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Agathe Uwilingiyimana
Agathe Uwilingiyimana (Kinyarwanda: [u.wǐː.ɾiː.ɲɟi.jí.mɑ̂ː.nɑ]; 23 May 1953 – 7 April 1994), sometimes known as Madame Agathe, was a Rwandan political figure. She served as Prime Minister of Rwanda from 18 July 1993 until her assassination on 7 April 1994 during the opening stages of the Rwandan genocide. She was also Rwanda's acting head of state in the hours leading up to her death.
She was Rwanda's first and so far only female prime minister.
Agathe Uwilingiyimana was born 23 May 1953 in the village of Nyaruhengeri, Butare Province in southern Rwanda, 140 kilometres (87 mi) southeast of the capital Kigali. She moved with her farming parents to the Belgian Congo to find work, but they moved back to Butare in 1957. She was a member of the Hutu ethnicity that made up the majority of the Rwandan population.
After success in public examinations she was educated at Notre Dame des Cîteaux Secondary School, and obtained the certificate to teach humanities in 1973. She continued with graduate studies in mathematics and chemistry, after which she became a schoolteacher in Butare in 1976. By 1983 she was teaching chemistry at the National University of Rwanda in Butare. She received a B.Sc. in 1985, and taught chemistry for four years in Butare academic schools. She received criticism from traditionalists for promoting mathematics and science study amongst female students.
Uwilingiyimana married a high-school classmate, Ignace Barahira, in 1976; she kept her maiden name, as is customary for Rwandese women. She had the first of her five children the next year.
In 1986 she created a Soriority and Credit Cooperative Society among the staff of the Butare academic school, and her high-profile role in the self-help organization brought her to the attention of the Kigali authorities, who wanted to appoint decision makers from the discontented south of the country. In 1989 she became a director in the Ministry of Commerce.
She joined the Republican Democratic Movement (MDR), an opposition party, in 1992, and that April was appointed Minister of Education by Dismas Nsengiyaremye, the first opposition prime minister under a power-sharing scheme negotiated between President Juvénal Habyarimana and five major opposition parties. As education minister, Uwilingiyamana scrapped the academic ethnic quota system, instead distributing public school spots and awards on the basis of open merit. This came in the midst of the Rwandan Civil War of 1990–94, and earned her the enmity of the Hutu extremists, as the quota system had favoured Hutus.
Uwilingiyimana succeeded Nsengiyaremye as Rwanda's prime minister on July 17, 1993, following a meeting between President Habyarimana and the five parties. The party was divided between moderates and extremists, and she was a moderate. Nsengiyaremye and the MDR convened an extraordinary congress in Kabusunzu on 23–24 July, during which hardliners had her resign from the party, together with the president of MDR, Faustin Twagiramungu.
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Agathe Uwilingiyimana
Agathe Uwilingiyimana (Kinyarwanda: [u.wǐː.ɾiː.ɲɟi.jí.mɑ̂ː.nɑ]; 23 May 1953 – 7 April 1994), sometimes known as Madame Agathe, was a Rwandan political figure. She served as Prime Minister of Rwanda from 18 July 1993 until her assassination on 7 April 1994 during the opening stages of the Rwandan genocide. She was also Rwanda's acting head of state in the hours leading up to her death.
She was Rwanda's first and so far only female prime minister.
Agathe Uwilingiyimana was born 23 May 1953 in the village of Nyaruhengeri, Butare Province in southern Rwanda, 140 kilometres (87 mi) southeast of the capital Kigali. She moved with her farming parents to the Belgian Congo to find work, but they moved back to Butare in 1957. She was a member of the Hutu ethnicity that made up the majority of the Rwandan population.
After success in public examinations she was educated at Notre Dame des Cîteaux Secondary School, and obtained the certificate to teach humanities in 1973. She continued with graduate studies in mathematics and chemistry, after which she became a schoolteacher in Butare in 1976. By 1983 she was teaching chemistry at the National University of Rwanda in Butare. She received a B.Sc. in 1985, and taught chemistry for four years in Butare academic schools. She received criticism from traditionalists for promoting mathematics and science study amongst female students.
Uwilingiyimana married a high-school classmate, Ignace Barahira, in 1976; she kept her maiden name, as is customary for Rwandese women. She had the first of her five children the next year.
In 1986 she created a Soriority and Credit Cooperative Society among the staff of the Butare academic school, and her high-profile role in the self-help organization brought her to the attention of the Kigali authorities, who wanted to appoint decision makers from the discontented south of the country. In 1989 she became a director in the Ministry of Commerce.
She joined the Republican Democratic Movement (MDR), an opposition party, in 1992, and that April was appointed Minister of Education by Dismas Nsengiyaremye, the first opposition prime minister under a power-sharing scheme negotiated between President Juvénal Habyarimana and five major opposition parties. As education minister, Uwilingiyamana scrapped the academic ethnic quota system, instead distributing public school spots and awards on the basis of open merit. This came in the midst of the Rwandan Civil War of 1990–94, and earned her the enmity of the Hutu extremists, as the quota system had favoured Hutus.
Uwilingiyimana succeeded Nsengiyaremye as Rwanda's prime minister on July 17, 1993, following a meeting between President Habyarimana and the five parties. The party was divided between moderates and extremists, and she was a moderate. Nsengiyaremye and the MDR convened an extraordinary congress in Kabusunzu on 23–24 July, during which hardliners had her resign from the party, together with the president of MDR, Faustin Twagiramungu.