Commentators’ perspectives on healing through gacaca

Finally, the existing commentary on healing at gacaca comes primar­ily from Rwandan academic writers and NGO psychosocial workers. A small number of non-Rwandan commentators and NGO personnel highlight the immense need for personal healing in Rwanda in a way which, for example, the Rwandan government rarely does.

Other psychologists such as Karen Brouneus echo Rutinburana's concerns above, warning against the dangers of further traumatisation through processes such as gacaca that require public engagement on highly emotional and often divisive issues. On the basis of interviews with sixteen women participants in gacaca, Brouneus argues,

In the case of gacaca, the judges are not professionally trained in giving psychological support. Furthermore, the proceedings are held in a school­room or most often outdoors, with a panel of nine judges, the accused perpetrator, and the assembled villagers as audience, including the family and friends of the accused.

More elaborate interpretations of healing at gacaca come from Rwandan academics and NGO practitioners. When Rwandan commentators explore individual healing in the context of gacaca, they generally emphasise - like Pearlman and Staub - the need for both survivors and perpetrators of the genocide to experience healing. Solomon Nsabiyera, whose work with World Vision has included conducting healing workshops for genocide suspects still in prison, emphasises the import­ance for personal healing of the reflective time that many suspects spend in jail.^[619] Reflection here is important for healing as liberation, as perpe­trators deal with feelings of guilt resulting from their crimes. �Detainees have had many years in jail to ponder what they have done', Nsabiyera explains, �and to deal with the guilt that many of them feel because of their crimes. This time to think is very important for healing.'^[620] In this interpretation, suspects' healing is a personal process that occurs primar­ily in jail, rather than at gacaca, although Nsabiyera adds that public confession at gacaca may �confirm to detainees the importance of their private decisions' and help facilitate their reintegration into the commu­nity, which will enhance their sense of personal liberation by increas­ing their feeling of communal acceptance.^[621] Again, such views underline the extent to which healing as liberation, particularly where liberation is understood as empowering individuals to participate once again in the community, is closely linked to healing as belonging.

Nsabiyera further stresses the connection between healing as liber­ation and healing as belonging when he argues that, for survivors, shar­ing painful experiences with the community is important in two separate stages: in its articulation, giving survivors a sense of freedom from the thoughts and feelings that they have harboured silently for years; and in its reception, as others in the community acknowledge survivors' pain and share similar experiences with them. �There will be no clos­ing without disclosing', Nsabiyera argues, echoing Rutinburana's view that traumatised individuals will not experience the healing of their psychological and emotional wounds unless they first publicly express their anger, sorrow and fear.^[622] Such a process, according to Nsabiyera, is �necessarily painful' but it is also likely to produce �unity in the healing process' as many individuals come to realise that others have suffered similar pain and loss to their own.^[623]