Drocell Mukantagara, approximately 75 years old, widow of the genocide and member of Avega, has lost five of her seven children, disappeared as well as their entire families : all of them were parents. Her two surviving sons still live with her, in her house on the village’s outskirts. The eldest, whose wife and children were killed, was particularly traumatised and has lost part of his mind. He lives depending upon his mother, despite her age and almost total blindness, as for two orphans taken in shelter after the tragedy, today aged 16 and 20. Drocell Mukantagara has recently had to ask the youngest of her adopted sons to abandon school, no longer having the money to pay for his transport fees.
At our meeting’s end, she pointed out :”When I talk about the genocide, everything spins in my head, I do not know where is the beginning nor where is the end”.
June 2005 – Nyamata - Rwanda.
© Pierre-Yves GINET