In 2002, Rwanda’s government began implementing gacaca on a national scale.The courts were open to the public, and the proceedings were broadcast on national radio.In exchange for coming forward and confessing their crimes, perpetrators were eligible for reduced sentences.The process was far from perfect, but it did provide a measure of closure for many Rwandans.
In 1994, Rwanda experienced a horrific mass murder during a 100 day period. This conflict was rooted in the colonial period when German and Belgian colonizers arrived and encouraged political division between the three ethnic groups of the population, Tutsi, Twa, and Hutu. The Hutu majority was granted exclusive access to political power, and this led to intense political hostility. A civil war broke out in 1990, and when the Hutu president’s plane was shot down in 1994, the conflict broke out anew. Hutu militias flooded the streets, killing Tutsi political enemies and civilians. Over 1 million Hutu civilians joined the ranks due to coercion, self-preservation, or personal agendas. The violence ended when the Tutsi army seized control of the country, and in the aftermath, a special tribunal was established in Tanzania to try the key perpetrators. To address the 120,000 Rwandans awaiting trial, the Rwandan government implemented the traditional process of gacaca which allowed for lay judges to determine an appropriate penalty within the community’s means. In the hope of trying perpetrators more quickly, the government adapted Gacaca for their formal courts. These hybrid trials had no professional attorneys or judges, and no evidence outside the spoken word and a case file detailing the crimes of the accused. All charges were then divided into four categories: masterminding the genocide and committing acts of sexual violence, participating in the killings, physical assault, or destroying Tutsi property. Those found guilty of the first two categories were entered into the traditional court system, but the other crimes were assigned set penalties which could be reduced if the accused pled guilty.
Beginning in 2002, thousands of Gacaca courts convened every week. The process proved faster than conventional courts, but Rwandan opinion on the trials was mixed. Some didn’t want to accuse their neighbors in a community setting, and many potential witnesses were intimidated to prevent their testimony. Additionally, while the trial showed that not all Hutu participated in the killings, the courts only reviewed cases with Tutsi victims, ignoring the Hutu casualties incurred during the genocide and the preceding civil war.
When the trials concluded in 2012, the courts had convicted 1.7 million individuals. For some families, these verdicts helped restore the dignity of those lost in the violence. For others, the trials were a decade-long reminder of a past they were desperate to leave behind.