By The New Times Editorial
KIGALI-The elections held last September in Rwanda were lauded by many as having been free and fair. Not only did the parliamentary election usher in fresh faces representing the different political parties, it also saw female parliamentarians take the largest number of seats - a percentage of 56.2.
Rwanda’s constitution also provides for other constituencies to be represented in parliament, that is the youth and those with disabilities.
Now for those with an interest in democracy, who carry a passion of measuring how democratic or representative a country is, they must not look further than Rwanda’s parliament as it is constituted today.
It is important therefore to laud the initiative of the US organization the National Democratic Institute (NDI) in fostering linkages among Rwanda’s political parties in the spirit of strengthening multi-party democracy.
Rwanda will in April commemorate for the 15th time, the horrific Genocide against the Tutsi. The celebrations are not just about the end of horrors still etched on the minds of many but also an acknowledgement of the human spirits’ ability to triumph against the odds and registering tremendous achievements.
Given that the end of the Genocide meant that there was not a structure left standing, all institutions had been totally decimated.
The task of the new leadership was to oversee a nine year transition which included the drafting of a new constitution, revitalization of functioning government institutions coupled with a healing process.
That is why 15 years on, partnering with institutions such as the NDI, makes sense as these will help to further enhance the country’s desire for a workable democracy, something that eluded previous regimes.
Given that prior to the Genocide; Rwandans hardly tasted any form of democracy, languishing under the brutal oppression of previous regimes, whose governance was characterized by the Genocide ideology.
A new dawn is beckoning for Rwanda, brought about by the tireless leadership that is in place.
It is however, instructive for international bodies such as the NDI to understand that each country, will shape its institutions according to its history, and meaning that there is no model of governance based on ‘one size fits all’, it differs depending on a plethora of historical challenges a country’s leadership has to take on.
America has its own challenges related to governance and democracy and so will any other county. What is wrong is to force one’s value systems down the throats of others, based on the very unfair skewed relationship that characterizes our power relations, based especially on one party being more financially resourced.
That is why those wishing to help Rwanda further enhance her institutions of governance must do so with the due respect of the strenuous efforts taken by the current leadership to bring the country to where it is today – a beacon of peace and stability.
Source:
The New Times-Kigali
What a joke!
ReplyDeleteIn fact, the september 2008 elections were massively rigged. The RPF got slightly over 98% of the votes and that figure was brought down to some 78% to make it look less "Stalinist". This means in effect that the PL and PSD "received" their seats from the RPF
"there is no model of governance based on ‘one size fits all’, it differs depending on a plethora of historical challenges a country’s leadership has to take on".
ReplyDeleteI am still wondering how this Rwandan democracy based on a plethora of historical challenges would differ from the ones in Burundi and South Africa given the historical spiral of violence in these three countries.
RPF members should be aware that this plethora of historical challenges doesn't grant them imunity nor the right to infringe the universal principals of democracy.
As as there will be limitations to freedom of political activities, there will be no Democracy in Rwanda.
Here are some of these limitations:
1) All of the political parties are required to be part of the so-called "Forum for political parties”. That means that if these political parties want to be legally active, they must be members of this forum, which is funded by the Rwandan government, takes its decisions by consensus, and can interfere in the internal affairs of different political parties. This forum is a component of the RPF ruling party. It is chaired by the current Secretary General of the RPF party. This is why this political situation makes the Rwandan regime a de facto single party.
2)Rwandan political parties cannot freely operate throughout the country. The current regime has acted in such a way that political parties are not allowed to have structures at the local level. The worst I find in this situation is that there is no security for the opposition leaders. The former president Pasteur Bizimungu was jailed for years and then released without any explanation. He was arrested for the simple reason that he had tried to create a political party independent of the RPF. Additionally, one of the co-founders of that party, Charles Ntakirutinka, a former minister of public works, is still in prison. That means that any opportunity to legally challenge the RPF is peacefully prevented in Rwanda. There is also an example of the former secretary of state in economic planning, Charles Kabanda, who wanted to create a party just before the 2003 elections. It was the ADEP-Amizero, a party that has never been authorized. Apparently, the main reason was that the party was so seditious to the RPF power and that it would have really represented a strong political opposition to the current Rwandan regime.
3)The structures of the state security, including the police and the intelligence services are anti-democratic and cannot guarantee the safety of the opponents.
The main activity of the department of military intelligence (DMI), known as "crushing the opposition" is to "hunt down opponents' every where including abroad. For instance, the Rwandan secret services assassinated in Nairobi on May 16th, 1998 Seth Sendashonga, one of the founders of the Resistance Forces for Democracy (FRD), a component of the FDU. Therefore, under such conditions nobody can speak of democratic elections in Rwanda.
4) The electoral commission is chaired by a member of the Executive Committee of the RPF party, Chrysologue Karangwa. The commission obviously doesn't include members of any political party that is independent of the RPF party. There are nine political parties in Rwanda, including the RPF party. Six of them have candidates on the list of the RPF party and are in fact RPF party factions. The remaining two are the Liberal Party and the Social Democratic Party. The Liberal Party is chaired by a soldier of the Rwandan army, Protais Mitali, who, to my knowledge, has never stepped down from the army. In addition, since 1990, members of the Liberal Party have also been members of the RPF. With regard to the Social Democratic Party, the situation is quite the same. The party’s chairman, Vincent Biruta, is a member of the RPF since 1991 and the current chairman of the Senate. He pretends to be an opponent but in reality he is an active member of the RPF party.
5) The most serious limitation to freedom of political activities in Rwanda, which has nothing to do with the legislation or the exercise of of political party activities, is that most of the current Rwandan political and military figures are suspected of having committed crimes against humanity and war crimes. These crimes were committed in Rwanda and in the DRC. Some of these crimes were characterized as crimes against humanity, genocide, terrorist acts, and war crimes. People who have been victims of these crimes have no way to speak out for themselves. Imagine a situation where the leaders that prevented you from burying your deads in dignity come to you asking to vote for them! For this moment, I cannot talk about a new dawn of multi-party democratic process in Rwanda because simply it does not exist. During the apartheid era, the majority of South Africans could not vote. Unfortunately, it is quite the same in Rwanda. The only difference is that Paul Kagame still claims that there is no discrimination and that all Rwandans are treated equally. At the same time Paul Kagame makes every effort to silence any voice that try to raise awarness about the alarming ethnic discrimination in Rwanda.