After 10 years on the road telling stories Rwanda passed through in 1994 Genocide against Tutsi, through curated arts, Ubumuntu Arts organisation has kicked off 10 days celebrations focusing on mental health while also looking back on its achievements in uniting people globally.
This year’s Ubumuntu arts festival connected local and global audiences through curated theatre, cotemporally dance, music performances from over 30 countries including Rwanda, Uganda, Pakistan, USA, UK, DRC, South Africa, Burundi and many other via live youtube streaming to global audiences live from Kigali Genocide Memorial Amphitheatre. 
The festival will take 10 days and over 50 performances are slated to perform for 13,000 plus expected attendees.
The first day of opening ceremony of the festival was graced by politicians and foreign dignitaries including Rwanda’s culture minister, Pakistan’s envoy and many more.
In her opening remarks, the minister of State at Ministry of Youth and culture, Mrs Sandrine Umutoni said that, Ubumuntu festival is a good platform of uniting people and reminding them about preserving memories.
“We have had performances from different countries and many people who have never been in Rwanda and the first encounter with Rwanda is Kigali genocide Memorial which is a strong lesson on memories resilience and the importance of preserving humanity,” she said.
The minister further said: “This definitely aligns with the government policy to promote creative economy because tonight we saw what the creative economy is capable of doing. One, it’s able to show to the rest of the world that the question of memory can be brought to an international level through arts. Tonight we had people who have never been in Rwanda, who learned Rwandan songs about resilience, we had people from southern Africa who were talking about the importance of being an African and what it means to us as children of the continent.”
Hope Azeda, who has been curating the festival since its commencement told journalists:“A decade journey of Ubumuntu festival has been a study tour for us, because every year was a learning year and it really broaden our thinking in connecting, uniting, preserving memories and giving hope to people through curated theatre,”
According Azeda, they started the festival not sure where it will head in terms of logistics but they only had idea.
She said: “Although we were like a kid who doesn’t ask anything but rather do anything that comes to its head, we encountered several logistic challenges to host all these countries. We needed a big budget which we didn’t have, but we could always find solutions and now its time to focus on the new journey which is mental health.”
Back in 2020 and 2021, Ubumuntu arts festive embarked on using virtual to reach audiences only via digital platforms due to the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Ubumuntu Arts Festival returned to the physical stage from July 14 to 17, 2022.
Rwandan artists performed on the stage a play dubbed 25 generation which tackled the stigma that children of Genocide perpetrators experience especially during the commemoration.
Rapper Kivumbi King and singer Jolis Peace were among the Rwandan performers who acted 25 generation which talks about the dilemma of kids born while their fathers are on the run as genocide perpetrators.
It aims at encouraging the children to speak out and join other in building the nation as one without having the stigma.
Since its inception in 2015, Ubumuntu Arts has continued to grow in scale and global recognition. The festival provides a platform for artists from all over the world to present performances dealing with difficult aspects of societal violence and human nature, from police brutality, to mass incarceration, civil war and genocide.
Both the timing and location of the festival hold deep historical and moral significance. The festival takes place at the Kigali Genocide Memorial, built on the resting place of 250,000 Tutsi. It occurs in July, during the final week of the 100-day commemoration of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi. The impact the festival has on visitors and artists, however, extends far beyond the flagship event, and many attendees have returned home to start similar festivals in their own countries.
Ubumuntu’s performances, workshops, panels and genocide memorial visits encourage participants to remember the past, celebrate the present, and build a more peaceful future. Ubumuntu; The Kinyarwanda word for ‘humanity’, calls for unity among all peoples of the world, promoting love and inclusion and rejecting hatred and discrimination.
