Love Above All: Forgiveness of a Young Rwandan Genocide Survivor

In 1994, in Rwanda, a country from the Central East Africa; genocide was perpetrated against Tutsis by some extremist Hutus. In less than 100 days, over one million (1M) of Tutsis were exterminated and my family perished among them. Eleven years old then, I became an orphan.

My life struggle started then, commemorating my lost family and the way they died, searching if any of my relatives survived, and fixing to earn everyday life as I did not hope for the future. This struggle took long. However, as time went on, I started gaining hope for the future. I first started thinking beyond myself, then about helping my fellow genocide survivors and finally about contributing to the reconstruction of my country in particular and assisting to people of all generations in general.

My belief in God generated love, love brought me to forgiving people who killed my family and forgiveness took me to making them my friends. Peace and forgiveness resulting from love is what I preach and this is what I wish for everybody.