Asserting Their Presence! Women’s Quest for Transitional Justice in Post-Genocide Rwanda

Conclusion

“…Women activists there succeeded in having sexual violence categorized as one of the most serious crimes (category 1) in the 1996 Genocide Law instead of as a crime of the same significance as the stealing of nonhuman property (category 4) as was proposed in the draft bill. 6 As indicated in the Introduction, the transfer in 2008 of all genocide rape cases to the Gacaca courts threw up a number of specific obstacles for women to testify against their rapists. 7 For reasons presented in the stories, the women did not expect any positive outcome of speaking out in Gacaca.…”