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  Banderembako, Judith

  Judith Banderembako

  Before the 1972 Genocide of Burundi, Banderembako said her community was filled with neighbors who were always willing to share and help one another. Their peaceful and welcoming way of life was shattered when a soldier arrived with a list of names of people who were to be collected and killed. Banderembako explained that people were snatched from their homes, forced to dig their graves, and then their bodies were tossed into the ground. If the victims refused to dig, the perpetrators would tie their limbs together and throw their bodies into a river. After their death, the victim’s homes were looted, and all their possessions were taken and divided among the perpetrators. She explained that she would appreciate a memorial but remains doubtful that this structure would help Burundians’ heel. Banderembako said she is concerned that the history of the genocide will negatively influence the youth, and she fears their hearts will become tainted with a lack of desire to reconcile. She lost her father, husband, and brother-in-law during this violent attack. However, Banderembako explained that as a Catholic, she must forgive.

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  Bangirinama, Renata

  Renata Bangirinama

  Renate Bangirinama was born in 1940 in Gisovu village, in Kanyosha commune, Bujumbura province. She recounts that during the period of 1972, many people suffered in a way they didn’t know. No gunshots were heard in that war, you could see people being taken away and never coming back. The fugitives stayed away and you could see some repatriates.

  Renate dropped out in fifth grade in elementary school. In 1972, she had been married and she had already given birth to five children, unfortunately only two were alive: one daughter, Budura Marie Ntahimpereye and the son, Melchior Ntahontungiye. Her father died before 1972.

  The tragedy broke out in Rumonge, her husband was the supervisor of road construction, he was employed by a white man named Murekancuro who was from Rwanda, then they went there. Tragedy began in the meeting, they said that they fell asleep and didn’t wake up. The residents of Rumonge woke up, they wore shields in their heads, and swords. That war was called genocide, it opposed hutus against tutsis.

  At that time her husband was at Karonda in Rumonge, they searched him everywhere and he fled to a cassava field in the hole, he ran together with a tiger. They moved there in secret until Tanganyika lake where they took the boat and fled to Tanzania.He fled together with a wife who had twelve children, when the boat began to sink, they threw all things into lake, and that woman threw three of her children into lake. There in exile, they lived badly.

  Renata encountered many problems: perpetrators came to look for her husband, and accused her of having hidden him in the house, they attempted to burn the house, but they didn’t; her mother in law accused her that she made her husband to move away, so she was very mistreated, and she stayed in tears. She decided to close the house and went back to her native family, she stayed there with her children. Her husband’s family members went to take her children by force, she let them go but this shocked her too much. The other problems they encountered that same year was a terrible hunger, a starvation; her children couldn’t get school education because she couldn’t support them. the 1972 tragedy took away a lot of people: her two brothers in law who studied at university: Emmanuel and Bernard; her two sisters who were at secondary school in Rushubi; her two cousins were also killed. The 1972 tragedy targeted hutus, mostly the educated ones.

  After a certain period, she got information that her husband was still alive from a person who was coming from Tanzania. After two and half her husband repatriated but he was not comfortable. They gave birth to five other children, they employed him again in communal office, he was killed in the 1993 war, they shot him, but none of his children knew where he was buried.

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  Banka, Jean

  Jean Banka

  Banka shared that his older brothers were murdered during the 1972 Genocide of Burundi. Banka explained that the militia violently took his brothers from their homes, smashed all their windows, and stole their property. Banka remained in hiding after the perpetrators killed his brothers for fear he would be next on the list to die. When he emerged from hiding, he found out that many other men from their community were also killed. To make this loss even more devastating, Banka was then forced to live among the killers who murdered his family members. He knew the perpetrators who claimed their lives walked freely among them. Banka was not allowed to mourn or inquire about his dead relatives, as this behavior was punishable by death.

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  Banyasekera, Philippe

  Philippe Banyasekera

  Philippe and his 3 other siblings did not attend school, as it was rare to go being Hutu without experiencing harm or death. His father was the first relative closest to Philippe who was captured by the armed forces in Burundi. Philippe’s father was a woodmaker and did construction work for a living. One day on the job, his father and uncle were approached by a man they once had acquaintances with, they even helped construct parts of his home. The man, who goes by the name Bimpenda, tells Philippe’s father that he and his brother are wanted at his office for a discussion, where they assumed he had a job opportunity assorted for them. They arrived and were arrested, packed on military trucks, and taken away. A communal administrator named Nzogera, brought a group along with him and looted Philippe’s whole home, taking 24 of his family's goats. The men responsible for this claimed that they were taking traitors' belongings and how no one deserves them, to justify their actions. That same week, they forced Philippe and his family out of their homes, causing them to move in with their grandfather, on his father’s side. Days later came, where the interior minister ordered them to go back to their homes, but at that point, everything they ever owned was stolen, causing them to go back to nothing but an empty home.

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  Banyikwa, Pascal

  Pascal Banyikwa

  In 1973, when Pascal Banyikwa was just 13 years old, he awoke to gunshots cutting through the Gatoke night sky. He watched in horror as people from his community were taken against their will. They were arrested, blindfolded, and forcefully loaded onto a truck. Banyikwa explained that the perpetrators told the group of hostages they were being taken away for interrogation, but the circumstances and whereabouts remained unknown. Baltozar Baski, who is Banyikwa’s father, was one of the many captives taken away by force in the dark of night and was never to be seen again.

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  Barakirura, Salathiel

  Salathiel Barakirura

  During the 1972 Genocide of Burundi, Barakirura said militia invited all male members of the community to attend a peace meeting held under the guise of ceasing violence between the Hutu and Tutsi. When the men entered the meeting grounds, soldiers invaded the area and slaughtered everyone to death. After the horrific ambush, Barakirura fled to Tanzania while the perpetrators stole his home and his land. Barakirura returned to Burundi in 2008 and has fought to regain his property for almost two decades. He said he is not concerned about discussing who is Hutu and who is Tutsi. He wants Burundians to come together as one and end the ethnic divide.

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  Barantndikiye, Mathias

  Mathias Barantndikiye

  Mathias Barantndikiye said he remembers a group of soldiers circling him and his fellow parishioners after he was walking home from Sunday mass. The soldiers forced them into a where a commander demanded everyone there take out documentation to prove they had all paid their taxes. However, Barantndikiye explained that no one traveled with their paperwork because it was Sunday, a day of rest. He said the militia began to release the men in large quantities. As they were released, Barantndikiye said he saw tractors digging large holes in their community. At first, he thought the digging might be a type of military exercise, only to discover later they were digging mass graves to bury those massacred in the 1972 Genocide of Burundi.

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  Barutwanayo, Vincent

  Vincent Barutwanayo

  Vincent Barutwanayo said soldiers captured his father and four uncles, tied them up with cords, and proceeded to slice them to death with machetes right before his eyes. When Barutwanayo tried to escape the violence, he said soldiers spared his life, but not before holding him down in the street so he could watch his father die. After the attack, Barutwanayo said his suffering only continued to grow. The mothers in the communities were left without fathers and providers for their children. As a result of their deaths, he said homes began to collapse around him. Now, more than 50 years after this gruesome attack, Barutwanayo said the people who ordered his family be murdered are still alive and currently live in the same community with him.

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  Bazompora, Yohani

  Yohani Bazompora

  John Bazompora was born in 1953 in Karamagi village, Kirundo commune and province. In 1972, he was a student in 8th grade. He witnessed the arrests of his father and brother, who were taken away and he never saw them again. According to Yohani Bazompora, he said that what happened in 1972 began even before 1965. In 1965 Rwandan Tutsis fled to Burundi, they advised Burundi Tutsis to get rid of Hutus so that they shouldn’t undergo the same problem as Rwandans because they said they were persecuted by Hutus. From that period Tutsis began to persecute Hutus and then killed them. He was 12 years old, he witnessed Tutsis coming into their house, they beat him severely and still now he feels shock. They beat his father until they broke his eyes and finally they brought him to jail. When they came home, they obliged him to redig a pit which had been found after making bricks used to construct a house. They asked him to pull out a gun, they said that his father had hidden it there, he redug about one meter but they didn’t find it.

  At that time he recounts some other people they took to prison such as; Gasombozo, the local leader; Kanama Raphael, the headmaster; Nonabakize Zacharie, the hospital legislator; Mahombwe Prudence, the merchant and others; those people were not killed at that time, but they were killed after in 1972.

  In 1972, he was a student at Bujumbura, he lived together with his brother Salvator Rucindika who was teacher at Bujumbura; that brother who supported him in his school life was taken when he was in pub, and he never saw him again. He was obliged to drop out of school in order to sustain his family because his father also was taken away to be killed and their things were looted. Among their things looted, there was his father’s new truck and clothings. Local leaders were included in those killing and looting; the administrator Gahima, captain Nyanka, Ndabaneze, the soldier; the authority Ivo who looted their things, etc. They saw cars coming full of Hutus taken away to be killed, Tutsis were sitting on them, and others were under tires.

  During that period, Hutus were targeted but also Tutsis who attempted to help Hutus in that tragedy. Ndayigize Emmanuel was a tutsi, a soldier killed by tutsis because he gave food to a hutu Busongoye Andre from Bwinyana. There was also another Tutsi killed because he helped a Hutu to flee to Kanyaru River. Gapiripiri of cewe was a tutsi killed because he loved Hutus.

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  Bukuru, Sabina

  Sabina Bukuru

  Sabina attended Notre Dame School but stopped her studies after the fifth grade to help with work at home. She completed her confirmation in 1959 at St. Michael's Catholic Church. Sabina was raised by her aunt after her parents died. She was born in Rweza but did not grow up there. She had two brothers; one was killed during the 1993 crisis, and the other went to Congo and never returned back to Burundi.

  During the tragedies of 1972, Sabina lost her husband, Commander Zacharie Harerimana. Harerimana was a soldier and abroad in Belgium for a work mission. Upon returning to Burundi on April 3, 1972, he was warned by a friend that he would die if he returned. Despite this, he insisted on returning home. On the same day he arrived home, he went directly to give the mission report at work although his friends kept warning him of impending death. He never came back.. Sabina was forced out of their government-provided home in INSS quarter, Avenue Bururi No 45, by officers. They were left homeless, and her husband was later reported dead and Sabina and her children were eventually sent to her father-in-law's house.

  Shortly after the incident, Sabina’s children were separated from her, and she did not know their whereabouts.

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  Buzirigi, Isaie

  Isaie Buzirigi

  Oral history of Isaie Buzirigi.

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  Bwasoni, Rejina

  Rejina Bwasoni

  In the interview, Rejina recounts seeing soldiers arriving in a Jeep at her school. The soldiers took away several teachers and other individuals, including her uncle, Mark Buhinja, who was an agronomist. The interviewee saw the abductions occur and mentioned that the teachers and her uncle were placed into vehicles. After the abductions, Rejina went home and found her family in complete distress. These abductions had deeply affected the community, with her uncle's wife and her mother expressing extreme grief, as anyone who loses a family member tragically would. Unfortunately, the speaker later learned that those taken, including her uncle, were killed. There were also rumors that spread and confirmed reports about the killings, including those who were tied up and transported.

  This resulted in Rejina and her family facing severe emotional distress. She was forced to drop out of school due to the upheaval and the loss of her father, who was also killed. The interviewee's father had been a soldier and was involved in burying bodies before his death.

  She also recounts how the local community and the school treated her and her siblings, by insulting them and facing discrimination. The family's suffering was compounded by the broader political violence and social upheaval of the time.

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  Gahutu, Jumayine

  Jumayine Gahutu

  In 1972, Jumayine Gahutu said he heard reports on the radio about the violent attacks happening in Bujumbura. According to Gahutu, people began to speculate that it was only a matter of time until the mascaras made their way through Muyinga. Gahutu said the military would grab male Hutus out of their homes, tie their hands behind their back, and throw them onto a truck. He explained that the victims were then taken to prison to be killed, and their corpses were tossed into a river or dumped into a mass grave. After the bodies were disposed of, Gahutu said the militia would come back to cease all property and vehicles. When violence erupted again in 1993, Gahutu fled to Tanzania for refuge.

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  Girukwigomba, Pasikaziya

  Pasikaziya Girukwigomba

  Pasikaziya Girukwigomba recounts the tragedy of 1972, how she lost her husband and what was happening in her neighborhood. The massacre happened systematically. In the beginning they started killing Hutu soldiers, later they killed civilians. They arrested them, herded them and took them away but the people said nothing. They arrested teachers or any Hutu who worked for the government. And one Tutsi could arrest and take away fifty Hutus. Pascasie's husband was a soldier who left her for work and has not returned to this day. And despite what her husband had at work, Pascasie got nothing and they stole it all. He also owned a shop, they looted it after they killed the shopkeeper. Dead bodies were thrown in deep pits and in rivers. Many were thrown into pits in Bururi. Pascasie lost her brothers, her uncle, her cousins, one of her brothers was a headmaster in Rutovu school, the other was a teacher. They didn't know who killed them. They only know that the Tutsis are the ones who killed the Hutus. During slaughter, some were killed by swords, others were beaten to death. There are those who were taken from prisons and brought outside to be killed. Pasikasiya's husband left her with three children and her life took a bad turn. Although it was hard to survive, she sent her children to school.

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  Hajayandi, Andre

  Andre Hajayandi

  Hajayandi watched in horror as perpetrators invaded his community, setting everything in their path ablaze. He said he will never forget seeing his beloved church rapidly engulfed in flames. Many of Hajayandi’s neighbors lost their homes and businesses during this militia invasion of 1972. Hajayandi, however, lost his brother, cousin and uncle. Hajayandi wants Burundians to return to helping each other instead and come together for the country's greater good. He explained that if there were a memorial built for all victims of the 1972 Genocide of Burundi, it could rejoin the Hutus and Tutsis and become one: Burundians.

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  Hatunga, Remejiyo

  Remejiyo Hatunga

  Remejiyo recalls a traumatic situation from his childhood when his father was forcefully taken away by authorities while he was working in his home as a carpenter. The police arrived to ask him to come to the commune for questioning. Despite some initial hesitation, he agreed to go. The interviewee vividly remembers the details: the police in khaki clothes similar to shoes and a specific type of hat, the location (Murore), and the events leading up to his father's arrest. After his father was taken away, Remejiyo's family heard that he was loaded onto a dump truck with others and taken away. This was the last time they ever saw their father again.

  Following their father's arrest, the family faced additional hardships. Their home was later looted by thieves, taking a new bicycle and 18 goats. Having witnessed these events, the interviewee explains how it caused him to feel powerless and afraid to speak out due to fear of the authorities returning for them, just as they had taken his father.

  Remejiyo also mentions the emotional impact on his family, especially his mother who struggled to take care of them, without their fathers support. After this incident with his father being captured, Remejiyo would hear cruel comments from others speculating about his father's fate and mocking his hope that he might return.

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  Hatungimana, Marceline

  Marceline Hatungimana

  When Marcelin Hatungimana was 8 years old, she received news that the militia had killed her two older brothers. As she struggled to process the death of her siblings, she then found out that teachers were being taken out of schools and slaughtered. As the violence grew, Hatungimana’s liberties dwindled. Her mother, father, and brothers were all killed during the 1972 Genocide of Burundi. She had no choice but to leave school and focus on surviving. She would go for long walks to identify plants she could pick and sell to support herself. Hatungimana physically survived the 1972 Genocide of Burundi, but she never returned to pursuing her education.

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  Hicuburundi, Athanase

  Athanase Hicuburundi

  Athanase Hicuburundi lost his brother in 1972. On April 29 a meeting was organized at Rumonge and the leaders urged everyone’s attendance. At that time anyone who didn’t go could be jailed. Although Hicuburundi was a teacher at Minago, he didn’t attend the meeting. Those who went there came running and said that a small group of armed men with machetes, called Mulele attacked the meeting. The killings continued on Monday. The soldiers ran into the roads and villages killing Hutus. The students who went to school returned saying that the headmaster had been killed. People became scared, most of them fled to the priest's compound but the soldiers arrested them later. They packed into a truck and transported them to the market of Minago to dump them into the pit dug by construction machines. In that period they mostly arrested Hutus who were teachers and salesmen. Soldiers came to arrest Hicuburundi but they didn't find him, and he decided to run away to Congo. They killed his small brother Simbananiye and his nephew Ntangibingura. The head of village Ntagumuka is among the perpetrators who killed many people. All the people who owned lands were killed by him. He then plundered their lands. Hicuburundi’s brothers didn't continue to study; they dropped out of school. The communal administrator called Nyambere is one of the perpetrators who persecuted many people in Rumonge.

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  Icobaragiye Ramadhan, Saleh

  Saleh Icobaragiye Ramadhan

  During the 1972 Genocide of Burundi, Icobaragiye said he was almost murdered during a militia roadblock. He attributes being alive today to football. Icobaragiye explained the governor immediately recognized him as a champion footballer and spared his life. However, other male Hutus, including Icobaragiye’s father, were less fortunate. They did not survive the roadblock. Some Hutus were killed on the spot, while he said others were tied and tossed into a nearby river to drown to death. After Icobaragiye narrowly escaped death, he hid in his home for 3 months. He said he told as many people to flee as possible before migrating to a refugee camp.

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  Kandava, Riberata

  Riberata Kandava

  Riberata Kandava shares how she studied till the first grade and after one year, studied at catechetical school. However, she stopped attending school, because her mother viewed it as a risk, after her father was captured. Riberata narrates how armed individuals came to her home, arrested her father who was a merchant, and subsequently killed him. The perpetrators looted her family's belongings, taking away a bicycle and a radio, and later returned to take whatever remained in the house. The family was left in appalling circumstances, constantly harassed by local authorities who accused them of being traitors. The term "traitor" was unclear to the speaker as a child, but it was used as a derogatory term against those who were targeted. The interviewee also mentions an alarming practice where some perpetrators would return to marry the widows of the victims they had killed. The speaker's mother, a young and attractive widow, became a target of such advances, which intensified their hardships. The family lived in fear and poverty, struggling to survive amid ongoing harassment, as well as threats from local authorities.

  Overall, the interview paints a vivid picture of the brutal consequences of political violence and how it profoundly affected the lives of innocent civilians in Kandava during that period.

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  Kangeyo, Marie Rose

  Marie Rose Kangeyo

  Marie Rose Kangeyo was born in 1947 in Bwinyana village, Vumbi commune, Kirundo province. She was married there, and became a widow there in Bitare, a place opposite to Rarwe. She got school education until fifth grade. Her father was Ntamugenzi Andreya, he was a diploma holder, he was an agricultural assistant. During the 1972 tragedy, Marie Rose Kangeyo lost many people: Her husband, her father, Michel Pfayokumpa, Mariko Kazirinikori, Rwobahirya, Pasikari, Saturumino and others.

  According to Marie Rose Kangeyo, educated hutus were targeted even women, but also important people, merchants were mostly targeted. She witnessed the arrest of her husband and other hutus to be killed. Their graves are at Vumbi in an unknown place because they took them away and they never returned back. They recommended her husband to bring a report as he was chief, while he was enjoying his holidays, so they took him away and killed him. Some local leaders were involved in that tragedy, the administrator Mako, Gahima nicknamed Gasuravumbi, and others. That administrator also was involved in the arrest of her father, and they embarked him in his car which he had stationed at Gasivya. They killed them using small hoes, under the administrator’s order.

  The money her husband had saved in saving account was not recuperated by his family because he had gone with all diploma documents. They even looted the land his husband had bought at Kabuye in Kiremba. They also looted banana crops they had. Misogoro was a man who brought thieves to steal Marie Rose’s things because she refused to marry him as his second wife after her husband’s death. After the death of her husband, she was traumatized, she was constrained to return back to her mother’s home. Thieves always troubled her, trying to break through the window, because she was a widow. She alertly cried out with her few children with whom they lived together, but they lacked someone to come in help. So, her mother came and took them out of there. Her children didn’t continue school education, no one of them graduated, they survived in a very sorrowful life.

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  Karibwami, Louis

  Louis Karibwami

  Karibwami Louis was born in 1970, in Gitega commune and province, in Rutegama village. During the 1972 tragedy, his father was killed. After his father’s death they lived in very bad circumstances of poverty, as her mother was jobless. His father was a soldier, it was during the morning; he went to work but his family had already heard that there were killings which were being done all over the country. His family lived in a military camp and there was no way, no possibility to escape.

  When they lost they lost his father, it was as if their lives stopped. His mother didn’t know perpetrators, because there were teams appointed just for coming and took away them to kill them in mass graves. They realized that it was the government’s plan at that time. No one could see the body; you couldn’t even go to ask, if you went to ask, you could also be killed. They didn’t even find bodies of killed people.

  They were badly affected, that is why they would like to stop it, because it was a hard tragedy and many people lost their lives. Hutus were targeted in that tragedy.What they ask is that they should be given back their properties and things plundered; a lot of people were plundered with all their things, so they should be compensated.

  The advice he gives is that Burundians in general, and youth in particular, should fight against divisions and work hard to make development.

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  Macumi, Béatrice

  Béatrice Macumi

  Béatrice recounts the tragic times of 1972, where there was a massacre. She mentions incidents where people were arrested and killed, due to accusations of witchcraft or other reasons. She mentions that in 1972, some people disappeared, possibly taken away to work and never returned, presumed dead.

  Béatrice denies knowing about traitors or any specific details of the killings, indicating a lack of clear information or memory due to the passage of time. She mentions losing her husband, who was a soldier and taken away, and also losing a child during that period. She also recalls being called to live in a camp with her husband temporarily, and later returning home where her husband was again taken away and ultimately killed.

  The interview provides the interviewee's fragmented memories and the traumatic events she experienced during the 1972 massacre, highlighting the uncertainty and loss that affected her and her family.

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  Macumi, François

  François Macumi

  Macumi Francois was born in 1953 in Kabuye village, Kamihigo subvillage, Vumbi commune, Kirundo province. In 1972, he lost his beloved brother who raised him. He lived in his house because his father had married another wife and had left his mother. His brother clothed him, fed him like his parents. The day they came to take him away, he hid himself in the upper shelter built in the house below the stove, so they burned the red pepper which made him flee from there, so they picked up him, he never returned back.

  According to Francois, the 1972 tragedy targeted people of a given ethnic group. During that period, local leaders, policemen, JRR members and other tutsis took away hutus, put them in prison and killed them. He said that most targeted people were hutus who had conflicts with local leaders or with other tutsis, and teachers. They accused them of being too many. When they took them away, you couldn’t cry, you couldn’t mourn, you couldn’t say anything, in order not to be considered as evil doers complicit.

  His brother had had conflict with a certain tutsi, so they convoked him the following day. When he went there he was imprisoned for about three days, they released him, followed him, called him back telling him that there was something he had forgotten, and then they killed him. His family members never saw him again; they realized that he underwent what happened to other people, as such things were happening around them.

  After some days, they persecuted the interviewee, the local leader protected him and advised him not to go to answer that convocation, they accused him that he wanted to avenge his brother, which was not true, that was pretext to kill him. His sister in law who was left by his brother became foolish because of problems that happened to her, she was downhearted, she was put in jail because of that foolishness and she finally died after three years, but she had returned home. She left two orphans who were sustained by their grandmother and family members.

  The interviewee affirms that it was a very sorrowful period and that oppression went on even in 1973, they were sent to clear forest at Murehe, where they saw sorrowful past events, burned houses, empty houses and areas where people had fled from.

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  Manirambona, Rehokadiya

  Rehokadiya Manirambona

  In Rehokadiya’s testimony, she explains how in 1972 people were taken away without clear reasons, often labeled as "dissidents" by those in power. She mentions how this time period was marked by confusion and a lack of understanding about the true nature of the violence. The interviewee was a student at Murehe elementary school during the genocide era. She witnessed classmates and teachers being taken away by soldiers and never seeing them again. The local population were given a warning by an Italian priest about the danger and encouraged to flee if possible.

  Rehokadiya lost two family members (cousins) during this tragedy, one was a demobilized soldier working in the governor's office who disappeared and was later confirmed dead. Another was a teacher who attempted to hide but was eventually captured and killed. She narrates how Mourning and traditional funeral rituals at the time were prohibited. Expressing grief would result in being accused of sympathizing with the victims, and could easily lead to further persecution.

  These arrests were carried out by compiled lists made by government authorities and passed down to local officials who carried out the arrests and executions. The interviewee describes mass graves in Vumbi municipality, where victims from various regions were brought to be killed. The graves were located in a large cave used for hiding and disposing of bodies. Rehokadiya heard about the massacre from a former perpetrator who described the brutal methods and locations where bodies were disposed of. This person, named Magarama, recounted the details of the killings and the state of the mass graves.