Kagame wins 99% of vote election.
Paul Kagame, the current president of Rwanda, has been declared president for the fourth time. Mr. Kagame has won his fourth term in office, leading with 99.15 percent of the total votes cast.
With 7,099,815 votes, RPF-Inkotanyi candidate Kagame led the field. Mr. Habineza of the Democratic Green Party received just 38,301 votes, or 0.53% of the total.
Mr Kagame, who has won every election since 2003 with more than 95 percent of the vote, will now extend his rule to three decades.
The same two opponents Mr Kagame faced in the previous election in 2017 came out to challenge him again. In 2017 he won with 98 percent; Mpayimana and Habineza split the remaining 1.3 percent.
Diane Rwigara was controversially disqualified from running for office a second time due to what appeared to be a lack of compliance with the electoral commission’s rules.
The Kigali high court denied Ms. Victoire Ingabire access as well, ruling that her rehabilitation was incomplete. She was essentially placed under house arrest following her pardon by the president in 2018.
After leading the Rwandan Patriotic Army to put an end to the Hutu-dominated government of Juvenal Habyarimana, Mr. Kagame came to power in July 1994.
He is mostly credited with bringing the condition of Rwanda’s economy back from the brink of the genocide.
However, he is also chastised by Western nations for curtailing democracy and stifling free speech. But his government is adamant that it cannot implement democracy according to a Western model.
