Pastor Athanase Habyarimana, a head teacher from Rwanda

Today, the world moves so quickly from one international disaster to another that one event seems to eclipse the last in the blink of an eye.

This week China. Last week Burma. Last year Darfur. And so it goes on.

So who remembers the genocide in Rwanda 14 years ago? In just ten weeks up to a million Rwandans, Tutsis and moderate Hutus were slaughtered while the international community turned its back.

By 2000, it was estimated that around 300,000 orphaned or abandoned children were still without anybody to look after them.

For the past two weeks, pupils and staff at a Bournemouth school have been learning about one of the darkest episodes in Africa's history, trying to understand its legacy and hoping to make some small contribution to the country's future.

Talbot Heath School has been hosting Pastor Athanase Habyarimana, the headteacher of St Emmanuel School in Hanika near the capital Kigale.

The two schools are twinned through a partnership agreement signed by headmistress Christine Dipple when she visited Hanika last year as part of a Dorset delegation, although the Bournemouth schoolgirls have been emailing their Rwandan counterparts since 2005.

She explained: "Our main objective is for students and pupils to develop friendships, build links, encourage co-operation and share our experiences.

"I believe it's so important for us to have a good understanding of the wider world and to help in any way we can."

Rwanda is one of the world's poorest countries ranked 158 out of 175 by the United Nations. Sixty per cent of the population lives below the poverty line and 400,000 children are out of school.

"Things are very hard in Rwanda," said Pastor Habyarimana. "Delivering education is very tough.

"Many teachers are not qualified, our buildings and equipment are basic and we have little or no money. There is nothing to spare."

When Mrs Dipple visited, she took with her pens, rubbers, rulers and pencil cases.

"It was like birds scrabbling for seed - over biros."

At St Emmanuel there are 1,200 pupils aged 13 upwards (some are in their 20s and 30s) and 700 of them are orphans from the civil war and the Aids epidemic.

It is a boarding school, so the children are well cared for in term time, albeit in classes of up to 60, but during the holidays things are different.

"Then, many of them are taken in by other families and they are not always that well cared for," said the pastor.

The trauma of 1994 endures throughout Rwandan society but there is little help available in the way of counselling and other support services that we take for granted in the developed world.

While the genocide is a shared experience, everyone is having to cope with his or her own trauma. Pastor Habyarimana said his visit, which also included aspects of the wider community in Bournemouth had been "an incredible experience."

He admitted that Africa as a whole had to be a greater respecter of time and he wants his own pupils to have a wider focus - not an easy when daily life can be more than anything simply a matter of survival."

Mrs Dipple said: "I have seen his school at first hand and I know he does an amazing job in very difficult circumstances.

"When he goes back he can influence many young people, especially by showing them there are other ways of doing things."

Talbot Heath student Olivia Osmond, 14, said: "It's important for us to understand what things are like in countries like Rwanda and why things are the way they are.

"We should be optimistic, especially as we are the next generation and it will be up to us to help change things."

4:00pm Wednesday 14th May 2008

Print   Email this   Comment