It has been 34 years since the government of President Juvénal Habyarimana attempted to assassinate Major General Paul Kagame through a female operative.
On February 27, 1992, Major General Paul Kagame revealed to the Ugandan newspaper, The New Vision, how the RPA had apprehended a woman sent by the Rwandan government to kill him using poison.
The story was published in that newspaper on a Thursday, appearing in Volume 7, Issue No. 49. It was written by journalist Sam Mukalazi, who had visited the RPA forces in Muvumba, located in the Eastern Province, Nyagatare District.
The report stated that the woman was dispatched to undermine the Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF) forces, who were then overwhelming Habyarimana’s government troops and had already captured several areas in the Eastern and Northern Provinces.
Kagame stated: “We apprehended a woman sent by the Kigali government, who was given poison to kill me.”
The news report further detailed that the woman, identified as Eugenia Kayitesi, had been captured by RPA forces in mid-1991. She was reportedly the wife of a former Rwandan Minister of Finance whose name was not disclosed.
The woman was allegedly being handled by a Rwandan diplomat based in Uganda and had been promised a reward of a luxury house in Belgium, to be purchased with Rwandan government funds.
Kagame told the publication that the Rwandan government aimed to kill him to restore the confidence of their soldiers, who were suffering continuous defeats at the hands of the Rwanda Patriotic Front forces he led.
Beyond this failed assassination attempt by the woman, the report noted that Habyarimana’s government had repeatedly tried and failed to assassinate several other RPA leaders.
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