The First Anniversary of the Rwanda People's Party (RPP)

(LONDON) - On this week we celebrate the first anniversary of the RPP, I want to congratulate all our supporters, the Rwandan people, who have stood behind us and our vision and your party for our first year in formation.

The RPP is now an established party in Rwanda and is fast growing as a national and progressive party. The RPP has a clear program, political, economic and social for our country and is now accepted as a key partner in the project of African renaissance.

RPP has issued a call as well as a Road Map to Peace Talks in Rwanda that can lead us to a comprehensive settlement of the conflict and communal violence we have had in our country for the last 52 years.

RPP has a comprehensive national and nation building, reconstruction and peace programs which are based on the following principles and agenda:

• A regime of freedom, • A justice policy; • A national reconciliation policy; • An economic and development policy; • A social policy; • A cultural policy; and • An independent and sovereign country Policy

The RPP has issued a number of documents which can be accessed through our website and on Facebook. We herein attach the RPP first anniversary statement. Our summary is as follows:

• We have reached out to Rwandan people at home and in the Diaspora and have managed to setup self-sustaining youth, urban poor and peasant volunteers groups across the country working on poverty elimination and other social issues that confront them on a daily basis.

• We have proposed to the Rwandan government officially to hold peace talks with an open agenda on 5 May 2011, but so far we have not heard from the Rwanda government

• We are concerned about the harassment of independent media by the RPF, including our own website that has sometimes been hacked into or interfered with.

• We are encouraged by the support that we continue to receive from the Rwandan people, of all classes and ethnicities and we feel that as a party we offer hope to our people so that we can build the new Rwanda that we want and that our children and grandchildren can happily grow up in peace

• We have a political as well as economic and social program that you can access on our website. We are a transparent party and have nothing to hide from you. Even if you don’t agree with us, we are still open to dialogue with you or anyone else that cares about Rwanda

• We salute the Rwandan people and sympathize with their suffering under 52 years of dictatorial regimes and we believe if we stand firm, together we can build a new Rwanda based on rights, freedom and dignity of all Rwandan people, and commit ourselves, to never and never again to allow dictators to ruin our lives and that of our children now and in the future.

Fellow Rwandans, on the international stage, we can confirm to you that Rwanda People’s Party has been overwhelmed by what it has managed to accomplish in just 12 months. Today, the RPP is a party that is well placed and able to play a vital role in the international political arena in more than 87 countries. The party also has built a firm foundation with global bodies and institutions that include: the United Nations, European Union, Commonwealth, African Union, Arab League, Gulf Cooperation Council, Non Aligned Movement, Islamic Conference and Co-operation, ASEAN, Organizations of the Central and Latin America States etc., and has a working desk to more than 2389 global universities and religious institutions etc.

Fellow Rwandan, you are all aware of the Rwanda Road Map to Peace, since Sept 2010. As a party, we can confirm to you that the new revised proposals of the Rwanda Road Map to Peace were re-drawn and delivered directly to President Kagame’s Office at Urugwiro on 05 May 2011. The party has also delivered other hard copies to President Kagame through: Ms. Louise Mushikiwabo, Foreign Minister & Cooperation of the Republic of Rwanda and H.E Ernest Mucyo, Rwandan High Commissioner to the UK. The proposals of the Roadmap were encrypted in a-16 pages documenting the current political uncertainty in Rwanda, why Rwanda needs the Peace Talks, what is to be achieved out of the Peace Talks, and what might be the most likelihood should Rwandan politicians fail to reach a political settlement. We believe that there is no wall of fear and no barriers of distrust that Rwandan people can fail to jump, in their search for the lasting peace and prosperity of all people of Rwanda.

The Rwandan soil belongs to all Rwandan (Tutsi, Hutu and Twa, failure to resolve their differences in a democratic and civilized manner since 1959 has been a big betrayal to people of Rwanda and the nation of Rwanda. The repercussion is evident from the genocide of one million Rwandan Tutsi and re-exodus of the Hutu refugees to the Democratic Republic of Congo. Fellow Rwandans, the disaster that we went through where some Hutu believe that Tutsi were their enemies and some Tutsi believe that Hutu were their enemies. This ethnicity feeling where based on false premise because there were not true. The Hutu and Tutsi have got to live together side by side in their country. My party the RPP wants to build a bridge between all communities. One of the main pillars of my party is to break the artificial enmity that politicians have created among people who don’t have to hate each other. Therefore, if Hutu or Tutsi have no other country to live in other than Rwanda, then none can justify their “wisdoms why they cannot calm down, pause for a moment and work together” for a suitable resolution to the Rwandan political crisis. Indeed, they don’t even need to like or marry each other if they don’t want, but they need just laws that guarantee their individuals’ rights, freedom, dignity and equal opportunity to live and work together as Rwandan for the prosperity of their country. This is an indelible moment of truth and illumination of fact.

This is the vision and progressive ideas of the RPP and, we are asking you to join hands with us to build a better Rwanda that all of us can belong to and feel comfortable with and be proud of. We seek to develop a better Rwanda that gives opportunities to all its citizens and nurtures and protects its children.

Fellow Rwandan, in terms of publicity, we have managed to expose the political myth of the RPF’s regime internationally. We have managed to storm the RPF’s wall of fear and barriers of distrust, and have inflicted on them with permanent irreparable holes and cracks. Today, the RPF regime is being seen by some of its western core supporters as a “candle melting” on fires. As a party, we are determined and merciless to continue to expose levels of brutality and aggression of the RPF regime against the peaceful and unarmed Rwandan population, until its wall of fear and barriers of distrust are completely swept away. Today the RPP enjoys an undisputed working relationship with more than 498 global reputable newspapers, radios and TV stations. As a party, we would like to thank the media for their contribution and support.

Let us march together to build a new Rwanda that all Rwandans deserve. We want a modern country which shall therefore be the Rwanda which lives in peace within itself, with its neighbors and with the rest of humanity.

We thank you very much and look forward to communicating with you on the RPP website rwandapepeopleparty.org and on Facebook: John V Karuranga

Thank you very much
May God Bless Rwanda and the People of Rwanda
John V Karuranga, President
Rwanda People’s Party (RPP)
London, UK

Submitted by: Jennifer Fierberg, MSW; a correspondent, Assistant Editor, and Volunteer Coordinator for NGO News Africa through the volunteer project of the UN. Jennifer is also the media co-coordinator and senior funding executive for The Africa Global Village (www.africaglobalvillage.com)