Paul Rusesabagina was born June 15, 1954 in Gitarama, a city in the South-Central region of Rwanda. (Rusesabagina 12) He and his eight other siblings helped their parents make a living farming. He was born into mixed heritage. Rwanda was divided between two major classes, Tutsi and Hutu. Rusesabagina’s mother was Tutsi while his father was Hutu. As was custom, he took on his father’s heritage. When he was young he wished of becoming a pastor when he grew up. Thou he did not fulfill this childhood ambition, he grew up to become a very heroic man.
In 1981, Rusesabagina graduated from the Hotel Management program of Utalii College in Nairobi Kenya. As part of his studies he traveled to Switzerland. Upon his arrival he was employed by the Hotel des Mille Collines as assistant general manager. He worked in this position from October 1984 to November 1992, when he was then promoted to general manager of the company’s Diplomat Hotel in Kigali, the capital of Rwanda. ("Leave None to Tell the Story" ) Paul Rusesabagina’s education and work experience taught him many things. He learned how to be very hospitable, affable, quick on his feet, and sociable. These characteristics helped him greatly during the difficult years of his life. Though a simple hotel manager, Rusesabagina made contributions to mankind far beyond imaginable.
At the start of the genocide, Rwanda was composed of about 85% Hutu and 15% Tutsi. ("Paul Rusesabagina") Descendents of two ancient tribes, these modern groups have almost always spoken the same language, lived in the same territory, and shared the same culture; yet have not always coexisted peacefully. The primary cause of this conflict can be traced back to European Colonialism. The territory, now Rwanda, was first colonized by Belgian rule. Belgian colonialists decided that tall and thin Tutsis were to be superior to the more populous, short and stocky Hutus. In this way, Belgians favored Tutsis in all positions of power. This built a gradual resentment among Hutus. The ruling Belgians had deserted the relative few power-wielding Tutsis, with Rwanda’s independence in 1962. A Hutu dictatorship soon took over, further polarizing the ethic states. Tutsis were blamed for every previous crisis, and for the deprived state of the country. When Rwandan President and Hutu, Juvenal Habyarimana’s plane was shot down above Kigali airport April 6, 1994, Hutu extremist politicians blamed Tutsi rebels for the incident. Within hours, a 100 day genocide would ensue. Hutu militia known as the Interahamwe flooded the streets, spurred on by furious calls for bloodshed across local radio. In weeks, the slaughter had spread to the rural areas of Rwanda. Local officials ordered Hutus to kill their Tutsi neighbors, and many Hutus who refused to do so were murdered themselves. At its peak, this genocide claimed 8,000 lives per day. ("Genocide: Rwanda" 376-377) This rate was faster than that of times during the Holocaust. Western governments avoided labeling this massacre as “genocide”, which would oblige outside nations to intervene under the UN Geneva Convention. While the international community was tuning a blind eye, Paul Rusesabagina made his heroic stand.
When violence broke out in Rwanda, Rusesabagina fled his home and brought his family to the Motel des Mille Collines for relative safety. The other managers fled from their responsibilities at the hotel. Instead of following suit, he called the hotel’s corporate owners and requested a letter appointing him the acting general manager of the hotel. Despite some difficulties getting the staff to accept his new authority, Rusesabagina was able to secure his position. Seeing there was no foreign aid from the UN nor any its powerful Western members, he turned his hotel into an impromptu shelter for orphans and refugees, most of whom were Tutsis. All the while, murderous Hutu militia threatened to enter the Mille Collines. The Hotel’s power and water lines were cut, and small-scale attacks were made from outside the hotel walls. Yet Paul Rusesabagina did not back down. He made countless selfless bribes and short-term agreements militia men to keep them from slaughtering those he had been able to rescue. He cared for the refugees at his hotel in every way possible. The hotel’s swimming pool was drained by buckets for drinking water, and Rusesabagina himself risked leaving the hotel grounds to bargain for food and such with Hutu militants.
Rusesabagina, and his family, along with the 1,268 refugees whom he rescued managed to escape to Tanzania. More than 800,000 Rwandan’s (~10% of the population) had been killed before any foreign aid came to Rwanda. (Ye Hee Lee 3) Having applied for asylum, he currently lives in Belgium with his wife, three children, and two orphaned, now adopted, nieces. He has started and owns his own trucking company there. Paul’s heroism is dramatized in the 2004 Academy Award nominated movie Hotel Rwanda. He feels that the film was “less violent” than the actual genocide, claiming that “you cannot invite someone to watch the real thing.” ("Hotel Rwanda" Portrays Hero Who Fought Genocide ) Rusesabagina received the US Presidential Medal of Freedom on Novermber 9, 2005 from President George W. Bush. He has also been awarded many other honors including the 2000 Immortal Chaplains Prize for Humanity, the 2005 Wallenberg Medal of the Univeristy of Michigan, the 2005 National Civil Rights Museum Freedom Award, the 2007 Honorary Doctorate of Law from the University of Guelph, and the 2008 Honorary Degree from Gustavus Adolphus College. In 2005, he founded the Hotel Rwanda Rusesabagina Foundation to provide financial assistance to the women and children affected by the genocides in Rwanda and other African nations. Paul Rusesabagina was not born, raised, nor particularly educated to be a hero or humanitarian. To this day he believes that he was just doing his job as hotel manager. Yet Paul Rusesabagina’s bravery, compassion, and quick thinking exemplified true heroism; a heroism we should all bring into our own lives.
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