Man on a Mission
It was a time of extreme political turmoil in Zaire and Campbell says he couldn't take any unnecessary chances in the collection and dissemination of his information. To protect witnesses, he burned his notes each night, after typing them into a hidden and encrypted file on his laptop. Exiting the region, he entrusted whatever written material he had to safe couriers. To this day, the identities of those who helped Campbell uncover the true story of the massacre of Rwandan refugees remains a carefully guarded secret. So brutally has the Congolese government repressed its citizens' independent voices, that Campbell is not even comfortable revealing the names of the villages he visited. When the crimes were committed, several forces were moving across the country: the Rwandan Patriotic Army (RPA) and the Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Congo (ADFL), both working their way toward the capitol; the Army of then President Mobutu Sese Seko, fleeing these factions; and former Rwandan soldiers and militia, implicated in the Rwandan genocide and also in flight. The ADFL's nominal leader, Laurent Kabila, seized control in May and, by summer, the international community—eager to begin the flow of aid to this untested leader—seemed to wish never to know what had happened in the chaos of retreating and advancing armies. "Many of Africa's political leaders today—the so-called 'new leaders'—are highly sophisticated, educated in the world's finest military and education establishments, and have used seductive diplomacy with U.S. and European diplomats to find support for their regimes," Campbell says. "Rwanda and Uganda have been particularly successful at this and, unbeknownst to most Americans, the U.S. is perceived in Africa as being their most important supporter and thus quite partisan in the present war in central Africa. All the while, few of these 'new leaders' have their countries on the road to democracy and, on the contrary, use harsh repression to maintain a grip on power and economic wealth. Kabila is a much clumsier diplomat, more in the old-style dictatorship fashion of a Mobutu or an Idi Amin: he hasn't been nearly as successful as the Rwandans or Ugandans in dodging international criticism of his human rights record and thus has little international support outside of Africa." Seeking evidence that would make it impossible for the world not to know Kabila's wrongdoing, Campbell began to conduct interviews in Eastern Congo of witnesses who had fled the violent clearance of refugee camps. He traveled alone, inconspicuously, sometimes with assistance from unexpected quarters. His destination was an 80-kilometer stretch of road that passed through three villages. Rwandan refugees and soldiers from all sides had traveled the road some months before. Campbell arrived at a place accessible "by motorcycle and machete" to find its inhabitants traumatized by the crimes they had witnessed. Despite their fear, and at great personal risk, certain brave individuals confided in Campbell and told him what they had seen. |
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In 1997, Scott Campbell '82 was sent to the former Zaire, now the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), as a consultant for Human Rights Watch, a non - governmental organization dedicated to upholding the tenets of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights. His mission was to tell the world about the atrocities being committed against Rwandan refugees from an insider's vantage point—a risky proposition that no one else
had dared to accept. "It's useful to tell people on the outside what's happening. But that's on the outside," Campbell says. "If you really want to make lasting change, people must take matters into their own hands."