After some hours the group of Hutu killers came. "Where are the Tutsi you were hiding?" they asked. "You have to bring them out right now!"

"We really don’t know where they are," we replied. They threatened us. We were scared so we fled to Murayi. We stayed there two months. Then we heard that there is a new Administrator in our area so we came back. A few days later the Hutu killers returned. This time they were armed with guns. To them we were traitors for saving Tutsi. They wanted to kill us. There were shootings. We were scared so we ran to Ndarishikaniye house, there on the other hill at Gashingwa near Buziracanda.

Ndarishikaniye, who is a Tutsi, was surprised to see us Hutu running away from other Hutu. "I know you saved Tutsi in your area," he said. "Just come to my house. We are going to stay together." We felt safe then.

Jean Marie: Around noontime on Thursday, October 21, 1993, I saw many Hutu approaching our homes. They were armed with arrows and spears. They came from other parts of Muramvya, not from here. They told us to go and form work groups. Work groups? On Thursday? How come? They ordered us to go and cut trees. We went together with them and cut those trees. We closed the access from the main roads. Sometimes we used big stones instead of trees. We closed the road from Mwaro.

After that we were told to go home. The Hutu accompanied me to my home. They forced their way inside. "We’re coming to take the guns you hide here," they told me.

"Hmm," I said. "I’m not a soldier. I don't even have a son who is a soldier. How could I posses a weapon?"

They searched anyway and found nothing. Then they took me and my brothers to my father, Appolinaire Ndayirukiye. They searched his home for guns too but they still didn’t find anything.