Five people were arrested on 3 February after a group of men assaulted Victoire Ingabire; her assistant Joseph Ntawangundi was badly beaten in the attack in the capital, Kigali. Ingabire who intends to run for president returned to Rwanda in January after 16 years in the Netherlands. She has been criticised for highlighting the deaths of Hutus  in the genocide and for claiming that the current government is dominated by a Tutsi elite. Gregory Mthembu Salter, a research associate at the South African Institute of International Affairs, said the attack may reflect a need for Rwanda to better uphold freedom of speech.