Shake hands with the devil

"Blame Belgium" is one simplistic message to be drawn from a docudrama presenting the memoir of the retired Canadian United Nations general (1993-4) in Rwanda, whose Shake Hands with the Devil was subtitled "The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda".

The movie version, directed by Ottawa-born Roger (48 Hrs, Turner & Hooch, Tomorrow Never Dies, And the Band Played On) Spottiswoode, is a grim reminder that some European colonists left a bigger mess than they'd found when they arrived in far-flung corners of the world. Of course, the whole sorry saga of Rwanda's colonial administration, civil war, genocidal divisions, bitter class system, interfering neighbours, ineffectual United Nations and indifferent global powers cannot be told, let alone explained, in a movie that's less than two hours long.

Instead, Rwandan history is summarised in the opening credits:

" Rwanda is a small country in Africa.

For centuries its 10 million citizens viewed themselves as one people.

In 1916, Belgium colonized Rwanda, introducing a system of identity cards separating the majority Hutus from the minority Tutsis.

The Tutsis were given preference in education, jobs and power.

In 1959, when Rwanda became independent, the Hutus rebelled and took over the government, exiling and killing Tutsis.

In 1990 a Tutsi-led multi-ethnic rebel force invaded from Uganda.

French troops intervened.

The invasion ended when both sides signed a peace treaty in 1993, a treaty the UN was sent to protect."

Almost every noun and verb in italics can be disputed (via Wikipedia).

Rwanda, together with Burundi and parts of Uganda, was a feudal kingdom for a couple of centuries, controlled by the ruling class of Tutsis, who had the same ethnic background as the realm's Hutu serfs and Taw pygmies.

During the 1880s carve-up of uncolonised parts of Africa, Rwanda was allocated to Germany; it was grabbed by Belgium during WW1 and became a League/UN mandate. Both sets of colonists maintained the Tutsi-dominated class system, but Belgium switched to supporting the majority Hutus prior to independence in 1962, when Burundi was separated out. Inter-class warfare lasted from the 1950s until the 90s.

Consequently, the Canadian general's increasing despair, and clinical depression arising from his impotent tour of UN duty, can be attributed to everyone's failure to understand that Rwanda was a feudal society on a par with many others (from Fiji and Iran to Nepal and Cambodia, the UK and Liberia to Haiti and Latin America) in which a self-appointed social elite ran things for their own benefit, as the Tutsis still do in Rwanda. All concerned in the 1990s blithely blamed "Hutu extremists" without wondering what had driven them to such bloodthirsty extremes.

The C$11-million docudrama primarily targeted TV and cable audiences in Canada, where the politically aroused lieutenant-general became a popular figure, best-seller and senator: Romeo Dallaire (played by lookalike Roy Dupuis). His naivety and the developed world's mendacity are well depicted and Rwanda's scenery is presented picturesquely, but this movie is a pitifully inadequate glimpse at a socio-political mess the Belgians and the UN stumbled into and out of.