Rwanda's civil war led to frequent massacres in the 1990s. The civil war between the Tutsi and Hutu ethnic Rwandans, who were killing each other, often left piles of dead Rwandans. For Rwandans in already weakened areas, the problem of disposing of the corpses was one source of potential disease.
Rwanda's inequalities were more unevenly distributed regionally, with those in power dominating in the north and benefiting most from bribes in Rwandan government positions, economic activities they managed, and development projects they supported. This favoritism was further accelerated during the 1958-1962 revolution, when the Catholic Hutus overthrew the Tutsi monarchy. Implicitly supporting the revolution were decolonial forces who feared a Tutsi regime that would maintain foreign control of Rwanda for many years. Many Tutsis were killed in the revolution, and most of the former Tutsi authorities in Rwanda fled to other countries, including Central Africa.
The reign of violence began to tighten in 1962, and in 1961-1962 exiled Tutsis fought back against Rwanda from their bases in Burundi and Uganda. They were easily subdued by the Hutu army. Tensions rose, and in 1962, about 2,000 Tutsis were executed, and in 1963, about 10,000 were killed. About 140,000 to 250,000 Tutsis fled the country, and the Tutsi population dropped from about one-half to three-quarters of its original size.
The two regimes that ruled Rwanda from 1966 to 1993 killed or forcibly removed Tutsi authority figures. the two regimes were very repressive and gave legitimacy to the Hutus. First, state-led development by the Rwandan regime was for the benefit of the Hutus. It convinced the people that it was a democratic effort to give the Hutus the upper hand. Second, after hundreds of years of domination by the Tutsi minority, the ideology of Hutu ownership made the Rwandan government appear to favor Hutu hegemony. While giving legitimacy to the repressive regime, the Hutus' fear and prejudice against the Tutsis grew incrementally. In fact, the Rwandan government systematically fostered prejudice against Tutsis. Over the course of about 20 years, it turned prejudice into radical hatred of Tutsis. Eventually, it escalated the violence against Tutsis, and in 1994, it attempted to exterminate them. By focusing Hutu attention on the Tutsis, the Rwandan regime diverted public attention from its failures.
It was strictly forbidden for Tutsi refugees to return to Rwanda. A quota system was introduced that allowed Tutsis to participate in socioeconomic activities according to about 9% of the population. Within the government, the quota of approximately 9% was never realized. In less regulated sectors such as commerce and non-governmental enterprises, the number of Tutsis far exceeded about 9 percent.
In the early 1990s, the events of the conflict generated a genocide that massacred. Antipathy toward the Rwandan government grew in the underdeveloped areas of the Hutu population. The Rwandan government favored the northern part of the country, and the Hutus in the south became increasingly angry, leading to an intra-Hutu conflict. In 1990, the descendants of Tutsis who had been exiled between 1959 and 1963 invaded Rwanda. This added fuel to the fire of ethnic hatred. The Tutsis were well-funded and well-supplied, and the invasion was able to overrun the northern areas. The resurgence of Tutsi rule fueled a sense of urgency among the Hutus, and by 1992, the international community, led by the United Nations, demanded that the newly returned Tutsis integrate with the Hutus and demanded that the Hutu government negotiate the establishment of a more inclusive government.
The negotiations, demanded by the UN in Arusha, Tanzania, have added to fears that Tutsis will invade Hutu-controlled Rwanda. On April 6, 1994, Rwanda's Hutu president was killed in a plane crash on his way back from negotiations in Arusha. On April 6, 1994, the Hutu president of Rwanda was killed in a plane crash on his way back from negotiations in Arusha, and thousands of Tutsis were killed in the Hutu uprising that followed the shooting down of the plane. UN officials were evacuated from Rwanda. These riots led to a 100-day civil war in which some 800,000 mostly Tutsis were massacred. The Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), a Tutsi group in the north, resumed its invasion and captured the Rwandan capital, Kigali, on July 4, 1994. On July 4, 1994, the RPF took over Kigali, the capital of Rwanda. About two million Hutus fled to the Democratic Republic of Congo (formerly Zaire) with many army and government officials to regroup. By 1999, at least 200,000 Hutus and Tutsis had been killed in Rwanda, hundreds of thousands had fled to neighboring countries, and hundreds of thousands had been displaced within Rwanda and were being held in refugee camps.
The situation in Rwanda has become very volatile. The presence of large numbers of refugees inside and outside of Rwanda has led to a gradual increase in prejudice and fear that the Hutus will control their lives unless the Tutsi minority is exterminated. The presence of large numbers of refugees has squeezed the resources of other countries in Central Africa, making the possibility of renewed conflict and carnage in Africa in the 21st century much more likely. in April 2000, President Kagame, a Tutsi from the RPF, took office in Rwanda, and the African economic miracle began. In the meantime, he was re-elected president in August 2017 to a long-term dictatorship until 2034 by extending his re-election with amendments to the new constitution in May 2003 and December 2015.
