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Rwanda: Fugitive Kabuga Still Makes Merry
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The East African Standard (Nairobi)
ANALYSIS
10 May 2008
Posted to the web 9 May 2008
Patrick Wachira
Nairobi
Wanted for genocide in his country, fugitive Felicien Kabuga has been said to be in Kenya on several occassions. Last week, it emerged that he has business ventures here. How the whole world could be after him without success.
That wanted Rwanda genocide fugitive Felicien Kabuga has business interests in Kenya must be disturbing to many.
It has emerged that the genocide suspect has been collecting a cool Sh50 million in rent from apartments he is said to own in the posh Kilimani area of Nairobi, and other business ventures.
The apartment owned by Rwandan genocide suspect Felicien Kabuga and his wife Mukazitoni Josephine in Kilimani, Nairobi.
This means that claims that he may be in Kenya may be true, much as the authorities consistently deny.
The last time Kabuga appeared in the news, six months ago, was when the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) said the fugitive might have resided in Kenya "at some point in time."
ICTR Spokesman, Mr Roland Amoussouga, told the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (Chogm) in Kampala, Uganda, that there was "credible information" that Kabuga lived in Kenya at some stage in his long years of hiding.
Kabuga has a $5 million bounty on his head and is wanted for genocide crimes in his country, where close to one million people were killed.
It is not clear if the search for the man has been ongoing and in what countries, but Amoussouga said Kabuga's son-in-law was arrested in Germany early this year, giving some hope to the ICTR.
On Wednesday, Attorney-General, Mr Amos Wako, successfully sought court orders to freeze Kabuga's assets and proceeds from his apartments, managed by the Kenya FinanceTrust Company.
Curiously, the company has no physical address, but has been collecting some Sh290,000 every three months. The money is then banked into Commercial Bank of Africa and wired to an account in Belgium, according to the court proceedings.
The big question, therefore, is could Kabuga and his wife, Josephine Mukazitoni, be enjoying a luxurious life here, while the whole world is looking for them?
If that is the case, is the world really looking for him and where?
Kabuga reportedly bought the machetes used in the Rwanda genocide, which makes his participation as culpable as can be under the law. Amoussouga said Kabuga was still being "actively sought."
His snapshot, showing his greying hair at the temples, was widely circulated in police networks at the height of his search. But more than 14 years after the genocide, the search has yielded nothing.
That Kabuga may have been in Kenya, captured the national imagination in 2002-2003, but the Government did little to either probe the issue or placate the rumours.
Denial
The Government steadfastly denied that the genociduer was on Kenyan soil. The denial sort of aided the speculation, making it look like a Hollywood movie scene, rife with suspense, drama and intrigue.
The matter would have ended there, but a Kenyan journalist, William Gichuki Munuhe, was found murdered in his Karen house in February 2003.
It emerged that Munuhe had hatched a high profile plot to lure Kabuga out of his hideout and deliver the fugitive to the law. As anyone could guess, Munuhe would have pocketed over Sh300 million.
But something went tragically wrong. The hunted man apparently sensed danger and went after his pursuers.
Munuhe was found dead in his apartment, with a charcoal stove in the same room. Apparently, his killers wanted it to look like he died from carbon monoxide fumes.
But his relatives insisted Munuhe never had such a stove, nor did he use any such apparatus to cook.
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Days later, it emerged that just before Kabuga could be ensnarled, Munuhe lost contact with his collaborators and calls to his cell phone went unanswered.
The police sensed something was terribly amiss and they went to his house, where they found that he had been dead for hours.
Since Munuhe was said to have been working alongside the Federal Bureau of Investigations, it did not make sense that the scheme could have been bungled so easily.
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The reason nobody is giving him up is because they know they are dead if they do, that and the fact that nobody really has faith in a government that has failed them so many times in so many different ways. I bet that if you offered the money in U.S. dollars and a one way visa to there choice of the world, you might get some results. Also, the FBI has so many things in there hands at the moment wouldn't be nice if you did this one all on your own.
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