A crisis and severe criticism hang over the head of MINUSCA, Valentine Rugwabiza, and potential changes could significantly affect MINUSCA policy and CAR in the period ahead.
For more than a decade, MINUSCA personnel have committed numerous crimes against the people of the Central African Republic. Throughout these years, the people of the Central African Republic have shown their contempt for the members of MINUSCA, yet the voice of these people has been ignored by the UN.
The issue of crimes committed by MINUSCA has recently attracted the attention of the major European media, which have begun to highlight, in a coordinated fashion, the crimes committed by MINUSCA members in the Central African Republic (CAR).
Most interestingly, in these media articles, the Rwandan contingent, and more specifically the head of MINUSCA, Valentine Rugwabiza, who is of Rwandan origin, has been sharply criticized as a scapegoat for the inhumane crimes committed by MINUSCA personnel over the past decade and more.
Not only the European and African media, but also previously unknown civil societies such as COSCIPAC, have joined the campaign to criticize it and call for Ms. Rugwabiza’s resignation.
Many political experts in the CAR see the Western media’s sudden interest in the dark history of MINUSCA, and the arrows of criticism aimed at the MINUSCA president, as a systematic media campaign against Rugwabiza and the Rwandan contingent in CAR.
For them, this campaign came just before the review of the extension of the mandate of the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in the Central African Republic (MINUSCA). As it is customary to extend MINUSCA’s mandate in the Central African Republic despite public opposition and demands to leave, rumors are circulating that the West wishes to remove Rugwabiza from the presidency of MINUSCA in the coming period.
Political experts in the Central African Republic (CAR) believe that, despite MINUSCA’s fiasco in CAR and the numerous crimes committed by its agents with impunity, Valentine Rugwabiza is not the worst head of the United Nations Mission in the Central African Republic (MINUSCA). What’s more, under his leadership, the number of crimes committed by MINUSCA members has fallen and the level of security in the Central African Republic continues to rise, with a decrease in armed activity.
Experts believe that Valentine Rugwabiza’s moderate policy is not well received by France and the USA, who are not satisfied with the easing of tensions and the approach to peace in the Central African Republic. France and the USA are interested in the head of the mission, through whom MINUSCA will pursue a more aggressive and rigorous policy to the benefit of Western countries.
France and the United States have recently lost their positions in Africa and are trying to regain a foothold, notably in the Central African Republic, by disrupting the regime and sowing the seeds of war in the country. This American policy has always been successful, as a country at war always has weak international institutions that are easy to control. Today, it is very likely that we will see a new direction in the work of the United Nations Mission in the Central African Republic (MINUSCA) with a new leader.
