In the Kingdom of Gorillas, page 46
Walking from the outdoor ceremony to a tented reception nearby, we shared our unique perspective on the day’s meaning. Thirty years earlier, we wondered if the gorillas could survive—and whether anyone in Rwanda would care if they didn’t. But on that clear day in 2007, more than 10,000 Rwandans stood in the shadow of Mt. Sabyinyo and cheered for each gorilla named. They listened as President Paul Kagame linked their future to that of the gorillas and the tourism industry built upon their broad backs. We dared to dream of success in the dark days of 1978. But never in our wildest dreams could we have imagined a day when thousands of Rwandans, their political leaders, foreign diplomats, and invited dignitaries would gather to celebrate the gorillas in this way.
President Kagame approached the Kwita Izina stage from below, his strides long and purposeful, in contrast to his casual dress. From the simple chair that served as his place of honor, he looked out over the crowd to the volcanoes beyond. on that day, he would speak of the volcanoes as a refuge for mountain gorillas. But Kagame also knew the volcanoes as a refuge for himself and his RPF guerillas during the three years when they probed, waited, and planned their return to Rwanda. Since that time, he has been the country’s unquestioned leader, first as head of the army, now as elected president.
Paul Kagame understands leadership and power. He doesn’t reject the label “authoritarian.” He is impatient with his nation, his government, and himself. Increasingly favorable comparisons of Rwanda with neighboring African states provoke a sharp response: We don’t want to be Zambia or even Kenya. We want to be the next South Korea, Malaysia, or Dubai. His ambition to transform agrarian Rwanda into a center of banking, trade, and internet communications within a generation raises eyebrows. But Kagame believes that transformation of the Rwandan economy is the essential next step in restructuring Rwandan society along post-ethnic lines.
With Kagame stressing the need for greater vision, promoters of new initiatives have learned to describe their pet projects as “a global model,” “the first ever,” “the biggest,” and of course “visionary.” Rwandans are not immune to such hucksterism and they’ve occasionally been stuck with energy, hotel, and carbon credit trading schemes that promise much but benefit only the promoter. Annual performance contracts, called imihigos, further encourage some senior government officials to sign off on big-dollar but otherwise dubious ventures. Still, there are no more snake oil salesmen in Rwanda than in other countries; probably fewer, given its relatively low incidence of corruption. And big vision and performance goals are positives that most countries would do well to emulate, so long as they are reinforced with the technical understanding needed to make good decisions.
Rwanda has exceptional human resources with which to achieve its president’s ambitious goals. The country has always had an abundance of farmers, whose hard work and skill generally managed to keep at bay the specter of starvation that haunts so much of Africa. Now Rwanda has an urban population that may be the best educated of any in Africa, formed overwhelmingly of returnees—members of the former Tutsi diaspora who grew up in Montreal, Chicago, Manchester, Brussels, and a host of African capital cities. Returning to their traditional homeland, they bring business experience, entrepreneurial skills, and an understanding of the world beyond their tiny nation’s borders. Many have contributed to Kigali’s dynamic growth by starting coffee shops, restaurants, and tour agencies, informed by prior experiences in places like Seattle, Rome, and Nairobi. Others bring needed skills in medicine, communications, and Internet technologies.
Many returnees staff growing government offices. They are mostly young and often female. Rwanda has the world’s highest percentage of women holding elected national office, with 57 percent of the seats in the current parliament. Women also occupy many of the government’s highest offices, including the chief justice and five other justices of the twelve-person Supreme Court, the mayor and the chief of police of Kigali, the minister of foreign affairs, the general directors of ORTPN and REMA, and many more. The recent reorientation of education priorities to include equal access for girls at the primary and secondary levels should ensure an expanded pool of qualified young women in the future.
Some critics say that the predominance of returnees in high positions reflects the government’s ethnic bias. But it can be argued that Rwanda’s returnees are privileged far more by their education and experience than by their ethnicity. When we posted openings for new positions with our projects, the resumes of returnees were almost always superior to those of their countrymen who lived through a lost decade of limited education and work opportunities within Rwanda. The perceived “bias” in employment may thus be a bias toward competency, but the result is still an elite. Ultimately, Rwanda’s ruling class will be judged by how well it addresses the daunting challenges facing its country—especially forging a new, post-ethnic society with equal opportunity for all.
It is illegal in today’s Rwanda to use the terms Tutsi and Hutu in any way that seeks to compare or contrast different ethnic groups. The labels are decried as colonial creations used to divide an essentially unified people. There is some truth in this assertion. Whatever their ancient origins, both groups speak a common language with shared oral history, music, and artistic traditions; Rwandan society allowed for a high degree of intermarriage, with flexible labels depending on one’s changing social or economic status; and Belgian authorities rigidified this class system through the strict use of “racial” identity cards and officially favoring one group over the other. Current policy is grounded in the Rwandan leadership’s conviction that its people need to see themselves as Rwandans first and foremost if they are to heal the deep wounds of a bloody genocide and move toward a new kind of society.
By the end of 2008, Rwanda completed its monumental task of resolving more than 100,000 cases of individuals accused of participation in the 1994 genocide. Two years earlier, billboards appeared throughout the country with the haunted faces of survivors and the words Inkiko gacaca—Ukuri kurakiza. Participate in the gacaca—the truth will free you. What followed was an unprecedented series of public sessions—part confession, part trial— using the vehicle of the gacaca, a judicial system that traditionally addressed more commonplace crimes of cattle theft and adultery. Ultimately, more than 12,000 gacaca courts were held in outdoor markets and schoolyards. Most of those tried were freed: some because they were found innocent, most because their remaining prison sentences were commuted.
Those released through the gacaca process entered programs of reeducation and community work designed to lead them to full reintegration into Rwandan society. In many instances, they returned to live in the same communities with survivors of their crimes. Speaking of the strains produced by this forced coexistence, a presidential advisor told journalist Philip Gourevitch that “what is required politically is emotionally incomprehensible.” Yet Rwandans are asked to bear this burden, among others, in order to create a new Rwandan society, forged in the crucible of past catastrophic failure.
Every April Rwanda observes a month-long period of genocide remembrance. It is a traumatic time for many. Depression and suicide rates spike, as survivors remember lost family and friends and confront their own memories from 1994. Survivors and returnees also confront more current reminders that ethic hatred has not disappeared from their land. A grenade attack during the 2008 remembrance period killed a guard at the Kigali genocide memorial. Printed screeds filled with “genocide ideology” have been distributed at some schools, at times accompanied by physical harassment. In some rural areas, survivors have even been killed over past or pending testimony in genocide trials. One former RPF soldier, twice wounded and now working at airport security, recalled his parents’ murder in 1994, adding, “We must not say some things too loudly or someone will come to kill us. It’s not over.”
The darkest clouds on Rwanda’s horizon appear over its western border with the Democratic Republic of Congo, where remnants of the interahamwe—those who spearheaded the genocide—sustain their deep ethnic hostility. Rogue radio stations broadcast hate-filled reminders of their presence across Lake Kivu. Rwanda has responded with its own radio program to which Congo-based rebels can call in to debate the country’s future with those who defend the current government. A Rwandan friend reports that “the exchanges can get nasty, but it’s better to be talking than killing each other.” Criticized for its earlier unilateral intervention in Congo, the Rwandan military has begun cooperating with its Congolese counterparts to pressure remaining militias to disarm and disband. As a result, many have returned to Rwanda to go through the same reintegration process as released prisoners. But thousands remain in Congo, where they and competing militias terrorize local populations through campaigns of murder, mass sexual abuse, and theft of the region’s still vast mineral resources.
Economics may trump ethnicity in Rwanda through broad-based economic development. Traditional foreign assistance can help, especially in the public sectors of education, health, and infrastructure development. Rwanda also benefits from the attention and funding accompanying its many big-name friends, from Bill and Melinda Gates to Paul Farmer and Bill Clinton. While appreciative of their assistance, President Kagame is one of Africa’s most persistent voices calling for “trade, not aid.” The Macy’s deal to sell “Peace Baskets”—woven by women’s groups initially formed to reinforce ethnic connectedness through traditional basket weaving—fits perfectly with that vision. Starbucks’ arrival in Rwanda not only puts Rwandan coffee and artwork in American stores but also assures higher producer prices and better environmental practices. An organization called Kageno works with a single community to build a school, health clinic, community center, and ecolodge on the edge of Nyungwe, while its activist founder, Dr. Frank Andolino, develops international outlets for the export of baskets, artwork, and organic products made by local residents.
Microcredit financing could help an even greater number of rural Rwandans demonstrate their own entrepreneurial skills. In 2005, we made a $5,000 personal donation to a women’s microcredit program around the Parc des Volcans. Over the next two years, this sum underwrote more than a dozen small loans to purchase sewing machines, cloth, sheep, and a motorcycle to serve as a rural taxi. As the first women repaid their loans to the cooperative, other women used the revolving fund for a succession of small-scale development activities. Now, with much better capitalization for the microcredit programs spreading across Rwanda, the potential exists for Rwanda’s less advantaged rural poor to improve their lives and livelihoods—one loan and one cooperative at a time.
Tourism plays a critical role in Rwanda’s economic future. While the agricultural sector produces a much greater share of domestic GDP, tourism is now Rwanda’s top source of foreign revenue, earning an estimated $80 million in 2009. More than one-fourth of that total comes from gorilla tourism; almost $10 million from gorilla visit permits alone. With annual visitation nearing 20,000 people, however, Rwanda’s seven gorilla families visited by tourists are now fully booked in advance for almost every day of the year. Faced with this finite carrying capacity, gorilla tourism revenues can grow in only two ways. Raising the price of a gorilla visit to $500 per person has not diminished demand, and future increases are certainly possible. However, current ORTPN strategy calls for a significant expansion of attractions, products, and services to encourage visitors to stay longer and spend more in-country. Kigali’s emergence as a major conference site and the rise of English as Rwanda’s dominant language will certainly help. So will a rising Rwandan business class, including several successful tour operators. Creating products and services that match the quality of the gorilla experience—and competing ecotourism attractions around the world—may prove to be a greater challenge.
Gorilla tourism remains an extremely positive force for conservation. Permit fees cover 100 percent of the day-to-day operating costs of all three of Rwanda’s national parks, as well as all primary functions of the central ORTPN office and dozens of staff based in Kigali. The 5 percent of annual park revenues—roughly $500,000 per year—that is shared with communities around each of the national parks pays for new schools, health clinics, water supplies, and other development activities. If there is reason for concern, it stems from the risk that the financial success of the tourism program might overwhelm the conservation mission. ORTPN was recently integrated into the newly created Rwanda Development Board. Modeled on similar structures in South Korea, Thailand, and other Asian development leaders, RDB groups eight former government agencies into a single unit intended to fast-track development investment and export production. It is logical for tourism functions to be located in such an institutional structure because of their leading role in foreign revenue generation. It is less clear how nonrevenue-generating conservation functions such as park management and wildlife monitoring will fare in this context. For now, Rwanda continues to reinvest significant resources in applied conservation.
No matter how Rwanda manages tourism in the future, mountain gorillas cannot be the primary engine for continued economic development if the country is to realize its ambitious aspirations. Much more depends on sound political leadership, economic ingenuity, improved education, and hard work by Rwandans across all sectors. But for the rest of the world, the gorilla remains the face of the nation and its most visible barometer of progress.
Pablo died defending his family. Rwandan trackers reported evidence of a major fight on July 13, 2008, the day that Pablo disappeared. Though no one witnessed the fight, large areas of vegetation were flattened and small trees broken. One of the many flight trails led to a neighboring group, where its silverback, Inshuti, was found to have fresh wounds. Pablo was never seen again.
Pablo’s reign as alpha male did not last long. Within a few years after Amy’s visit in 2000, he was supplanted by his younger sibling, Cantsbee. Most silverbacks in his position would leave the group, but Pablo remained to support Cantsbee. Perhaps the closeness of their relationship made this possible; perhaps it was the presence of so many of Pablo’s offspring. Whatever the reason, he stayed to become the primary defender of the group that continued to bear his name. It was a role he seemed to relish, according to researchers and trackers from Karisoke who monitored the group. While Cantsbee would lead the females and infants to safety, Pablo threw himself into visual, vocal, and sometimes physical confrontations with whatever silverbacks might challenge the group. He had prevailed over Inshuti in previous encounters. On July 13, he lost his last fight.
Pablo’s death was tragic only in the sense that he died defending the younger brother who had usurped his place as head of the family. Otherwise, he lived a full and storied life before dying a silverback’s death at the relatively advanced age of thirty-four. Pablo was one of the last surviving members of Amy’s original research group. Puck died of a massive cancer tumor in April 2007 at the age of thirty-eight. Starting with her first gender-bending birth— Cantsbee in 1978—Puck proved to be a prolific gorilla mom, like her own late mother Effie. Shinda, whom we knew as a shy, almost timid infant, grew to be a powerful silverback leading a large group that bore his name before his sudden death at thirty-one in November 2008. Titus, a survivor of the Group 4 massacre in July 1978, also rose to head his own group. In September 2009, he died of an apparent heart attack at thirty-five, after weeks of being pursued and wounded by a younger silverback. Among the females left to an uncertain future following his death was Puck’s sister, Tuck.
Of the original thirteen gorillas from Group 5, only Cantsbee, Poppy, and Tuck remain alive in 2010. While it is sad to see the passing of an era, it is heartening to know that these gorillas lived life free from the human violence that we first witnessed thirty years ago. Details of their individual life stories and family histories enrich our scientific understanding of gorillas and inform the millions of people who have followed their lives for decades. Without question, this intimate knowledge is the greatest legacy of the long-term monitoring begun by Dian Fossey more than forty years ago.
As compelling as their individual life stories may be to us and others, the primary focus for conservation has always been on the gorillas’ survival as a population. In 1983, we published a paper in Biological Conservation projecting potential growth in the Virunga population from our count of 262 in 1978 to 400 gorillas in 2010—if poaching and habitat loss could be halted. Based on a 2003 census estimate of 380 gorillas, it is virtually certain that the Virunga population now totals more than 400—within the range first estimated by George Schaller in 1960. Four gorilla groups have surpassed Schaller’s maximum of thirty-two individuals, with Pablo’s Group more than doubling that number. Yet, just as conservationists could savor this success, a new concern arose, unforeseen and frankly unimaginable when we first started: gorilla overpopulation.
Pablo died in a fight. Titus was aggressively pursued until his death. Shinda showed signs of stress, according to veterinarians monitoring his deteriorating condition. All three silverbacks died during a period of intensified fighting and other interactions recorded by Karisoke researchers in recent years. With the loss of established silverbacks, the number of infanticides spiked. Ultimately, the four largest groups—Pablo’s, Shinda’s, Beetsme’s, and Susa—splintered into smaller subgroups and shifting alliances. As this deadly drama plays out, some wonder if the population has grown too large for the available habitat.
Faced with the possibility of overpopulation, ORTPN in 2008 began to consider reacquiring the 25,000 acres cleared from the Parc des Volcans in the early 1970s for pyrethrum production. For some in the park service, restoration of a buffer zone for use by gorillas—and tourists—would serve a greater good than the current mix of potatoes and pyrethrum. Less evident is how more than 30,000 poor farmers now residing in that zone could find new lands in a country with none to spare, or alternative occupations with little education and no training.
