My name is Anne Marie Nzeyimana but people also call me Mama Susane. I was running a business together with Georgette in the market. When [President Melchior] Ndadaye was killed, the young men in Kinama were very frustrated. One day they came to the market. They had knives. I went over to Georgette and told her, "Mama Elise, I am going to be killed here. These young men are looking for Tutsi. They blame us for killing Ndadaye. You know it is not us that killed him. We liked him just as much as everyone else." Georgette took her clothes and she covered me. She then walked with me very slowly to her home.

When we got there, she said, "go hide under the bed." As I had left my child in the market, she went back there and brought him to me. I was feeling very bad. The young men followed her and they asked her, "Georgette, why did you hide that Tutsi in your house? You know that the Tutsi killed Ndadaye?" She replied, "That woman did not kill the President. When was assassinated she was right here." They ordered her to surrender me to them. She refused. She told them I was not there.

At night more people came back. They were not from the area. They may have been from Kamenge or somewhere else. There were many of them and they stood outside Georgette's house. I thought, "This is the end. I am going to die now." Georgette opened her door and asked them what they were looking for. They told her, "Give us your Tutsi, the one you took from the market. You hid her and you must tell us where she is. If you refuse, we will kill both of you." She allowed them to enter to search the house. They went into one room and they did not find me. Then they went into her bedroom. I was hiding under the bed, very close to the wall. I gave a breast to my baby so that he would not cry. They did not see me and they left.

The following day, the soldiers started shooting in Kinama. Georgette said we should leave. We passed by Kidumburwe and took some of the rice we have cultivated there. Then we went to Tenga. We spent two nights there. Almost all the Hutu from Bujumbura were there. There was not a single Tutsi. I said to myself, "I am going to die here." Still Georgette went on comforting me. I told her, "Mama Elise, I will die here!" That day a plane flew over and started bombing us. Many people died.

Then we went to Rubirizi, she held my hand. She spent so much time on protecting me, that she paid less attention to her children. While we were in Rubirizi, she would travel to Buyenzi to buy for us the merchandise we sold in our business. I stayed with her in Rubrizi and she treated me like a princess. Then I heard there was a plot to get me killed. I went to Georgette and told her, "Mama Elise, this man has paid for a crate of beer they want me to deliver to a place where he would kill me." Mama Elise went to speak to him. He told her, "I have already been paid to kill her." I know he killed another Tutsi who was living in Rubirizi. The Tutsi he killed was a very old woman. [I was unable to verify the allegation against this individual, and his name does not appear on this website - DST.]

We stayed in Rurizi for a while longer, and we then moved to Mubone. The Zone leader, Mr. Iddy and the Commandant Nibigira came to ask us to go back home. We came back here in Kinama and Gahungu Laurent began organizing us. We went to Cibitoke to count the Hutu houses that have been destroyed and the Tutsi came to count the Tutsi houses that have been destroyed. As many of the Hutu had fled, there was no security here in Kinama. We stayed here until we get accustomed to visiting each other. When the Tutsi who have stayed in Cibitoke saw me, they asked me, "Where are you living?" I told them I was in Kinama and they said I was a fake Tutsi. I told them, "You are right. My name is 'fake Tutsi' because if you live in harmony with the others, you stay living in peace." Till now I am still thankful for this woman. We are still living together because it her who saved me while I was about to be killed.

Q: When you saw the killers coming, did you imagine Georgette would save you easily or you thought she might be like the others?

No, you see, one has to trust in her neighbor especially when you know that you have been living harmoniously. We were running our business together, I trusted in her. But I sometimes thought she would change her mind, but in general I trusted in her. I thought she would change her mind and deliver me to the murderers, but God empowered her. She protected me and till now, wherever she is that is where you can find me. When she hears anything about the heroes, she informs me and we are all the time together.

Q: There are many people who have been killed in Burundi because of their ethnic group while they would have been saved by people like Georgette. Why haven't there been many people who behaved like Georgette and save the others?

You know that there are good persons and the bad ones. There are bad persons who allowed the killers to harm the others while they did not save any person. Thus this woman is good and God empowered her with love.

[this may be an old verson]

I live in the Commune of Kinama and I have five children; At that time, of war, when president Ndadaye was killed, people start to kill each other; These were the two ethnic groups hutus and tutsis. Here in Kinama, hutus were the majority, and tutsi the minority. At that time when at Musaga, hutus were killed, in Kinama it was tutsis who were killed; then, tutsis start to run away. I had a neighbour who were a tutsi woman, whose name’s Anne Marie Nzeyimana; they then started to seek her; I analyze the situation and wonder myself, why do they want to kill her?

I knew very well my neighbour because we worked together at the market, I knew our everyday hard work, that if we do not get enough customers, our children could’nt have something to eat, and, even ourselves, for being able to eat we could work to our sweat. Then I took her, and told her,“ come and stay with me in my house, don’t go outside, there is a risk of being killed ”. She stayed there, when my children and I went to school, we let her alone in the house, I made sure, she could have something to cook meanwhile.

After some days, the situation became worse, on our turn we were obliged to run away from Kinama, and I faced the problem of Anne-Marie, I wonder myself “ in which road will I pass with my that tutsi woman” ?

From here to Cibitoke where Tutsi were grouped wasn’t an easy task, even to go to that area near here, there was a risk of being killed. She couldn’t go anywhere. I finally told her to come with me no matter what the price it would cost, we run away together. We went in Rubirizi, then in Tenga, arrived in Tenga, my fellow hutus, got angry with me asking me why I came with that tutsi woman, I replied that she wasn’t a tutsi, that all tutsi live in Bujumbura town,

“how come, could she be a tutsi and running away with hutus ” ? I said, let her don’t lose your time killing her, I told them. In Tenga they chased us away, in Rubiririzi the same, they start accusing of having brought a tutsi with me, I told them, this is a hutu like you,if you kill her, you’ll in wrong; we stayed together, because if I tried a little bit to let her with them, they’d kill her immediately. We stayed together, as internal refugees, wherever I went, for instance, to seek some food for my children, we went together, up to the seven months we stayed far form our houses, and at Kinama, not even one hutu stayed in his house, everybody flee away.

Thereafter, we turn back to our homes, we started to rebuild our houses since some were destroyed, with AGRC Ngo, and the former Cibitoke administrator, Mr Laurent Gahungu. We, as Kinama women thereafter notice that we can’t live alone in Kinama, without Tutsis, we decided to tell to the autority to go and bring back tutsi women who flee away; but because those tutsi women who flee away, saw how I took care about the tutsi Anne-Marie who took refuge in my house, they saw how she stayed with me, and how we kept together even in refugee camps, up to when we came back together, buy all this she, Anne-Marie, Told them to come back home. Some tutsi women use to ask her, “are really in Kinama”? She said ,“yes I am.” Where do you live”? “I live with Georgette”. They didn’t believe it. They even gave her a nickname “pirate”, because for them, Anne-Marie, has been identified as a false hutu, they consider it unbelievable how a tutsi woman can live together with a hutu family whereas other tutsis are running away. Up to now, she’s my friend and neighbour, we even belong to the same Kinama women association called “Abaniki.

This association has born because we notice that we should organize some activities relating to help each other in rebuilding our houses, and the Ngo GVC helped us so much; At that time, many hutus who flee away came back home, in our new created association “abaniki” we made some activities of rebuilding destroyed houses, welcoming back families, and for that we were like wise women, of the village, men were somehow absent, because at that time, when a man came to try to do anything special, he was automatically killed.

But, we as women we tolerate all this and tried to be patient, we made judgements, there are even some who were chose of being of the chief of the district, and for the time being some women from our association are ruling their living area and “ Abaniki” association continue working, that’s how things happened.

One thing which surprised me is that is that these days we heard about people who got prize of what they didn’t deserve, for instance, there are 1000 women who have been promoted Nobel prize, and 10 of them were Burundian, but there were no “Abaniki” among them, but we have been among the first burundiia to promote reconciliation between hutus and tutsis, from Cibitoke and Kinama, and also the first of being wise women in our area, I think I could say in the whole capital Bujumbura. All meeting we’ve done were about women and children rights, even men got a good example about it.

Many persons couldn’t believe that a hutu from Cibitoke who run away in Kinama, could come back in Cibitoke, one day; and the same, for a tutsi from Kinama, who took refuge in Cibitoke, could come back one day and leave peacefully. The deputy Laurent who was the Kinama authority one day was about to be killed for he was accompanying some women returning home. He was the only one who dare do such thing the others were afraid of it, and without him it was difficult for us alone, to enter Cibitoke quarter, in our way, we sometimes met blood of persons who were just killed, we used to stop and say to him, “chief, we can continue, it’s too hard” and we continue, despite it;

The authorities of that time loose their faith; they saw our work as unrealisable, It was like a dream, but, we kept going on, but we did it and succeed; Even now, I’m among the heroes, because we saved persons from different ethnic group and even now, we are still good friends.

Question/ Coming back to the person you saved, why did you do it?
I did it as a human being; I knew she a person like I am, and she was going to be killed for nothing special, she didn’t even participate in politics, even the president Ndadaye was unknown, apart from radios; she even doesn’t go in propaganda meeting, since she wasn’t in any political party, we just heard he has been elected as a president. So, it was unjust for her to be killed as for many other who died.

As I told you before, she was a simple woman selling few items in the market, and to see that a woman like her is going to die just for she is a tutsi was unfair;

Question/ can you tell us what was the feelings of the hutus who wanted to kill the tutsi you saved? At that time, those who asked me why I bring with me that tutsi woman, they were really furious, they were ready to kill every name called tutsi, I think that if I would have said this woman is a tusi one, she couldn’t live for more than two minutes. And in that time, a person could die for nothing, only because you don’t share the ethnic group, only that. People were really frustrated, they were very angry just because the president Ndadaye, was killed. But, what really made people becoming like animals is that they said: “the first president was a tutsi from Bururi, he has been just pushed out of power, but he wasn’t killed; the second one “Bagaza”, a tutsi, there has been just a coup, but wasn’t killed, the third president “Buyoya”, the same; so why do for the first time, that we have a hutu president, kill him? Just after three months only of power! That’s what makes people angry; they feel like they could eat tutsi meat, or cut tutsi part of the body in many parts. This was the situation prevailing.

Question/ When hutu started to kill tutsi, is there anything that the power did so that to punish the one who did it?
Well, many of those who kill others died, because they have been arrested by militaries, and killed them; others have been imprisoned, but, frankly speaking most of them have been killed. At this time, militaries were frustrated, so that every hutu they find in their way, has to be killed, without analyzing if you were a criminal or not, if you didn’t go away from them, it was very dangerous.

Then after, when tutsi died, Militaries took revenge into hutu population, and as a hutu you just became a victim of your ethnic group, this is the way things happened.

Interview by Maziar Bahari
Translated by Tatien Nkeshimana
Edited by David Shem-Tov