Mutara III Rudahigwa (March 1911-25 July 1959) was King of Rwanda from 16 November 1931 to 25 July 1959, succeeding Yuhi V Musinga and preceding Kigeli V Ndahindurwa.
Biography[]
Rudahigwa was born in Nyanza, Rwanda in March 1911, the son of the Tutsi King Yuhi V Musinga. He became a chief in January 1929 and King in 1931 after the Belgian colonial administration deposed his father, and he assumed the regnal name "Mutara". In 1943, he became the first Rwandan king to convert to Catholicism, adopting the Christian name Charles Leon Pierre. In 1946, he dedicated the country to Christ, making Rwanda a Catholic nation. From 1944 to 1945, a famine killed 200,000 Rwandans - 10% of the country's population. In 1956, pressured by Hutu unrest, Mutara was forced to demand Rwandan independence, but the Hutus ultimately took matters into their own hands and launched a revolution against the Tutsi elite and the Belgians. On 24 July 1959, he died of a sudden cerebral hemorrhage, but his death was blamed on the Europeans, and European cars were stoned.