Rwanda holds its presidential election on Monday, billed as a remake of the 2017 plebiscite won with more than 98% of the vote by head of state Paul Kagame, who has ruled the country with an iron fist for 30 years.
Aged 66, Paul Kagame will face the same two opponents as seven years ago: Franck Habineza, leader of the only authorized opposition party (the Green Democratic Party), and the independent Philippe Mpayimana. The two men then obtained respectively 0.48% and 0.73% of the votes.
He was the architect of the spectacular economic recovery of the country, which was drained of blood after the genocide of the Tutsis in 1994 and is today presented by certain Western and African leaders as a model of development.
Its solid growth (7.2% on average between 2012 and 2022) has been accompanied by the development of infrastructure (roads, hospitals, etc.) enabling socio-economic progress.
But his regime is also criticised for its role in neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo – where its army is accused by the UN of fighting alongside M23 rebels – and its repression of dissenting voices.
Several opposition figures (Victoire Ingabire, Bernard Ntaganda) were not able to run because of past convictions. The courts rejected their requests to have their civil rights restored.
The electoral commission also invalidated the candidacy of another anti-Kagame voice, Diane Rwigara, due to non-compliant documents. She had already been excluded from the last presidential election, accused of falsifying documents and arrested before being cleared by the courts in 2018.
A total of 9.01 million voters are registered for this election, which will for the first time be combined with the legislative elections to renew the Parliament dominated by Paul Kagame’s party, the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF).
“President forever”
This year again, the imbalance between the strongman of the country since the end of the Tutsi genocide in 1994 and his adversaries was glaring during the three weeks of campaigning.
Pennants on cars, flags, posters and banners on the side of the roads: the RPF machine has deployed its red, white and blue colours and its slogans “Tora Kagame Paul” (“Vote Paul Kagame”) and “PK24” (for “Paul Kagame 2024”) throughout the country.
The giant meetings of the head of state bring together tens of thousands of people, flooded with T-shirts and caps glorifying the RPF and “PK”, while his rivals struggle to gather a hundred people – most of them coming as curious onlookers.
At a Frank Habineza rally in Eastern Province, Beatrice Mpawenimana explained that she had come “to listen to what he says.” “But I will vote for Paul Kagame,” said the 30-year-old mother: “He gave us women a voice, he brought us roads, hospitals… I want him to remain president forever.”
In this landlocked country in the Great Lakes region, 65% of the population is under 30 and has only known Mr Kagame as leader.
“Formality”
Mr Kagame has been Rwanda’s strongman since he overthrew the extremist Hutu government in July 1994 with the RPF rebellion, ending a genocide that left 800,000 people dead, mainly among the Tutsi minority, according to the UN.
First vice-president and minister of defense but de facto leader of the country, Paul Kagame has officially been its president since 2000, elected by Parliament after the resignation of Pasteur Bizimungu, then three times by universal suffrage with a minimum of 93% of the vote (95.05% in 2003, 93.08% in 2010, 98.79% in 2017).
“The ruling party, the RPF, is very popular across the country, that’s undeniable. The election is like a formality. There is no real opponent to Kagame,” says Rwandan constitutional lawyer and political analyst Louis Gitinywa.
In a recent statement, Amnesty International denounced the “severe restrictions” on the rights of the opposition, as well as the “threats, arbitrary detentions, fabricated charges, killings and enforced disappearances.”
After reaching the limit of two seven-year terms, the leader was able to run in 2017 thanks to a controversial constitutional revision in 2015 establishing the five-year term — maintaining a maximum of two mandates.
This amendment had sparked strong criticism because it reset the number of Paul Kagame’s mandates to zero and also authorized him to run for a transitional seven-year term from 2017 to 2024.
This reform therefore allows him, in the event of re-election, to remain in power until 2034.