Gacaca Court - Criticisms

Criticisms

There are criticisms and controversy surrounding the decision to implement Gacaca courts. Human rights groups worry about the fairness since trials are held without lawyers which means that there is less protection for defendants than in conventional courts. In addition Conventional trials have seen false accusations and intimidation of witnesses on both sides; issues of revenge have been raised as a concern. The acquittal rate has been 20 percent which suggests a large number of trials were not well-founded. Also because the trials are based on witnesses testimonies, the length of time between the crime and trial heightens the risk that the witnesses' memories will be unreliable.

Senior Human Rights Watch adviser Alison Des Forges said the lack of legal representation was a serious concern. "The authorities' view is that this is a quasi-customary kind of procedure, and there never used to be lawyers, so there's no need for lawyers now. The problem with that is that little is the same except for the name. In this system, there is considerable weight given to the official side. The office of the prosecutor provides considerable assistance to the bench in terms of making its determination, so you no longer have a level playing field." There may, however, be no alternative to the Gacaca trials, she added. "Obviously the problem of delivering justice after the genocide is an overwhelming problem. Gacaca may not be ideal but there is at this point no alternative.... The official explanation I think is that people did not speak openly until the Gacaca process and now many more accusations are surfacing. Also, the concession programme, which requires the naming of all those who participated along with the accused, has led to a multiplication of names. "How many of these are well-founded, what is the credibility of the evidence, these are very serious concerns."

It has to be noted that with time, some suspects have made enemies during their spell in prisons who they have come out to later accuse not necessarily because they committed crimes but because the accusing parties see them as enemies worth serving longer or similar sentences. Obtaining evidence on this aspect is not easy as witness reports take precedence in most cases.