Juvenal Habyarimana (8 March 1937-6 April 1994) was the President of Rwanda from 5 July 1973 to 6 April 1994. The leader of Rwanda and the National Republican Movement for Democracy and Development for twenty years, Habyarimana was a dictator who used election fraud to remain in power. He was a Hutu power advocate, and his assassination in 1994 by Tutsis led to the Rwandan Genocide against the Tutsis.
Biography[]
Juvenal Habyarimana was born on 8 March 1937 in Ruanda-Urundi, Belgium (present-day Rwanda) to a Roman Catholic family of Hutus. Habyarimana served as the Chief-of-Staff of the Rwandan Army, and on 5 July 1973, he seized power for himself, becoming the third President of Rwanda. Habyarimana used electoral fraud to remain in power, with 98.99% of the vote in 1978, 99.97% in 1983, and 99.98% in 1988. Habyarimana was originally liked by both the Hutus and Tutsis by not catering to his own Hutu people, but he eventually became a Hutu power advocate and a ruthless dictator. The people of Rwanda, who lived in extreme poverty, were required to chant and dance in front of the president in mass pageants of political "animation", with his enforcers ensuring that they did so.
In October 1990, the Rwandan Civil War broke out when Tutsi former Ugandan soldiers of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) crossed the border into Rwanda and fought the government. Troops from France and Zaire helped the Rwandan Army to force a ceasefire in 1993 in the Arusha Accords. However, on 6 April 1994 his private Falcon 50 jet was shot down near Kigali International Airport in Rwanda. Habyarimana and President of Burundi Cyprien Ntaryamira were both killed, along with several other people. Future president and Rwandan Patriotic Front leader Paul Kagame ordered the assassination, which led to Hutu extremists retaliating against the Tutsis in the Rwandan Genocide.