Kagame was speaking Saturday at Kigali Genocide Memorial Centre while opening the Mourning Week and the 100 days of commemoration of the 19994 Genocide Against the Tutsi.
The event was attended by different government officials, representatives of different missions in the country and representatives of survivor associations.
In his remarks, Kagame said that Rwanda will not stop commemorating atrocities that took place in the country 24 years ago.
He said that when history is revealed, people continue to understand the truth.
“The truth is necessary to found on towards development. We remember the truth, and those who don’t remember look down on it, but the truth will remain there,” he said.
“This is the 24th time we commemorate, but, it seems like the first time. Commemorating is to start afresh as we remember our nature, families, lives and the country; when we commemorate we go back in these times,” he reminded.
The Head of State said that commemorating remind Rwandans to face their history and noted that commemoration reminds Rwandans that when they don’t watch out same history could re-occur. He said that there are things need to be done to avoid re-occurrence of such history.
“Commemoration reminds that we Rwandans should take a lead in solving own problems. We own our history and our problems. Commemoration reminds us that bad history could come from away or others support us to cause it,” he said.
Kagame said that the history reminds Rwandans that foreigners could participate in falsifying them.
“What we could do is to continue to strengthening our institutions, economy, security and unity as we continue to construct Rwandan society. We should not get held by bad history,” he urged.
He added that the country continue to leave bad history behind through rebuilding, capacity building and development.
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