Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, May 26, 1994                   TAG: 9405260078
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-13   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Cox News Service
DATELINE: TAKOMA PARK, MD.                                LENGTH: Medium

RWANDA'S EXILED MONARCH PLEADS FOR HIS LOST COUNTRY

Sitting on a suburban park bench, the 7-foot-2-inch exiled king of Rwanda pleaded for the world community to step in and stop the horror in his homeland.

"The United Nations should send in troops and, if necessary, use force to stop those killings," declared King Kigeli V. "They should have the power to restore law and peace in the country and to punish the criminals."

With an estimated 200,000 people massacred and 1.7 million homeless in Rwanda following five weeks of tribal warfare, the U.N. has voted to send an all-African peacekeeping force to protect civilians and relief workers. However, their role would be much more restricted than envisioned by the former king.

It has been a long, strange journey from an African throne to this bedroom community outside Washington, D.C., for King Kigeli (ki-GAY-lee) Ndahindurwa (da-HEN-dur-wah), who traces his dynastic monarchy to the year 1081. Following his father and older brother as king, he ruled Rwanda from 1959 to 1961, when he left to attend a U.N. meeting in Zaire and was not allowed back by Belgian colonial authorities.

Rwanda gained independence in 1962 and voted to abolished the monarchy. Subsequent leaders also have kept King Kigeli and his family in exile. After living for three decades in Tanzania, Uganda and Kenya, he grew fearful for his safety and moved to the United States in 1992. He has been granted political asylum.

Along with his longtime aide and translator, Boniface Benzinge, the 57-year-old former king spends his days meeting with government officials and private agencies to try to set up a social welfare organization for Rwandan refugees.

Even before the recent uprising created hundreds of thousands of new refugees, there were 2.5 million of his countrymen involuntarily living outside their homeland, the king said.

The current fighting in Rwanda began after President Juvenal Habyarimana, a member of the Hutu majority, died in a suspicious plane crash April 6. Most of the victims of the Hutu militia have been minority Tutsis and Hutus believed opposed to the government.

Born a member of the Tutsi minority, King Kigeli said he long ago renounced such divisions.

"Once you are a king, you are no longer in a tribe," he explained. "You are father of the nation and above all tribes."

He said the Tutsis and Hutus share a common culture and language and lived together peacefully for centuries before their divisions were exploited by colonists.

"The killing has surprised everybody, because this has never happened in the past. There had been some massacres, but it had never reached this scale. It is beyond the imagination of everybody," said the king, who blamed political rather than tribal differences. "The militia wanted to destroy the Tutsis and keep power in the country."

The exiled king lives modestly in a one-bedroom apartment, traveling by bus and relying on financial help from friends and government agencies. He wants to go home - and not necessarily as king.

His goals are "peace in country, repatriation of all Rwandese in their motherland, and then free choice by Rwandese themselves, without outside interference, to choose their own government.''

"If they want a monarch, he will be the king. if they want a republic, he will stay as a citizen," Benzinge said.

King Kigeli said the current carnage has created a false impression about Rwanda, which he says is a beautiful country.

"A lot of people are saying Rwanda is poor and doesn't have anything. That is not true. Rwanda has got gold, Rwanda has got diamonds, Rwanda has got tin," he said. "There are many minerals that have not been exploited up to now. Rwanda could be developed and be one of the best countries in Africa."

Meanwhile, he exists in a strange sort of political and personal limbo.

"It is the custom of the country that a king in exile cannot get married," the king said. "Marriage is a celebration, and he can't celebrate while the people are dying."