda, Kabatesi is the second of five children. Only three of them survived the genocide, including Kabatesi. The youngest lives with Kabatesi now and is in school. The elder sister resides and works in Rwanda.

After the genocide:
Under the guardianship of her uncle, Kabatesi returned to school after the genocide. She completed her secondary school education at Essa Gisenyi Secondary School in Rwanda, and in 2004 graduated from Apade Kicukilo Nursing School in Butare, Rwanda.

Employment in Rwanda:
Trained as a nurse, Kabatesi worked at various pharmacies in Butare and Kigali before moving to Uganda in 2008, where she joined a Kinyarwanda dance troupe.

Marriage and life in Uganda
Kabatesi got married on June 24, 2012 to a Ugandan, Richard Ssekamatte, with whom she has one child.
She is currently employed as a sales representative at Eris Limited, a medical drug distribution company in Kampala. She has been with the company for the last two years.