Musician, murderer?

Attended the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda on Wednesday morning to watch the verdict for the appeals case of one Simon Bikindi. Bikindi was a well-known composer and singer in Rwanda, active prior to the genocide. His songs have been banned in Rwanda since 1994, as their messages were seen by many as a call-to-arms for genocidal murder.

Wednesday's proceedings lasted less than an hour, during which the sole speaker was the central judge of the tribunal. Bikindi was appealing his current sentence – which is to serve 15 years in prison, from 2001 – on a collection of grounds. The ground given the most attention by the judge's summary (and I therefore expect it was Bikindi's most fundamental plea) was that Bikindi's previous defence council was inadequate and therefore unable to properly defend him.

In a previous trial, Bikindi had been found guilty of incitement to commit genocide. The prosecution had proved, beyond any reasonable doubt, that the singer had made a speech from an Interhamwe vehicle equipped with a sound system, encouraging those in hearing distance to start killing.

In response to the Bikindi's appeal, the prosecution brought a rebuttal of their own – that the accused's sentence should be lengthened to at least thirty years, if not life. For not only was Bikindi guilty of this Interhamwe vechicle crime, they argued, but he had also had a far wider impact through his music and political action prior to the genocide. He was even once accused of having participated in genocidal killings, as well as training Interhamwe militia.

With this battle of appeals, the case therefore had a lot of potential to be quite exciting. Because of this, the press box was packed – not an empty seat in sight. I was lucky to steal a working headphone set from the seat front of me, after I realized no sound was coming through mine.

In spite of the excitement of the packed audience area, the trial resulted in a judgement that rejected both Bikindi's and the prosecution's appeals. He'll go back to prison to serve out the remaining six years of his sentence (unless another appeal is brought forward) before becoming a free man once again.

I suspect that many people in attendance were hoping that Bikindi would be made to face a harsher sentence as a result of the new trials. Evidently, this was not the case. Though it is jarring to know that a man who may have played a part in brain-washing regular Rwandan people into committing murder, through his music and the power of radio, will not be persecuted to the full capacity of the court.

On the other hand, though Bikindi has been proven guilty of one crime – the instance in the Interhamwe vehicle – it's probable that hundreds of people could be guilty of the same thing, but avoided justice because they were lower-profile targets than this infamous musician. Is it fair that he is jailed for that crime while others guilty of the same thing walk free?

As I know little about Bikindi other than what today's events have informed me of (as well as some tertiary internet research), I'll cease my rambling commentary. Definitely glad I got to witness this part of the ICTR though.