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General elections are due to be held in Rwanda on 15 July 2024 to elect the president and members of the Chamber of Deputies. [3] [4]
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General elections are due to be held in Rwanda on 15 July 2024 to elect the president and members of the Chamber of Deputies. [3] [4]
A referendum in 2015 approved constitutional amendments that allow incumbent President Paul Kagame to run for a third term in office in 2017, as well as shortening presidential terms from seven to five years, although the latter change would not come into effect until 2024. [5]
In 2022 Kagame told a French television channel that he intends to run for president again in the 2024 election, despite having already served three terms in office. [6]
The President of Rwanda is elected in one round of voting by plurality. [7]
The 80-seat Chamber of Deputies is elected by two methods: 53 seats are directly elected by closed list proportional representation in a single nationwide constituency with an electoral threshold of 5%; seats are allocated using the largest remainder method. [8] The remaining 27 seats are indirectly elected by local and national councils, including 24 reserved for women (six from Eastern, Southern, and Western provinces, 4 from Northern Province and 2 from Kigali), [8] two for representatives of youth and one for representatives of the handicapped. [9]
For the 2024 election, campaigning will be held from 22 June to 12 July. [10]
Kagame announced his bid for a historic fourth term on 20 September 2023 in an interview with the pan-African Jeune Afrique magazine, saying "I am happy with the confidence that the Rwandans have shown in me. I will always serve them, as much when I can. Yes, I am indeed a candidate." [11] Member parties of Rwanda's ruling government coalition, the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) endorsed Kagame's campaign including the Ideal Democratic Party, the Democratic Union of the Rwandan People, the Prosperity and Solidarity Party, and the Rwandan Socialist Party. [12] Kagame’s candidacy was finalized by the RPF without objections at the end of its congress on 9 March 2024. [10] He was also endorsed by the Liberal Party and the Social Democratic Party on 31 March. [13]
2017 presidential candidate Frank Habineza of the Democratic Green Party of Rwanda has also indicated he will run again in 2024. [2]
Political activist Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza said that her United Democratic Forces party would challenge Kagame if registered in time. [14] She said in 2023 that while recognizing Kagame's achievements while President, his greatest achievement would be stepping aside to let a peaceful transfer of power take place. [15] However, Ingabire had previously been disqualified from running after being convicted on charges of threatening state security and downplaying the Rwandan Genocide. On 13 March 2024, her appeal to be allowed to stand for office was dismissed by a court. [16]
Rwanda is a de facto one-party state ruled by the Rwandan Patriotic Front and its leader Paul Kagame since the end of the 1994 genocide against members of the Tutsi ethnic group. Although Rwanda is nominally democratic, elections are manipulated in various ways, which include banning opposition parties, arresting or assassinating critics, and electoral fraud.
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 served as 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 fourth 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 Republican Rally for Democracy in Rwanda, also known as the Rassemblement Démocratique pour la Retour is an unregistered Rwandan political party. Its stated goal is to establish a democratic and free Rwandan Republic, and its current president is Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza.
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.
Presidential elections were held in Rwanda on 25 August 2003. They were the first direct presidential elections since the Rwandan Civil War and the first multi-party presidential elections in the country's history. Paul Kagame of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) was elected to a seven-year term with 95% of the vote.
Presidential elections were held in Rwanda on 9 August 2010, the second since the Rwandan Civil War. Incumbent President Paul Kagame of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) was re-elected for a second seven-year term with 93% of the vote.
Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza is a Rwandan politician who served as chairwoman of the Unified Democratic Forces from 2006 to 2019. As an advocate for democracy and critic of President Paul Kagame, she was the UDF's candidate for the Rwandan 2010 presidential elections, but was ultimately arrested and sentenced to prison. A Sakharov Prize nominee, she served 8 years of a 15-year prison sentence in Kigali Central Prison on charges of terrorism and threatening national security. She currently leads the party Development And Liberty For All, with the focus to campaign for more political space and for development.
C. Peter Erlinder is an American lawyer, originally from Chicago, who lives in St. Paul, Minnesota. He was Lead Defence Counsel for the UN International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda and has represented several clients internationally, most notably several Rwandan opposition leaders, including Rwandan presidential candidate Victoire Ingabire.
The United Democratic Forces of Rwanda is a coalition of Rwandan opposition groups. Since its foundation in 2006, the UDF-Inkingi has profiled itself as an opposition party whose main objective is to change the regime of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), which has been in power since the end of the genocide against the Tutsis in July 1994. To this day, despite multiple attempts to become officially registered in Rwanda, the UDF-Inkingi has not yet been authorised to operate in Rwanda as a party. According to international human rights bodies, such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, UDF-Inkingi members inside Rwanda have been regularly subjected to persecution and even to murder, mostly non-elucidated.
Frank Habineza is Rwandan politician founder and chairman of the Democratic Green Party of Rwanda, a political party formed in August 2009 in Rwanda. In its first year, the party made six unsuccessful attempts to register. As of mid-August 2010, the party was still not registered, and therefore was unable to submit a candidate for the August 2010 Presidential elections. In September 2018, Frank Habineza and one other member of the Democratic Green Party of Rwanda were elected into Parliament. They are the first Opposition candidates to win seats in the Rwandan parliament since Kagame's Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF) came to power after the 1994 genocide.
The following lists events that happened during 2010 in Rwanda.
The Kizito Mihigo Peace Foundation, also called KMP Foundation, is a Rwandan non-governmental organization created in 2010 by the Rwandan gospel musician Kizito Mihigo. The foundation's main objective is to promote peace and reconciliation after the 1994 genocide.
Presidential elections were held in Rwanda on 4 August 2017. The incumbent President of Rwanda, Paul Kagame, was re-elected to a third seven-year term with 98.79% of the vote.
Ishema Party is a Rwandan political movement founded by Rev. Father Thomas Nahimana and other young Rwandan activists and scholars. Among these, are Nadine Claire Kasinge, Chaste Gahunde, Venant Nkurunziza, inter alia. They all met in Paris and for three days, they exchanged on issues facing Rwanda and possible consequences. In conclusion, they decided to start a new political party. That is how Ishema Party was born.
Diane Shima Rwigara is a Rwandan businesswoman and accountant who stood as an independent candidate in the 2017 Rwandan presidential election. Rwigara was charged on 23 September 2017, alongside her mother and four other defendants, with "inciting insurrection" among other counts, but was acquitted along with her mother on 6 December 2018.
Since the end of the Rwandan Civil War, many forms of censorship have been implemented in Rwanda.
Events in the year 2024 in Rwanda.
The only other candidate so far in the presidential race is lawmaker Frank Habineza of the Green Democratic party. He said he was not surprised by Kagame's announcement and would continue to fight for democracy.
I am happy with the confidence that the Rwandans have shown in me. I will always serve them, as much when I can. Yes, I am indeed a candidate.
Therefore, while recognising with gratitude the achievements that he has made over the past three decades, Kagame's greatest achievement yet would be to step away from power at the end of his term in 2024. In so doing, Kagame will have paved the way for better leadership in Rwanda and opened the door to future generations of Rwandans aspiring to become leaders in Rwanda.
