Name: Jan Aerielle D.

Almontero
Course and Section: AB Foreign Service 302
Subject: International Political Economy
Professor: Sir Jumel G. Estrañero
Date: March 24, 2018

A Critique of the film "Hotel Rwanda" :

An Analysis of the Tragic conflict between the two Tribes

The movie entitled "Hotel Rwanda" is based on a true story of a genocide that happened
in the Rwanda, Africa during the year 1994. This film shows one of the darkest era of the human
history through the eyes of the hotel manager named Paul Rusesabagina. During that time
Rwanda was composed of two major ethnical groups: the Hutus, which are the majority of the
population and the Tutsi, which are the minority of the population. The Rwanda genocide started
when the plane of the President of the Rwanda was shot down. The Hutus blamed the Tutsi
rebels for the act of murder and began killing the Tutsi citizens
This is where the story has started wherein the main character Paul Rusesabagina who is
a hotel manager of the famous Mille Collines Hotel in Kigali and a Hutus as well has a wife
named Titania which is a Tutsi on the other hand. Paul is a smart man who bribes his rich guest
to obtain a smooth business in the hotel. Paul is aware of the conflict happening between the two
ethnic groups in Rwanda that's why he is building up a relationship with the foreign guests in the
hotel for whenever he needed a help for his family he could ask a favor from this peoples. At the
first part of the film, Paul only aims to save his family but as the film goes on the humanity and
the sympathy as a human developed within Paul and helped the Tutsis by letting them stay at the
hotel. Paul could save his life because he is a Hutu citizen but instead Paul choose to risk his own
life for the safety of his family and the other Tutsi citizens. Another character from the film is his
wife, Titania. Titania as a Tutsi fears the safety if her family especially her children. Despite of
only saving herself along with her family, Titania also choose to help their Tutsi neighbors to be
safe from the hands of the Hutus militia. Titania portrays a brave woman of whom you can rely
on when such problems occur while his husband Paul portrays a generous and smart man and
shows that one should never give up in order to survive. Lastly is Gregoire, a Hutus employee in
the hotel who is mad at Paul for helping the Tutsi citizens. Gregoire portrays a selfish personality
who only choose to save his self by rather than saving hundreds of life.
Relating the movie in the political economy matters, it can be notice how security is very
important to maintain the order in the state. Due to the lack of security and military and
authoritative power in Rwanda the genocide has sparked and millions of Tutsi citizens has been
killed. It is very important for the state to be secure at all times in order to protect its citizens and
to avoid chaos in the state. The military security of a states shows how developed a state is. In
the modern era, wealthier nations shows that they tend to invest more in research and
development of weapons technologies, which can afford them a decisive advantage on the
battlefield. The high cost of maintaining large military forces places a burden on the economic
security of a nation yet provides an advantage for a condition of being safe. Also, lack of security
leads to war wherein the rights and freedom of an individual are being suppressed and restricted.
In my own perspective, peace must come first before development. When there is peace
within the state then the development can be seen but when the development comes first rather
than the peace then it might be harder for a state to progress more because this kind of
development will be put into waste for the reason that there is still a chaos within the country.
One good example is the Philippine, before even the Philippines started to develop the Filipinos
aims to achieve peace and freedom. I believe that the development cannot progress when there is
war, such a buildings and other infrastructure will be destroyed continually, the job of the state to
protect its citizen will be a failure and its citizens right and freedom will be suppressed. The
citizens of a nation must be in unity and must be able to help each other to develop and improve
their own country but when such chaos occurred, the citizens will live in fear of death. The
Philippines has developed a good strategy to improve their own state. They have been
developing their bilateral relationship with other country. It may seem that the Philippines is just
starting for further development but progress can be seen and interacting with other states can
help the Philippines to gain more knowledge politically and economically.
Thus, in order for the same incident not to happen in the Philippines, the Philippines must
develop and strengthen their national security to avoid such chaos. It would be great help to
bring back the ROTC in universities make it mandatory for everyone especially for man. A
citizen must be able to protect himself and must be able to aid the needs of his country when it
comes to the lack of soldiers in the state. The Philippines must also watch and observe each and
every movement of such insurgencies and terrorist that might disturb the security of the state for
the country to be ready when cases of emergency arises. Diversity of beliefs, ethnic groups and
such more should not be a hinder for a state to achieve unity and peace.