Paul Kagame’s thumping victory in Rwanda’s presidential poll may be too much of a landslide for his own good, analysts said on Tuesday, urging the Tutsi leader to open up to the mainly Hutu opposition.
”It’s too much. It looks like the return of single-party rule,” said a regional human rights leader, Noel Twagiramungu.
He is no relation to Kagame’s main challenger, Faustin Twagiramungu, who immediately cried foul, demanding fresh elections after initial results from Monday’s polling pointed to a win of more than 90% for the incumbent president, who has led Rwanda since the 1994 genocide.
Monday’s election was the first since the orchestrated slaughter in which up to a million Tutsis and moderate Hutus died, and the first multiparty vote in the history of the Central African country of eight million.
Kagame, campaigning on a theme of national unity, had been widely expected to win the poll, giving him a seven-year mandate and consolidating his hold on power since his guerrilla force ended the government-led genocide nine years ago.
”It’s good for Mr Kagame to legitimise himself as the sole and irreplaceable leader, as the savior,” the rights leader said, adding: ”But it’s a shame for a country that wants to be democratic and open to other possibilities.”
Another analyst, requesting anonymity, said: ”If I were he [Kagame], I’d have done it differently, for the sake of my own credibility. With a score like that, he has all the powers.”
With half the votes counted, Kagame scored 94,3%, the electoral commission announced in the early hours of Tuesday, while Twagiramungu garnered a mere 3,5% and the third candidate, Jean-Nepomuscene Nayinzira, just 1,19%.
Twagiramungu, a moderate Hutu who returned from exile to take part in the polls, decided on the eve of the election to order his polling agents not to be present at polling stations during the voting to prevent accusations of interference or fraud.
Few incidents were reported during the polling, but regional observers questioned Twagiramungu’s decision, with one saying it ”left the field free” for possible manipulation.
”We don’t understand his position. Was it total discouragement at the end of a campaign in which he was harassed, or the result of intimidation?” he asked.
Twagiramungu ran as an independent after his party was banned, and several opposition supporters disappeared in the run-up to the vote.
On Tuesday the opposition cried foul, charging that many people had been forced to vote for Kagame.
One Western diplomat based in the region was reluctant to comment until full results are released, but said: ”The positive side is it seems to have gone off peacefully throughout the country.”
A banker close to Kagame’s ruling Rwandan Patriotic Front said the result showed that ”Rwanda has transcended the ethnic dimension”. He and other analysts said the Tutsi leader could turn the win into a further boost for reconciliation by opening up to political opposition, with an early test approaching with legislative elections late next month.
”If Kagame does open up, then it’s a step towards reconciliation. We have to encourage this, because it’s the only positive way forward,” one analyst said.
As reports from international observers were still coming in on Tuesday afternoon, Colette Flesch, the head of the European Union observer mission, said: ”We have a contrasted impression. When it comes to the polling some of our teams reported everything went well, but others reported difficulties.”
Intimidation alleged in Rwanda poll
She declined further comment pending the remaining reports. — Sapa-AFP