By James Tasamba
KIGALI, Rwanda (AA) - Rwandan opposition politician Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza on Thursday denied any involvement in an alleged plot to overthrow the government.
The High Court in Kigali summoned Umuhoza after her name featured prominently in testimonies during an ongoing trial of nine people accused of plotting to overthrow the government, including YouTuber Theoneste Nsengimana.
The nine are accused of planning non-violent resistance under the guise of holding English language training sessions.
The prosecution alleges that the suspects were linked to Umuhoza's unregistered DALFA-Umurinzi party, from where they received financial and ideological support to facilitate their training in 2021.
However, Umuhoza told the court that her organization never held any political activities because it is not registered under the law.
“As such, we have not held any activities in the party’s name,” she said.
Umuhoza was sentenced in 2013 to 15 years in prison for terrorism and denial of the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.
She spent eight years in prison before receiving a presidential pardon in 2018.
Last year, she was barred from running in the country’s presidential polls because of a legal ban on convicted persons who have been jailed for six months or longer.
Umuhoza returned to Rwanda in 2010 from the Netherlands, where she had lived since 1994.
She was arrested and accused of denying the reality of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi ethnic group after calling for the perpetrators of crimes against members of the Hutu majority ethnic group to also be prosecuted.