INFLUENCE OF LANGUAGE ON RWANDAN GENOCIDE: TRENDS AND THREATS IN WEST AFRICAN SUB-REGION

Abstract

The paper examined the dynamics of language and communication in the historic ethnic cleansing in Rwanda, considering the current realities on the continent and particularly in the West African sub-region. Although many explanations for the 1994 crisis and genocide in Rwanda concentrated on ethnicity, some other explanations have traced the causes of the crisis to colonial legacy, distortion of language semantics and abuse of language. There are, therefore, divergent positions on the underlying factors responsible for the conflict. This paper employed a critical analytical method to explore the impact of language and communication on the crisis. It argued that language played a significant role in identity construction and reconstruction in the tragic political history of Rwanda. This is because the colonialists used language to promote ethnic hegemony of the Tutsi group that later degenerated into genocide in the country, thereby linking the explanations mentioned above to language as the root cause. It further emphasized the need for West African nations to learn their lessons from the global historical antecedents of genocide owing to the prevalence of the misuse of language to propagate hate speech in the West African sub-region in recent times. The paper concluded that West African nations must enforce legislation against hate speech to avert its lethal consequences and to promote sustainable peace and security in the sub-region.