musaolaka's blog

In the Month of October and November 2012, USF Holocaust and Genocide Studies Center (HGSC) librarian Musa Wakhungu Olaka traveled to Rwanda to digitize rare and unique documents on the genocide in Rwanda. These are documents that are currently held at IBUKA, which is an umbrella organization of associations of Rwanda genocide survivors. The digitization project took place at IBUKA’s headquarters which is located at a Nyanza-Kicukiro genocide memorial site.

Debate regarding custody of information on genocide in Africa and especially in Rwanda has been going on for the past couple of years. The greatest focus has been documents in the custody of International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) whose mandate is coming to an end and is right now winding down. This debate has also brought into focus all the documents produced by Gacaca courts in the process of carrying out its duties.

University of South Florida Libraries through the USF Holocaust and Genocide Studies Genocide Center (HGSC) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding to host on an open access basis, two journals that are currently being published in print form by National University of Rwanda’s Centre for Conflict Management. The two journals are: Journal of African Conflicts and Peace Studies; and the Peace and Conflict Management Review.

The end of genocidal killing tends to be the beginning of a new phase of living with the painful past for most perpetrators and survivors of a genocide. After the 1994 Rwandan genocide, most survivors had no alternative but to live next to people who had participated in causing them grievous harm. Without consulting survivors’ or getting their views, the Rwanda government started releasing into society large numbers of perpetrators and alleged perpetrators in 2003.

The world will be commemorating the 18th anniversary of the 1994 Rwandan genocide in the Month of April 2012 although survivors’ mental health and trauma still have a long way to fully be taken care of or addressed. Many survivors of this genocide used to be re-traumatized during the genocide commemoration period that takes place in the month of April of every year. As late as early this year, public institutions charged to oversee the commemoration period were still debating how to best handle survivors who get traumatized during this period.