“We are truly the forgotten people of Rwanda, having been there for the longest, having lived for thousands of years in the rainforest of Africa before the Hutu and the Tutsi arrived. We have been forgotten by all those who have come to use our forests, ignored by the European colonists, and we are again forgotten by all those who would help to resolve the chaos that Rwanda is in today”

This said Charles Uwiragiye, executive secretary of the association for the promotion of the Batwa, during a speech in 1994 asking the world to hear the suffering of the pygmies. More than a decade later, not much has changed.

The Batwa are recognized as the original inhabitants of the equatorial forests of the Great Lakes region of Central Africa. These forest peoples have been in these forests for thousands and thousands of years. The forest was their home. It provided them with sustenance and medicines, and contained their sacred sites. Their low-impact use of forest resources meant that their way of life was sustainable over thousands of years. In the nineteenth century, incoming agriculturalists and pastoralists started the process of deforestation, clearing forests for cultivation. With the advent of colonialism, large-scale forest logging and an increasing interest in trophy game hunting, the overexploitation and destruction of Central African forest habitats and wildlife impacted more and more on Batwa Pygmy communities. In recent decades, the establishment of protected national parks has led to their removal from their ancestral lands, while severe inter- and intra-state violent clashes and conflicts have undermined their livelihoods and culture even further.
The pygmies are a vulnerable people, and discrimination is part of their daily existence. Their marginalised status means they are likely to require more support than other citizens to claim their right to ancestral lands. In many cases, they have been driven away from their territory without compensation or any prospect of alternative livelihood. Without land or independent means of sustaining themselves, many pygmies live in extreme poverty.

Pygmies live in a considerable number of Central African countries, the Batwa however limit themselves to the Great Lakes sub-region of Rwanda, Burundi, eastern Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda. In these four states all Batwa Pygmy communities “suffer from loss of traditional forest territories and other natural resources, personal insecurity and violence, displacement by war and as a result of tourism and logging, political and social exclusion, poverty, ill-health, inadequate educational opportunities and negative stereotyping” (Lewis, 2000:3). Despite the unprecedented hardships they have experienced, the Batwa Pygmies of the sub-region are today making courageous and determined efforts to mobilize to defend and promote their rights through erecting NGOs defending and protecting their rights and by actively participating in political life.

CAURWA´s intend is to give voice to the often voiceless Batwa. CAURWA´s activities are only in Rwanda, but close connections to other Batwa organisations in DRC and Burundi are kept. If the Batwa Pygmies of the Great Lakes are to preserve their collective identity, the effectiveness of their own efforts and the support of external actors will be crucial. CAURWA tries to create awarness on the marginalized position of the Batwa today in Rwanda and perhaps function as an example for the other Great Lakes countries with Batwa communities. | top |

The Batwa in Rwanda are found all over the country. The Batwa forest-dwellers however are most numerous in the North near Volcanoes National Park and in the south near Nyungwe National Forest. The first map below shows the area of where Batwa are living in the enitre Great Lakes region and the second how the distribution is in Rwanda with a side map of where Rwanda's national parks are:

© MRG

© MRG

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