I am praying for one country a week and this week is Rwanda. I've included some facts about the country to give you a bit of info about it, things that are answers to prayer, and then specific things that we can be praying for.
When many people think of Rwanda the first thing that comes to mind is the genocide that happened in 1994 where over 800,000 people were killed. The Hutus and Tutsis, the two major ethnic groups, had been fighting since 1990 in a civil war. In 1959, the Hutus had overthrown the Tutsis from power and now the Tutsis were trying to gain back that power. There was much political and ethnical tension, which built up to 1994 when the Hutus wiped out almost ¾ of the Tutsi population in a mass genocide. Things have calmed down since then and Rwanda is now a republic with its first post-genocidal president being elected in 2003.
Facts about Rwanda:
-Population: 11,370,425
-13 people groups
-Official Language: French, English, Kinyarwanda
-The most densely populated country in Africa
-Slightly smaller than the state of Maryland
-Most of the country is savanna grassland
-Religion: Catholic 56%, Protestant 26%, few smaller religions with a small Muslim population.
Answers to prayer:
-Since 1994 the political structure has been stabilized allowing for road development, and education, sanitation, and political systems to be put in place.
-Rwanda has one of the fastest growing economies in Africa. The nation has stated that they want to be independent of foreign aid, which is a sign of confidence.
-The presence of women in the leadership. During the genocide, many of the victims were women. Today over half of the parliament are women
Pray for:
–Healing for those affected by the genocide. Many people still have deep wounds from that. The churches there are attempting to and must continue to focus on providing counseling and reconciliation for those people.
–Ethnic tensions that still go on. Even years after the civil war and genocide there is still some tension. I’m sure it’s similar to the differences between the North and the South in America during our civil war. Even today we still hear different things about the north and south that separates us some even if it’s not completely serious. Pray that all these tensions and inequity in Rwanda will be dissolved.
–Process of justice. Most criminal cases are poorly handled and people are treated unfairly
–Healing from HIV/AIDs. As you can imagine, this is a widespread problem in much of Africa.
Hotel Rwanda is a movie made in 2004 that tells the true story about how one man saved over 1,000 lives during the genocide. It shows some of the political and ethnic violence that went on during that time. I’ve seen it and thought it was a great story. If you want to get a glimpse of what it might have been like for the Rwandans during this time and what they had to go through, then I would recommend it.
This information can be seen at
http://www.operationworld.org/rwan
and
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/rw.html
