I don’t have capacity to support Rwandan rebels – minister Mateke

Mr Philemon Mateke, Uganda's State Minister for Regional Affairs. FILE PHOTO

What you need to know:

  • From last week’s meeting, it looks like Rwanda and Uganda are not anywhere near resolving their dispute. Officials from both countries have referred the matters to Presidents Yoweri Museveni and Rwanda’s Paul Kagame to handle after they failed.

Mr Philemon Mateke, the State Minister for Regional Affairs has described as rubbish claims by Rwanda that he was in constant communication with an armed group that launched an attack inside Rwanda on October 3, 2019.

The claims were tabled last Friday in the Kampala meeting between Uganda and Rwanda as evidence that the country was supporting groups that want to overthrow the Kigali administration.

The same claims were repeated in a lengthy interview in which Oliver Nduhungirehe, Rwanda’s State Minister for the East African Affairs, stated that the attackers had left phones at the scene showing contacts with Mr Mateke. The interview was published in the New Times Rwanda on Wednesday, December 18, 2019.

The attack referred to happened in Kinigi sector, Musanze District, near the border with the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Up to 14 people lost their lives and 16 others sustained injuries during the same attack, in which attackers used machetes and hammers.

“The evidence gathered from the crime scene, including phone handsets, from assailants showed that they were in coordination with Uganda’s State Minister for Regional Affairs Philemon Mateke,” Mr Nduhungirehe said.

In earlier interviews, John Bosco Kabera, the Rwandan Police Spokesman is quoted saying that the group belongs to a militia called RUD-Uranana, a splinter group of the notorious Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), founded by Hutu extremists partly responsible for the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

On Wednesday, Mr Nduhungirehe said that Mateke was in contact with a one Nshimiye alias governor, the head of Special Forces of RUD-Urunana.

But sounding rather dismayed, Mr Mateke spoke to this reporter on phone, posing rhetorical questions: “Am I their citizen? Am I a mercenary?”

The 76-year-old minister even went bare knuckles, saying that when “officials in Rwanda want to eliminate someone they start accusing them of such”, adding that those accusing him have been known for “eliminating people”.

“It’s not true, rubbish. Am I a Rwandese? Am I going to be a mercenary? Do I have capacity? Those people are very malicious as they have always been. When they want to eliminate a person, normally these are the excuses they give, you know their job is to eliminate people, but am not their citizen,” Mr Mateke said.

From last week’s meeting, it looks like Rwanda and Uganda are not anywhere near resolving their dispute. Officials from both countries have referred the matters to Presidents Yoweri Museveni and Rwanda’s Paul Kagame to handle after they failed.