Former student shares story of survival
December 11 , 2006
On Oct. 21, 1993, Gilbert Tuhabonye faced an inconceivable decision – he would be forced to choose the method of his own annihilation. The options offered him were simple, yet macabre: roast to death on a human pyre or be hacked to pieces with machetes.
How does one make such a choice? How does one live to tell the story?
Tuhabonye came to LaGrange College last week to deliver the Waights G. Henry Jr. Lecture and give an account of a horrific day in a remarkable life. The lecture was a homecoming for the Burundi native who trained at the College a decade ago in an attempt to make his country’s track team for the 1996 Atlanta Olympics.
After his introduction, Tuhabonye, a slender, lithe man, sprang up the Callaway Auditorium stage steps, walked midway across the platform and announced to the audience of about 350, “I am the survivor. I am the survivor.”
He talked about the day 13 years ago when 30 percent of his body was burned away; he talked about his time in LaGrange, and he talked about his childhood in Burundi.
“When I was 5, I started school – five miles away with no bus,” Tuhabonye said.
It was while making the 10-mile circuit that he developed a love for running and displayed a competitive nature, racing against the elements.
“Sometimes you could see the rain coming, so you would start running fast to beat the rain, and it was a lot of fun,” he said.
As the years rolled by, his athletic prowess grew, and at age 14, Tuhabonye won his first championship, running barefoot in an 8K race.
By the 11th grade, he was gaining recognition as his country’s top runner in the 400 and 800 meter events. But on a tragic day during his senior year, Tuhabonye’s life was nearly ripped to pieces.
In the early morning hours of Oct. 21, 1993, Burundi’s president, who was of the Hutu tribe, was assassinated by Tutsi military officers.
Tuhabonye, a Tutsi, discovered something was wrong while walking to school that morning when a Hutu classmate, whom he considered a friend, accosted him.
“He came up to me with a huge knife and said, ‘Tonight, I’m going to cut your neck,’ and I didn’t understand because I couldn’t image anyone doing something like that,” he said.
After his arrival at school, Tuhabonye learned about the coup that had occurred the night before; nevertheless, he tried to carry on with his normal routine – he went to class, opened a book and studied.
But by 11 o’clock it was clear the situation had devolved into malevolent chaos as Tuhabonye watched his Tutsi teachers being chased by Hutu mobs.
At noon, he decided to go to his school’s headmaster, a Hutu, for help. The response he received rattled him.
“The headmaster looked me straight in the eye and told me, ‘You’re going to see what Jesus saw on the cross,’” he remembered. “I was speechless for a moment, I couldn’t talk. I went back to class, and the students asked what was discussed with the headmaster, and I could not tell them, I was in shock.”
The day moved forward, and a crowd of Hutus began gathering around the school. As the mob grew, the Hutu students who remained decided to join it, leaving only Tutsis in the school.
Faced with few options, the Tutsi students decided to attempt a peace march to a camp 26 miles away. They didn’t get far.
“As we walked a mile-and-a-half away from the school, they stopped us,” he said. “The headmaster sent everyone to come and catch us and bring us back to the building alive.
“And I remember running, and as I’m running, they were everywhere. I’m running because the headmaster told them to get me first so I wouldn’t be able to run to camp and tell the soldiers to come.”
Surrounded by the machete-and-bow-wielding rabble, Tuhabonye was forced to surrender, and was marched back to the headmaster.
“He looked me in the eye, and he told me again, ‘You’re going to see what Jesus saw on the cross,’” he said.
At this point, Tuhabonye was locked inside a building while the Hutus went to work torturing many of his classmates – ears and limbs were hacked off, legs were broken.
After a time, the restless crowd demanded the school track star be sent out. Facing a horrible death, Tuhabonye looked around for a way to escape, but there was no escape. For a moment, his mind drifted to the possibility of suicide. But before he could take any action, an enigmatic voice spoke to him.
“I heard a voice and the voice was very strong, and the voice said, ‘Nothing will happen to you, be calm.’”
With the mystifying message still fresh in his memory, Tuhabonye was led outside where he and dozens of Tutsis were bound together and marched to a building two kilometers off campus.
It was at this location that Tuhabonye was compelled to make a mortal decision.
“Before you could go into the building, you had two choices,” he said. “They were either going cut you to pieces or you’re going to be burned alive (inside the building).
When the time arrived to choose his fate, Tuhabonye dashed toward the building through a gauntlet of machetes. He made it inside intact after surviving a hard blow to the chest that would leave him coughing blood for two months.
Once the Hutus had packed all the Tutsis shoulder-to-shoulder into the building, they set it ablaze.
For eight interminable hours, Tuhabonye lived Hell on earth. He breathed a pall of toxic air as he witnessed his friends perish one by one.
At some point in the ordeal, to save his life, he had to burrow under the smoldering corpses of his friends, whose bodies were so hot, they scalded his skin.
Now, near the end of his endurance, his situation grew more perilous when a part of the flaming roof fell on his back, severely burning him.
He was the last person in the building alive; he could withstand no more. He attempted to end his pain by diving into the ground headfirst … but his effort was unsuccessful.
And then, at the nadir of his existence, with all hope lost – the mysterious voice returned to Tuhabonye.
“The voice was very strong, ‘Nothing will happen to you. I am with you.’ And I couldn’t tell who was talking to me,” he said.
In desperation, he took a bone from a dead body and broke open a window.
“I look outside, and they are waiting,” he said. “They are chanting, they are drinking, they are screaming.
“If you tried to escape they are going to cut your neck and they’re going to kill you.”
But then, once again, “I heard a voice, ‘Get out!’”
And so he did. He jumped out and landed directly inside the heart of the mob – but something inexplicable occurred.
“They did not see me! They did not see me!” Somehow the violent horde could not see the naked man whose back was still on fire, though he was close enough to touch.
They were blinded to Tuhabonye for a full 10 seconds, and by the time they could see him, it was too late. He was racing away on badly charred feet … the only survivor out of 250 victims.
“Today, I call it a miracle,” he said.
During his address, Tuhabonye shared additional details of his escape and of his physical and emotional recovery from the severe burns he sustained – details that also can be found in his book, “This Voice in My Heart,” which Universal Studios plans to make into a movie.
He spoke of his time in LaGrange, where he came to train for the 1996 Olympics. And he remembered fondly his days as a student on the Hill.
“ LaGrange College taught me a lot,” he said. “I learned English here at LaGrange College. When Dr. Stuart (Gulley) told me … that you were willing to let me come and share my experience, I could not say no.
“It’s like God wanted me to be back home. In America, my life began here in LaGrange.”
Today, Tuhabonye lives in Austin, Texas, with his wife, Triphine, and two daughters, Emma and Grace. He coaches 500 students in a successful track program called Gilbert’s Gazelles, and he is a frequent church speaker.
