Kigali has confirmed, that yet again, president Paul Kagame has characteristically won an election via a landslide victory of more than 90% of the total vote tally. Kagame, 66 , will begin his fourth term in office as the president of Rwanda, having ascended to the position 24 years ago. He rose to power in the year 2000. Previously, a presidential term lasted for seven years, but amendments made to the Rwandan constitution through popular vote in 2015 changed it to five years and imposed a ten year term limit. This amendment allowed Mr. Kagame to stay in power for seven more years from 2017, and potentially vie for the subsequent two five year terms, which means he could hold on to power up to the year 2034.
Throughout his reign, Mr. Kagame has established a polished image in the international community, through what some have referred to as “consensus democracy” while locally he has been accused of dictatorship, intimidation and brutalization of critical voices and civil activists in Rwanda. However, this information remains irrelevant to this piece, as the man seem to have established what experts call a cult following given his consistent record of handing his competitors humiliating defeats on the ballot.
In 2003, Kagame won election by 95%, a figure that has kept rising ever since. In 2010, his tally registered a negative deviation of 2% after he won election by 93% followed by 95% in 2017 and this year, the highest percentage ever registered by the winner of a presidential race in history after garnering 99.1% of the nine million votes cast, in an electoral process that was described by former Kenyan Chief Justice Mr. David Maraga as ” One of the best elections I have ever seen.” Mr. Maraga was one of the International Electoral Observers in Rwanda.
All his competitors have conceded defeat and congratulated him, paving way for his inauguration. World leaders who have wasted no time in congratulating him include Kenya’s William Ruto, Tanzania’s Samia Suluhu, Yoweri Museveni of Uganda, the Emir of Qatar, Omar Salva Kiir of South Sudan, and leaders of other countries such as Switzerland, Kazakhstan, Turkiye, Senegal, CAR, Chad, Comoros, Mozambique and among others Oman.
In response, Mr. Kagame took it to X to appreciate all the leaders and vowed to continue working round the clock to bolster diplomatic ties with countries across the world.
My sincere gratitude for the messages of congratulations and support from the friendly leaders of countries around the world, notably Barbados, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Cuba, Djibouti, Egypt, Ethiopia, Guinea-Bisseau, Guinea, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Liberia,…
— Paul Kagame (@PaulKagame) July 22, 2024
