By Ruhima Jonah
Marc Hoogsteyns is a bitter man. Very bitter. His paymasters are certainly very bitter, murderous individuals. More on that, later. His vituperative article on behalf of his Kigali paymasters, Kagame and the RDF, as against the joint FARDC/UPDF offensive against ADF/ISCAP is full of so much falsehood it would make Joseph Goebbels blush!
The article is at once ridiculous, childish, bitter, annoying and amusing, if not outrightly shallow.
He lays out 7 to 9 broad strokes, that are no doubt, going to form Kigali’s and Kagame’s paid hacks’ baseline for attacks on a mission that has been half a decade in the offing (some players say plans started much earlier).
Marc Hoogsteyns, who also calls himself Kongomani, despite living in Kigali, writes as below (the errors are his):
” 1. The conflict with Rwanda resulted in the closure of the border between the two countries.
2. Rwanda is accusing Museveni to support several Rwandan rebel groups of which the FDLR (Hutu extremists) and the RNC (renegade collaborators of the Rwandan government) are the most important ones.
3. It is a fact that Uganda is feeding and taking care of the logistics of the FDLR and the RNC in Congo.
4. Museveni is also trying to divert the economical orientation of the province of North-Kivu towards Uganda.
5. I wrote another paper about that a couple of weeks ago.
6. Via ex-ministers like Philemon Mateke and his daughter who is now a minister in Museveni’s government the Hutu community is North-Kivu is receiving support to revive the old Hutu culture; in local churches and schools the usage of Kihutu *(Hutu dialect) was introduced with a very negative anti-Kigali and anti-Tutsi narrative.
7. Eugène Serafuli, a former governor of North-Kivu and a close relative of Mateke – Philemon Mateke was born in Kisoro, nearby Congo – is playing a very important role in all this.
8. Several facts show us that they are even trying to revive the Nyatura Hutu militia.The Nyatura militia is composed of Congolese Hutu’s and they have always collaborated closely with the Rwandan Hutu extremists.
9. This strategy is receiving the moral support of the Rwandan opposition in the diaspora that wants to lure Rwanda into a big war so that the international community can step inn to stop it and to force the current regime in Kigali to negotiate with them.”
There’s little doubt in any geopolitical analyst’s mind that Marc has given fodder to the Kagameist troll farm. From all op-eds and social media writs, their strategy will revolve around points 6, 7, 8 and partly 9.
It is astounding, really, to read in an article in print or online, such as the one Marc writes, that a journalist/anlayst had a discussion with senior RDF officers who called Museveni, “utterly stupid”!
Whereas hatred is normal, as all is fair in love and war, to call Museveni stupid exposes a depravity of mind and an overwhelming lack of sobriety bordering on insanity.
Let’s quote from Hoogsteyns’ article, verbatim;
“In Kigali several military commanders look at the UPDF intervention in the DRC as a warning for Rwanda not to intervene in its actions. But they are not impressed by it. “The old silverback gorilla (Museveni) is standing up and banging its fists on his chest to make as much noise as possible,“ told me one very high up official in Kigali. “But he’s not respecting the boundaries of his territory and he’s making all that noise to scare off other silverbacks who want to take over from him. We were anticipating a move like this so he’s not scaring us. We know and follow every step he takes. He’s utterly stupid and he’ll walk straight into his own retirement.”
Bitterness and gall with a spicing of frustration.
Unless, of course, Marc is passing on his own thoughts as those of the Kigali establishment and they are quite happy with such sentiment being expressed.
As a prelude to bigger media and diplomatic offensives against Uganda, the UPDF, and the person of Museveni, it is advised that Uganda’s security and defense establishment look out for Kigali’s modus operandi, which is fairly standard and predictable.
i) A heavy diplomatic campaign
ii) A propaganda machine to carry falsehoods
iii) Terror and sabotage missions
iv) The killing of civilians in the DRC who don’t support them.
v) Direct and extremly violent confrontations where they have managed to get the enemy in a difficult situation.
Let’s address some of Hoogsteyns’ points.
1. Kagame closed the common border with Uganda, like he has always done as against Burundi and the DRC, and can’t do to Tanzania, even if he wanted, because of the need for access to the sea. Only a moron would belabor the point as being a conflict between Uganda and Rwanda. It has always been a Kagame pathology to deny his having gotten anything from Uganda. Examples are numerous. The man denied Uganda ever helping the RPA in any way, most recently, at the wedding of Teta Rwigema, whose father, the first RPA, now RDF, commander, was also once commander of the NRA the precursor to the UPDF.
By mentioning Uganda, he basically denied having been a refugee in that country, not having had a rearbase in Uganda or having served in the NRA. Nonetheless, it was an interesting statement from a Head of State that once handed Kigali’s highest medals; the Uruti, the National Liberation Medal and the Umurunzi, RWANDA’s Campaign Against the Genocide Medal, to Museveni for his role in the fight against the genocide against the Tutsi.
2. Having run out of distortions and false flag operations to blame Uganda and its leadership, there is no doubt that they will pull out the pity party and blame Uganda for the genocide and hobnobbing with the FDLR genocidiares or what’s left of them, since the RDF routinely announces successes against them using such words as wiping them, and committed untold atrocities according to the UN Mapping Report of 2013 during the Congo War of 1996 to 2003 against hapless Hutu men and women who were in no way connected to the FDLR.
3. Read 2, above. Goebbels would be proud of this fat Belgian in creating false narratives.
4. Again only a moron would write what Hoogsteyns’ wrote as if Uganda is a state without National Interests. This, Marc’s point Number 4 is legitimate. We have been talking about it here and elsewhere. We have the resources and the means and will to go ahead with what’s in our National Interest. We don’t care about Kigali’s unless we have convergence. Kigali has been clear in word and action that they not only hate Uganda, but Ugandans- shooting over 12 hapless villagers at the common border over accusations of smuggling, instituting a trade blockade by not allowing Ugandan goods onto the Rwandan market, and disparaging the Ugandan president at every twist and turn including attacking his long deceased mother!
Kigali is telling the world that they will not accept the DRC-Uganda Roads Project, because they only know how to dispense violence and plunder, whenever they have been in indirect control of that area they claim as their sphere of influence for more than 30 years. Uganda is simply saying, build roads, let’s do legitimate business and have the conditions that have been a recipe for recruitment into conflict, done away with.
5, 6, 7, 8 and 9. These basically state the same thing. Which is utterly (to use Kongomani’s word) ridiculous!
Let’s be clear; there is no such thing as Hutu culture or Tutsi culture. Kagame, himself, keeps saying this in his Ndumunyarwanda and Agaciro talks. Marc would be advised to stop spewing genocide ideology as he explicitly does in his point 6.
All Banyarwanda are Banyarwanda. There are different Kinyarwanda dialects in the region and they tend to be geographical.
For instance, the Bafumbira of Kisoro have both Hutu and Tutsi and they speak a similar dialect.
Those in Northern Rwanda (Ruhengeri, Gisenyi) also speak a different dialect which is spoken by the Hutu and Tutsi of this area. The same is true of the Banyarwanda speaking people in DRC.
This is the first time I’m seeing someone say that different Banyarwanda groups have different cultures.
Clearly, Kigali is basically attempting to say that Uganda is not only supporting Rwandan opposition but the Hutu genocidiares who may not be Rwandan at all.
Done with his 9 point propaganda agenda Marc makes more spurious military claims that show his lack of understanding of the region. It is a shame to read his infantile musings. They are largely 4 as set out verbatim, below:
1 “Rwanda would probably not tolerate to have UPDF elements and hardware on the Congolese side of their border.
2. The RDF is probably better equipped, motivated and trained as the UDPF.
3. The Ugandans have jets, but the Rwandans have the missiles to shoot them down, tanks are lesser effective tools in a mountainous region like the Kivus.
4. The Rwandan troops are more skilled and battle-hardened and they are used to take casualties.”
If it wasn’t in print, one would imagine that it was some teenagers having a comparison of the size of their phalluses, who wrote as above!
It was so shockingly naive and therein is the problem, if at all, considering his access to Kigali’s establishment, they actually believe this tripe! Like a retired Kenyan Intelligence officer opined, whatever he wrote is absolute rubbish!
He writes like Uganda needs to go to the DRC in order to attack Rwanda, and start entry all the way north at Nobili over 300kms from the common border with Rwanda. Never mind that the two share a common border with Kigali barely 80 km away from Katuna.
Kongomani shoots himself in the foot rather than make a case for Rwanda. They need to hire better “experts” on the region. The fact that he has threatened three national armies in this write-up speaks to the desperate situation Kigali finds itself in. Or, one that he has created in his mind.
So, he says RDF will not allow UPDF/FARDC operations in North Kivu petit (Virunga, Nyiragongo, Jomba, Goma, Masisi area), and he adds that RDF is looking for permission to enter DRC to occupy these areas!
He is either saying that DRC/Uganda shall put the security of the Bunagana – Goma road construction in the hands of RDF or that there shall be no road construction (Bunangana-Goma), near the Rwanda border! Which is laughable, but not as much as when a Rwandan commentator, Gonzaga Muganwa, talks of Rutshuru being part of Rwanda in a tweet excahnge with a somewhat sober Olivier Mushimire on 7th December, 2021 in response to his KT Press article on 6th December, 2021, “Whatever May go Wrong in the DRC, Rwanda is to blame-Andrew Mwenda” https://www.ktpress.rw/2021/12/whatever-may-go-wrong-in-the-drc-rwanda-is-to-blame-andrew-mwenda/ which he ended in the usual Kigali way, by bringing up KISANGANI and stating that he hopes lessons were learned! Oh, Olivier! The world is changed, mon frere. The world is changed. You should feel it in the woods and waters as Galadriel hauntingly warns in that sweetest of voices in the soliloquy or monologue to the opening of The Lord of the Rings beautifully warns. It is good you remembered some journalistic ethos by saying RWANDA’s and by default UGANDA’s forays into the DRC cannot be called spheres of influence, but may get such a moniker only in relation to the threats emanating therefrom.
On Hoogsteyns’ blooper number 2, what is that guy smoking? How do you even make that claim? RDF better equipped, trained and motivated than the UPDF? Yikes!
In number 3, he repeats the same mistake of the naivety of kindergarten kids, at least, in terms of war.
No, Marc. Your TL-50 launchers (which are not your only air defence assets, but certainly the best in the RDF arsenal) are only 4 for the Sky Dragon system. They cannot do ANYTHING toUGANDA’s best air assets given their range, yet UGANDA’s jets don’t need any part of your airspace or even a 50km range from the border (if you were stupid enough to deploy the TL-50s at the borders, which would be a nice way to ensuring you lose all your air defence in seconds) to deliver their missiles, should the current expert wisdom being given Kagame and his men get us to that stage.
Number 4 is strange, to be polite. More skilled? How do you measure that, Marc? Battle hardened according to what measure? On taking more casualties, there is always a breaking point. Even Nazi Germany capitulated. You know the Nazis, don’t you Marc? Those nasty bastards who overran Belgium like a pack of cards crumbling? They were humbled by potato growers from Iowa, Soy bean farmers from Mississippi and proud guys from as far as Montana, and even some African polities. So, what’s the point? That in case of war, Rwandans can die for their country, but Ugandans wouldn’t want to die for theirs? Baloney.
Let’s tackle your second to last spurious claims;
“If the UPDF will leave the area around Beni and the Ituri forests and move to the south Museveni’s real intentions will become very clear.
His own collaborators in Kampala might not be willing to fight against a better organized, disciplined and better motivated RDF force to bolster his ego.
A possible bigger war with Rwanda might also initiate the end of his reign.
The opposition against the old man in Uganda is getting stronger by the day.
If the Burundian army or the Imbonerakure would be stupid enough to attack in the south of Rwanda their days in power would be counted as well.
The Congolese government will also be held responsible for a disaster like this: If they allow the Ugandans to use their soil to attack or to destabilize Rwanda you can’t blame the Rwandans to intercept that aggression on that same soil. And Tshisekedi would put the safety of his own citizens at stake”.
Collaborators? Opposition against the old man? Ego? Attack Rwanda?
Let’s ask a simple question: What strategic value does Uganda gain from attacking Rwanda and deposing its current regime? NONE. ZERO. Like the Baganda say, tewaali. We don’t rely on RWANDA for a market. They have shown that they hate Uganda and Ugandans, so, why fight Kagame? To what end? Get an extra 12.5 milion people to feed in addition to the 43 million in Uganda? There’s no diplomat, analyst or war planner that is serious, that thinks Museveni or the UPDF or Uganda, for that matter, want a war with Rwanda. There has been enough provocation, including shooting dead 12 innocent Ugandan civilians, and the kidnap of 2 soldiers at the common border to warrant a war. The point is, Kagame will not have a war on his terms, if that’s what he wants. However, the mistake is to think of silence as weakness or meekness.
So, Marc, continue living a good life in Kigali. No shell is about to land in your compound. Stop lying to yourselves about imaginary enemies. You would do well to read the classic fable by Aesop, The Boy Who Cried Wolf.
Again, Marc’s reading of Uganda, UGANDANS and the political situation in this country is woeful and shows that he is informed by his paymasters lenses, unfortunately. The UPDF are not collaborators of anyone. They are a capable fighting force so far removed from that that entered the DRC in 1996 and withdrew in 2003. Those that have tasted their wrath have learnt the lesson in many theaters. You know them.
Dude, Museveni’s demise has been on his opponent’s lips since he trotted into Kampala in January of 1986. Is he old? Is the Pope Catholic? To call his supporters collaborators is funny. Many people support Uganda, the country, not Museveni, the man. Try the mistake of making the same appear as one and you will understand what hellfire means.
Oh, you also said Uganda’s economy is in the gutters? Really? Writing from a country that tinkers with its economic growth figures as the Financial Times found out? Don’t believe us. Read it, here; https://www.ft.com/content/683047ac-b857-11e9-96bd-8e884d3ea203 That’s too rich, Hoogsteyns. Too rich. In any case, you’re obviously angry that your manouvres using the environmental lobby haven’t borne the fruit in stopping the East African Crude Oil Pipeline, have you? That’s about $15 billion in intital investment unlocked. We shall be polite and not state that that’s $3 billion more than the economy of the Singapore of Africa, as you like to call that country. Don’t worry. We shall not come to beg on Kigali’s streets like the numerous destitute Rwandans, here.
Next time, Marc. Our regards to the ladies.
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