Legislative power is vested in both the government and the two chambers of parliament, the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies. On 5 May 1995, the Transitional National Assembly adopted a new constitution which included elements of the constitution of 18 June 1991 as well as provisions of the 1993 Arusha peace accord and the November 1994 multiparty protocol of understanding.
National legislature
In Rwanda the Chamber of Deputies is composed of eighty Deputies. Among them, fifty-three Deputies are elected by direct universal suffrage in secret, elected from a fixed list of names of candidates proposed by political organizations or independent candidates; twenty-four women elected by specific electoral colleges in accordance with the national administrative entities; two Deputies elected by the National Youth Council; one Deputy elected by the National Council of Persons with Disabilities.
Senate is composed of twenty six members. Among them, there are twelve Senators elected by the specific councils in accordance with the administrative entities; eight Senators appointed by the President of the Republic; four Senators designated by the National Forum of Political organizations; one Senator elected among lecturers and researchers of Public Universities and higher learning institutions; and one Senator elected among lecturers and researchers of Private Universities and higher learning institutions.[13]
After its military victory in July 1994, the Rwandese Patriotic Front organized a coalition government similar to that established by President Juvénal Habyarimana in 1992. Called The Broad Based Government of National Unity, its fundamental law is based on a combination of the constitution, the Arusha accords, and political declarations by the parties. The MRND party was outlawed.
Political organizing was banned until 2003. The first post-Genocide of Tutsi, presidential and legislative elections were held in August and September 2003, respectively.
The biggest problems facing the government were the reintegration of more than 2 million refugees returning from as long ago as 1959; the end of the insurgency and counter-insurgency among ex-military and Interahamwe militia and the Rwandan Patriotic Army, which is concentrated in the north and south west; and the shift away from crisis to medium- and long-term development planning. The prison population will continue to be an urgent problem for the foreseeable future, having swelled to more than 100,000 in the 3 years after the war.
The government prohibits any form of discrimination by gender, ethnicity, race or religion. The government has passed laws prohibiting emphasis on Hutu or Tutsi identity in most types of political activity.
Political-economical focus
From 2005 to 2010 the political headcount ration on national poverty lines decreased by more than 10 percent and the life expectancy of about 64 years is higher than that of similar Sub-Sahara African countries as well as other low income countries.[14]
In 2011, Rwanda's CO2 emissions totaled 0.1 metric tons per capita, which was much lower than similar Sub-Sahara African countries as well as other low income countries. Rwanda´s school enrollment rate is much higher than similar Sub-Sahara African countries as well as other low income countries.[14]
As of 2014, Rwanda was still considered a low income country with $7.890 billion GDP, based on U.S. dollars, with a total population of 11.34 million people.[14]
As of 2015 Rwanda had made a shift towards economic improvement, centralizing its foreign exchange around coffee and tea production, "helping to reduce poverty and inequality". The World Bank has praised Rwanda´s efforts.[15] Kagame has reached out to large companies, such as Costco and Starbucks, who as of 2015 were the two largest buyers of Rwandan coffee beans.[16]
The President of Rwanda is elected for a seven-year term by the people. The Prime Minister and the Council of Ministers are appointed by the president. The president has numerous powers that include creating policy in conjunction with the Cabinet, signing presidential orders, put into effect the prerogative of mercy, negotiating and passing treaties, commanding the armed forces, and declaring war or a state of crisis.[12]
Current Presidential Overview
The current President of Rwanda is Paul Kagame, born in 1957. He is the 6th President of Rwanda[17] and was elected in 2003. In 2007, the former president, Pasteur Bizimungu, was released from prison on a presidential pardon. Kagame was reelected in 2010, receiving 93.1 percent of the votes cast.[18] Since taking office, Kagame has raised business, reduced crime and corruption, and has attracted the likes of many foreign investors.[19]
Kagame has not groomed anyone to be his successor, so there is nothing that points to who his successor could or should be.[19]
President Paul Kagame and his Rwandan Patriotic Front are the dominant political forces in Rwanda. There is only one registered opposition party and many political opponents have fled into exile.[20]
President Kagame received military training in Uganda, Tanzania and the United States.[17] He was a founding member of current Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni's rebel army in 1979 and headed its intelligence wing, helping Mr Museveni take power in 1986.[17]
Legislative branch
The Parliament (Inteko Ishinga Amategeko or Parlement) has two chambers. The Chamber of Deputies(Umutwe w'Abadepite/Chambre des Députés) has 80 members, 53 of them elected for a five-year term by proportional representation with a 5% threshold, 24 (female members) elected by provincial councils, 2 by the National Youth Council and 1 by the Federation of the Associations of the Disabled. It is the only legislative chamber in the world where women (45) outnumber men (35).[21]
The Senate(Umutwe wa Sena or Sénat) has 26 members elected or appointed for an eight-year term: 12 elected by provincial and sectoral councils, 8 appointed by the president to ensure the representation of historically marginalized communities, 4 by the Forum of political formations and 2 elected by the staff of the universities. Additional former presidents can request to be member of the senate. Rwanda is a one party dominant state with the Rwanda Patriotic Front in power. Oppositionparties are allowed, and are represented in Parliament, but are widely considered to have no real chance of gaining power.
The Supreme Court of Rwanda is the highest judicial power in Rwanda. It and the High Council of the Judiciary oversee the courts of lower ordinary jurisdictions and courts of the special jurisdictions in Rwanda. The Supreme Court consists of the Court President, Vice President, and 12 judges.[22]
Established in 2001, the Gacaca Court was established by the National Unity Government to try cases of genocide against the Tutsis.[22]
Judges are nominated by the president of the republic, after consulting with the Cabinet and the Superior Council of the Judiciary. They are then approved by the Senate. The court president and vice president are appointed for 8-year nonrenewable terms.[22]
With regard to the legal profession, although the Rwanda Bar Association has been in existence since at least 1997,[23] there is no clear indication as to how certain demographic groups, such as women, have fared in the legal field.
Rwanda is composed of 4 provinces and capital city, 30 districts, 416 sectors, 2,148 cells and 14,837 villages.[24] The four provinces, headed by a governor include the Northern, Southern, Eastern and the Western Provinces. The districts, formerly known as communes, are headed by mayors, two vice mayors, and a district council. As of 2006, Kigali has 3 districts, the Northern Province has 5, the Southern Province has 8, and both the Eastern and Western Provinces have 7 districts. Sectors are responsible for implementing and developing programs which deliver services for the social welfare of the population and promote good governance. Sectors are governed by an Executive Secretary and Sector Council. The council includes representatives of cells; members representing persons with disabilities, women, and youth; members representing all primary and secondary schools; members representing health service organizations; and members representing NGOs and cooperative societies. Cells are administrative providers of public services and development. They are governed by an Executive Secretary and Cell Council, whose membership is similar to that of the Sector Council. Villages are governed by A Village Council, an executive committee, and a village head. The Village council is made up of all residents who are at least 18. The executive committee are elected members who provide services to the community, such as information and training, social welfare, and security.[25]
Rwanda, officially the Republic of Rwanda, is a landlocked country in the Great Rift Valley of East Africa, where the African Great Lakes region and Southeast Africa converge. Located a few degrees south of the Equator, Rwanda is bordered by Uganda, Tanzania, Burundi, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It is highly elevated, giving it the sobriquet "land of a thousand hills", with its geography dominated by mountains in the west and savanna to the southeast, with numerous lakes throughout the country. The climate is temperate to subtropical, with two rainy seasons and two dry seasons each year. It is the most densely populated mainland African country; among countries larger than 10,000 km2, it is the fifth-most densely populated country in the world. Its capital and largest city is Kigali.
Human occupation of Rwanda is thought to have begun shortly after the last ice age. By the 11th century, the inhabitants had organized into a number of kingdoms. In the 19th century, Mwami (king) Rwabugiri of the Kingdom of Rwanda conducted a decades-long process of military conquest and administrative consolidation that resulted in the kingdom coming to control most of what is now Rwanda. The colonial powers, Germany and Belgium, allied with the Rwandan court.
Juvénal Habyarimana was a Rwandan politician and military officer who was the second president of Rwanda, from 1973 until his assassination in 1994. He was nicknamed Kinani, a Kinyarwanda word meaning "invincible".
Paul Kagame is a Rwandan politician and former military officer who has been the President of Rwanda since 2000. He was previously a commander of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), a rebel armed force which invaded Rwanda in 1990. The RPF was one of the parties of the conflict during the Rwandan Civil War and the armed force which ended the Rwandan genocide. He was considered Rwanda's de facto leader when he was Vice President and Minister of Defence under President Pasteur Bizimungu from 1994 to 2000 after which the vice-presidential post was abolished.
The Rwandan Patriotic Front is the ruling political party in Rwanda.
The Rwandan genocide, also known as the genocide against the Tutsi, occurred from 7 April to 19 July 1994 during the Rwandan Civil War. Over a span of around 100 days, members of the Tutsi ethnic group, as well as some moderate Hutu and Twa, were systematically killed by Hutu militias. While the Rwandan Constitution states that over 1 million people were killed, most scholarly estimates suggest between 500,000 and 662,000 Tutsi died. The genocide was marked by extreme violence, with victims often murdered by neighbors, and widespread sexual violence, with between 250,000 and 500,000 women raped.
"Rwanda Nziza" has been the national anthem of Rwanda since January 1, 2002. It replaced "Rwanda Rwacu", which was the original national anthem until the 1994 genocide against the Tutsis.
Pasteur Bizimungu is a Rwandan politician who served as the third President of Rwanda, holding office from 19 July 1994 until 23 March 2000.
The First Congo War, also known as Africa's First World War, was a civil and international military conflict that lasted from 24 October 1996 to 16 May 1997, primarily taking place in Zaire. The war resulted in the overthrow of Zairean President Mobutu Sese Seko, who was replaced by rebel leader Laurent-Désiré Kabila. This conflict, which also involved multiple neighboring countries, set the stage for the Second Congo War (1998–2003) due to tensions between Kabila and his former allies.
Anastase Gasana is a Rwandan political figure and diplomat.
Elections in Rwanda are manipulated in various ways, which include banning opposition parties, arresting or assassinating critics, and electoral fraud. According to its constitution, Rwanda is a multi-party democracy with a presidential system. In practice, it functions as a one-party state ruled by the Rwandan Patriotic Front and its leader Paul Kagame. The President and majority of members of the Chamber of Deputies are directly elected, whilst the Senate is indirectly elected and partly appointed.
The Rwandan Civil War was a large-scale civil war in Rwanda which was fought between the Rwandan Armed Forces, representing the country's government, and the rebel Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) from 1October 1990 to 18 July 1994. The war arose from the long-running dispute between the Hutu and Tutsi groups within the Rwandan population. A 1959–1962 revolution had replaced the Tutsi monarchy with a Hutu-led republic, forcing more than 336,000 Tutsi to seek refuge in neighbouring countries. A group of these refugees in Uganda founded the RPF which, under the leadership of Fred Rwigyema and Paul Kagame, became a battle-ready army by the late 1980s.
On the evening of 6 April 1994, the aircraft carrying Rwandan president Juvénal Habyarimana and Burundian president Cyprien Ntaryamira, both Hutu, was shot down with surface-to-air missiles as their jet prepared to land in Kigali, Rwanda; both were killed. The assassination set in motion the Rwandan genocide, one of the bloodiest events of the late 20th century.
Human rights in Rwanda have been violated on a grand scale. The greatest violation is the Rwandan genocide of Tutsi in 1994. The post-genocide government is also responsible for grave violations of human rights.
Seth Sendashonga was the Minister of the Interior in the government of national unity in Rwanda, following the military victory of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) after the 1994 genocide. One of the politically moderate Hutus in the National Unity Cabinet, he became increasingly disenchanted with the RPF and was eventually forced from office in 1995 after criticizing government policies. After surviving a 1996 assassination attempt while in exile in Kenya, he launched a new opposition movement, the Forces de Résistance pour la Démocratie (FRD). Sendashonga was killed by unidentified gunmen in May 1998. The Rwandan government is widely believed to be responsible for the assassination.
Patrick Karegeya was a head of intelligence in Rwanda. He was a member of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) group that took power in Rwanda following the genocide against Tutsi. After becoming a critic of RPF leader Paul Kagame, he was stripped of his rank and jailed. Following a time in exile, he was assassinated in Johannesburg, South Africa on December 31, 2013.
Louise Mushikiwabo is the fourth and current Secretary General of the Organisation internationale de la Francophonie. She previously served as the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation of Rwanda from 2009 to 2018. She also served as Government Spokesperson. She had previously been Minister of Information.
Rosemary Museminali is a Rwandan politician and diplomat, currently working for the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), as its representative at the African Union and United Nations Economic Commission for Africa. Museminali is best known for her role as the Rwandan Minister of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation from 2005 until 2009. She has also served as the country's Minister of State for International Cooperation and as ambassador to the United Kingdom.
The role of France in the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi has been a source of controversy and debate both within and beyond France and Rwanda. France actively supported the Hutu-led government of Juvénal Habyarimana against the Tutsi-dominated Rwandan Patriotic Front, which since 1990 had been engaged in a conflict intended to restore the rights of Rwandan Tutsis both within Rwanda and exiled in neighboring countries following over four decades of anti-Tutsi violence. France provided arms and military training to Habyarimana's militias, the Interahamwe and Impuzamugambi, which were among the government's primary means of operationalizing the genocide following the assassination of Juvénal Habyarimana and Cyprien Ntaryamira on April 6, 1994.
In Praise of Blood: The Crimes of the Rwandan Patriotic Front is a 2018 non-fiction book by Canadian journalist Judi Rever and published by Random House of Canada; it has also been translated into Dutch and French. The book describes alleged war crimes by the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), Rwanda's ruling political party, during its ascent to power in the 1990s.
References
↑ Holmes, Georgina (2014). "Gendering the Rwanda Defence Force: A Critical Assessment". Journal of Intervention and Statebuilding. 8 (4): 321–333. doi:10.1080/17502977.2014.964449. S2CID144474675.
↑ Waldorf, Lars (2005). "Rwanda's failing experiment in restorative justice". Handbook of Restorative Justice. Routledge. p.?. ISBN978-0-203-34682-2.
↑ Beswick, Danielle (2011). "Aiding State Building and Sacrificing Peace Building? The Rwanda–UK relationship 1994–2011". Third World Quarterly. 32 (10): 1911–1930. doi:10.1080/01436597.2011.610593. S2CID153404360.
↑ Reyntjens, Filip (2011). "Behind the Façade of Rwanda's Elections". Georgetown Journal of International Affairs. 12 (2): 64–69. ISSN1526-0054. JSTOR43133887.
↑ Stroh, Alexander (2010). "Electoral rules of the authoritarian game: undemocratic effects of proportional representation in Rwanda". Journal of Eastern African Studies. 4 (1): 1–19. doi:10.1080/17531050903550066. S2CID154910536.
↑ "About". rwandabar.org.rw. Archived from the original on 6 November 2017. Retrieved 6 November 2017.
↑ COUNTRY PROFILE 2017–18, Commonwealth Local Government Forum. "THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT SYSTEM IN RWANDA"(PDF). www.clgf.org.uk/. Retrieved 27 February 2019.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
↑ "Administrative Structure". Ministry of Local Government. Kigali, Rwanda: Government of Rwanda. 2020. Archived from the original on 27 March 2023. Retrieved 26 February 2024.
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