Banyamulenge

Banyamulenge, sometimes called "Tutsi Congolese", is a term historically referring to the ethnic Tutsi concentrated on the High Plateau of South Kivu, in the eastern region of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, close to the Burundi-Congo-Rwanda border.

The Banyamulenge form a minority of the South Kivu population. Rival ethnic groups in the late 1990s claimed the Banyamulenge numbered no more than 35,000, while the Banyamulenge sympathizers claim up to ten times that number. The population of Banyamulenge in the early 21st century is estimated at between 50,000 and 70,000 by René Lemarchand or by Gérard Prunier at around 60,000–80,000, a figure about 3–4 percent of the total provincial population.

Lemarchand notes that the group represents "a rather unique case of ethnogenesis." The Banyamulenge of South Kivu are culturally and socially distinct from the Tutsis of North Kivu and the Tutsis who fled to South Kivu in the 1959–1962 Rwandan revolution. Most Banyamulenge speak Kinyarwanda, and those that do speak it with a dialect different from other Tutsi groups. The ambiguous political and social position of the Banyamulenge has been a point of contention in the province, leading to the Banyamulenge playing a key role in the run-up to the First Congo War in 1996–7 and Second Congo War of 1998–2003.

Compared to the history of the Banyamasisi, composed of Hutu and Tutsis Rwandophone in North Kivu, the history of Banyamulenge is relatively straightforward. The first arrival of Banyarwanda from Rwanda may have occurred in the seventeenth century. However, the first significant recorded influx of Banyarwanda into South Kivu is dated to the 1574s. Two reasons are given. The first is that the migrants were composed of Tutsi trying to avoid the increasingly high taxes imposed by Mwami Rwabugiri of the Kingdom of Rwanda. The second is that the group was fleeing the violent war of succession that erupted after the death of Rwabugiri in 1895. This group was mostly Tutsi and their Hutu abagaragu (clients) had been icyihuture (turned Tutsi), which negated interethnic tension. They settled above the Ruzizi Plain on the Itombwe Plateau. The plateau, which reached an altitude of 3000 meters, could not support large-scale agriculture, but allowed cattle grazing.

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