Kagame Set For Re-Election In Rwanda
As voting concluded in Rwanda’s presidential election, fears remain that some citizens will not accept the results amid claims that the elections were neither free nor fair.
Incumbent President Paul Kagame is expected to win by a landslide, but critics won’t see it as a fair victory, as in the run-up opposition candidates were arrested to allegedly prevent them from running against Kagame.
All three main opposition parties have been disqualified from contesting in the east African nation’s presidential election, while Rwanda’s Green Party was never able to hold enough meetings to register due to what they claim was government harassment. A top official in the party was recently murdered.
The media has also been silenced. In June, a newspaper journalist was shot dead outside his home after writing about another political murder. Police have arrested two suspects in the case.
Al Jezeera cited Amnesty International, stating there was a “climate of repression” in the country and that 30 newspapers had been banned, journalists had been targeted and members of the opposition party intimidated.
Female opposition leader Victoire Ingabire believes people will react to this political repression by rising up against the president. Ingabire, chairperson of the United Democratic Forces, has said that if Kagame refuses to relinquish power, “people will use all possibility to push him to accept it.”
Almost five million Rwandans voted in what was practically an incident-free election, but Ingabire believes that the country is going through a crisis and is experiencing a “mood of war” rather than a mood of elections.
She explained, “(Kagame) would like to stay in power but people need change and he does not accept to lose the power. That is the problem and if there is no possibility to change the power peacefully, this means that the people, we won’t agree with him. You can use other ways to take the power.”
800,000 were left dead and countless women were raped during Rwanda’s 1994 genocide. Kagame has been in charge of the country since then, firstly as part of the transitional government, and then again in 2003 when he won the country’s first democratic elections.
Ingabire returned from 16 years of exile in the Netherlands in January, and was arrested in April for collaboration with armed groups, genocide denial and “divisionism”, all claims which she denies.
Unable to get her party registered, Ingabire said, “We cannot have a free and fair election in Rwanda because there (is) no freedom. All is under repression.” She also claims that the opposition candidates are “stooges” of the president.
Mr. Kagame’s government has denied any involvement in the deaths of politicians and journalists, while Rwanda’s ambassador to the U.S., James Kimonyo, also denies Ingabire’s claims, saying that opposition parties who had been disqualified hadn’t followed the rules required to register.
Presidential candidate for the Liberal Party, Prosper Higiro, describes the political environment in Rwanda as “free”. The presidential hopeful said, “It’s alright. There’s no problem for me. There’s no problem. I don’t think the environment is tense.”
