“‘‘Steep hills are reserved for good friends’’

This article was translated from Dutch by kompreno, which provides high-quality, distraction-free journalism in five languages. Partner of the European Press Prize, kompreno curates top stories from 30+ sources across 15 European countries. Join here to support independent journalism.

Rwanda and Belgium have not been friends for a long time. Since President Paul Kagame put an end to the genocide against the Tutsis in 1994, they have never really been. Instead of mutual trust came mutual suspicion. Instead of the respect equal partners show each other, contempt came. Year after year, mistrust soured the relationship, contempt rose on both sides and neither wanted to make much effort to straighten out misunderstandings of all kinds.

That attitude culminated in a sad climax at the end of March. And even though big emotions do not fit Rwandan cultural codes – after all, being angry, crying, laughing loudly offends dignity – Kagame gave free rein to all his frustrations in a blazing anti-Belgium speech on 16 March 2025. He was furious because of the European sanctions of which he saw Belgium – and not entirely unjustifiably – as a major instigator.

One day later, all Belgian diplomatic staff and their families were given 48 hours to leave Rwanda. Ten days later, on 27 March, then "all international and national NGOs, religious organizations and public interest foundations, registered and active in Rwanda, had to immediately cease their cooperation with the Belgian government or its related entities".

So the relationship had been very fragile for years, but now Kagame gave Belgium the gift of goodbye.

The dupe

Belgium's embassy in Kigali was responsible for issuing visas for 18 Schengen countries. They processed some 10,000 applications a year. All those countries are now looking for a solution. Possibly France will take on that task. Only, organizing such a passport machine does not happen in a jiffy. People in Rwanda who want to travel to Belgium now have to turn to the embassy in Kenya; the others have to make their plans.

Belgium contributed about €44 million in official development assistance to Rwanda in 2022, making it Rwanda's fourth-largest bilateral development cooperation partner.

While aid workers packed their bags, the impact on the Rwandan people is hard to estimate. But undoubtedly it is greater on the Rwandan population than on the Belgian, and not just in the short term. The employees and suppliers of the embassy and Belgian-related organizations, the expats' household staff are out of work overnight. But above all, the doctors in training, the people in exchange programms and the entrepreneurs who had to wind down their operations will no longer contribute to the country's growth.

Most Belgians who have lived there for years react resignedly. But there is also criticism: 'We are now in the same situation as the French until 2021. We will get by and this too will pass. We don't feel more targeted than usual. There is no reason to be afraid,' says a Belgian who arrived in the country in the 1970s.

Yet there are frustrations over the political statements of Belgian Foreign Minister Maxime Prévot (Les Engagés). 'Why does he side unequivocally and completely with Congo? Is there no corruption there then? Our minister has screwed up well for the next few years, the embassy will not open here again during his term.' A good part of the Belgian community in Kigali agrees with these statements.

Belgium, of course, has problems first and foremost with Rwanda's military action in eastern Congo, but criticism of former mandatary Belgium is dismissed by Rwanda as misguided neo-colonialism. The Rwandan government objects to Belgium using its voice on issues affecting Rwanda in international institutions such as the EU.

When it became clear that diplomat Bernard Quintin (MR) would almost certainly be appointed as the European Special Envoy to the Great Lakes, Kagame single-handedly telephoned French President Macron to block that appointment. And so it happened. So, thanks to Kagame, Belgium gained a minister: in this government, Quintin became Minister of the Interior. This story played out at the end of May last year and since then the tension between the two countries only increased, until it culminated in the cutting of ties.

Deep-seated resentment

Why is Kagame doing this? For the president of Rwanda, there are many reasons to turn away anyone who has anything to do with Belgium. First and foremost, a deep-seated resentment against 'the Belgians' haunts his mind. Was it not the Belgians who printed identity cards in 1924 and divided every Rwandan into an ethnic group: Hutu (90%), Tutsi (7%) and Twa (3%). Was it not the Belgians – albeit under the auspices of the United Nations – who organized democratic elections in 1958, lending a hand to the Hutus so that the majority was sure to win?

Mass killings in 1959, 1963 and 1973 caused entire groups of high-ranking Tutsis to flee the country. Toddler Paul Kagame also fled with his parents, both related to the Mwami, the Rwandan king, to neighbouring Uganda and ended up in a refugee camp. Growing up there, Kagame watched the country's once-important Tutsi leaders slip into depression. He observed that mothers were straightening out the family. This explains why Kagame likes to be surrounded by women advisers. He undoubtedly caught the many taunts against the Belgians there.

Moreover, the Belgians officialised the population groups into a Hutu, Tutsi or Twa. This division deepened and solidified the divide between the farmers (Hutus) and the dominant pastoralists (Tutsis). It would fuel envy for power. A hundred years later, Kagame still cites that division as the main reason for the 1994 genocide, and thus he holds the Belgians responsible for the deaths of one million Rwandans, 800,000 of whom were Tutsis.

Moreover, it is a thorn in Kagames flesh that Belgium hosts several opposition groups and critical voices. Here, he conveniently forgets that his Rwandan Popular Front (RPF) was also sheltered in Belgium during Habyarimana's regime.

Belgium has thus, according to Kagame, done more harm than good in his country. In his 16 March speech at the BK Arena, attended by 8000 people, he said: 'Some of the challenges we face today have their origins in colonisation, carried out by a country of similar size to ours, which has fragmented and divided us. That country is Belgium.'

Belgium's absence is convenient for Kagame

Our intertwined history means that over the years, Belgium has built a good information network in the region. And that does not please Kagame either. Together with the Americans, Belgium was able to be the first to map Rwanda's resource hunger. It was clear that the government could not dig up everything itself that it officially exported as raw materials. Through its informants, Belgium was also able to prove the links between the M23 and the Rwandan army, long before the war erupted openly.

Through its diplomatic work, our country was able to prevent Kagame from openly seizing Goma not much earlier, a senior source revealed. The Belgian information formed the basis for what a UN investigation group confirmed and by now is as plain as day: Rwanda's massive support for rebel group M23.

Kagame repeatedly experiences Belgium as an obstacle to implementing his plans with eastern Congo quickly and efficiently. The sanctions are the perfect occasion for him to send a nasty potty mouth out of the way.

Moreover, Kagame argues that "certain populations in eastern Congo are of Rwandan origin and they did not go there as migrants". That pre-colonial presence of Rwandophone communities is true, and the borders are obviously a colonial construct.

But the belief that at least part of eastern Congo belongs to Rwanda is a political discourse with far-reaching consequences.According to Kagame, Belgium is paving the way for the international community to view recapturing these so-called rightful territories as an invasion. When there is one clear enemy, it is easier to win over the people and go along with the war rhetoric. And he needs his people and every soldier to be successful in this campaign.

Distilling one clear enemy is a well-known tactic to create unity. For years, that enemy was France. After a French judge sought to take Kagame to court in 2006, Kagame blew up all diplomatic relations in 2006. Macron managed to win Kagame back for France, and since 2021 (15 years later) France has again an ambassador in the country. The French are experiencing their honeymoon with Kagame and Belgium is in the penalty box.

Echo chambers

Moreover, the French ambassador in Kigali is an undisguised fan of Kagame - something that happens to local ambassadors rather often. Some Rwandans gigglingly wonder if he is paid by the president. All the while Kagame is increasingly mouldering into a dictator.

The last somewhat critical journalist had ''a motorbike accident'' in 2023. This was followed by a series of reports by the journalists' consortium Forbidden Stories, to which the government spread the rather ridiculous rumour that Belgium had sponsored this series with two million euros. On the ground, however, that goes down like hot air.

Everyone in an autocrat's entourage wants to keep him friendly, often out of fear. So Kagame is only confirmed in his schemes of thought and surrounds himself with like-minded people. His ministers fall over each other to curry favour by blackening Belgium.

Minister Jean-Damascène Bizimana, the Minister for National Reconciliation, is the most zealous in this. He likes to think of himself as the nation's leading historian. Systematically, he randomly throws true but unrelated events from the colonial past and all linked to Belgian decisions into the mixer. He presses the button and a hate mash comes out.

With that, he bombards the population on radio and TV, who take it for true. The troll machine on social media, especially on X, is in full swing. If such a distortion of history serves the president's discourse, there is nothing wrong with that. A relentless flow of anti-Belgian propaganda is then the result.

Belgian diplomacy is well aware of these traits, the sensitivities and the, to us, sometimes odd twists of thought of Kagame and his ilk. At the same time, it is a fact that people within Belgian diplomacy have long felt a greater affinity for the more open, albeit corruption-ridden, Congolese leaders.

Rwanda does not have a good reputation at the Belgian Foreign Affairs, quite the contrary. The Rwandan government's activities on Belgian soil against its own dissidents contributed to this. That Minister Prévot did not prove insensitive to this information and spoke out strongly against Rwandan action goes back to the info he received from his administration.

How deep is your love?

Kinyarwanda is a complex language full of metaphors and is sometimes difficult to interpret. Cows and hills are grateful subjects for sayings in Rwanda. For instance, 'Agasozi gaterera ugatega inshuti' freely translated, 'steep hills are reserved for good friends'.

You can interpret it as 'You are only a good friend when you make an effort for each other' or, in other words, 'How deep is your love?'. But equally, it means knowing one's friends in difficult moments. It seems there will be one friend less walking around in the land of a thousand hills in the time to come. Both countries currently prefer to seek flatter paths.

This article was translated from Dutch by kompreno, which provides high-quality, distraction-free journalism in five languages. Partner of the European Press Prize, kompreno curates top stories from 30+ sources across 15 European countries. Join here to support independent journalism.