www.africa-confidential.com 29 August 2003 Vol 44 No 17 AFRICA CONFIDENTIAL RWANDA 2 RWANDA Tightening budgets Western aid is likely to be more A victory foretold conditional as international Kagame defeats ethnic arithmetic in the first presidential poll since concern about authoritarianism the genocide of 1994 and human rights abuses General Paul Kagame was right when, a few days before the presidential election on 25 August, he told increases. Africa Confidential: ‘Most likely I am going to win. RPF is going to win.’ The big question is what he does with his landslide victory, amounting to 95 per cent of the votes cast (turnout was over 80 per cent). MOROCCO 3 He says the resulting ‘increased legitimacy’ would give the ruling Front Patriotique Rwandais ‘more confidence’ – something it has not seemed in need of. Abroad, the result will not deflect mounting Basri’s heirs criticism of the FPR’s authoritarianism at home and continued meddling in Congo-Kinshasa. A new younger security line up has Not a natural campaigner, Kagame made wooden attempts at populism, awkwardly leading election emerged to tackle the challenge rallies in party chants and swapping military fatigues and sober suits for baseball caps, polo shirts and posed by growing Islamist activity. designer tie-dye shirts fresh from the packet. With regimental efficiency, his campaigners distributed Political parties are still dominated Kagame umbrellas, tee-shirts and hats, and his beaming portrait gazed down from election posters across by ageing leaders, but the power of the old Fes-based establishment the country. ‘I think that it’s going to be pleasant to get a feeling that the majority of the people of this is waning. country support our leadership, support what RPF has ushered in,’ he enthused. The electoral triumph has defeated the ethnic arithmetic which argued that Kagame’s Tutsi, with 13 per cent of the population, could not win mass support from the Hutu 85 per cent without widespread fraud NIGERIA 4 and intimidation. The result may be sweeter still since Kagame rejected the advice of his former ally, Mob rule President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda, to abjure multi-party politics in favour of a Ugandan-style no- party system. Plenty of election irregularities and a heavily skewed playing field were not enough to Mafia-style politics from Anambra discredit Kagame’s landslide. A relentless cycle of election songs in Kinyarwanda from a local rap band State make for a cracking yarn, but boomed through megaphones in marketplaces. Rallies of tens of thousands, many of them bussed in for are a sad reflection on the methods of recently reelected President the event, waved FPR flags. Many voters, it seems, voted for security and knew little or nothing about Olusegun Obasanjo’s government. rival candidates. The party (or state) coffers overwhelmed the rivals. Intimidating statistics SOUTH AFRICA 5 Many find the FPR’s record impressive, too. The restoration of security in most of Rwanda after the Busy bees genocide of more than 700,000 Tutsi and moderate Hutu in 1994 is the dominant achievement upon which the regime’s political and economic strategy has been built. For those without contentious political views, The Oppenheimer mining dynasty Kigali is one of Africa’s safest cities. has entered the debate on black Economic success overshadows political gripes. Since the FPR took power in 1994, real gross economic empowerment with its own set of proposals for the white- domestic product has doubled, according to Finance Minister Donald Kaberuka, and it rose by 9.4 per dominated private sector. The cent last year. Rwanda has soared away from the poorest states on the United Nations’ development government, too, is keen to ensure ratings, ranking 158th last year, ahead of Nigeria. Britain’s Department for International Development, that its empowerment initiatives Kigali’s staunchest foreign ally, says Rwanda will achieve the UN’s millennium development goals by enrich more than just the elite. 2015 in areas such as primary education. Most universities closed in 1994; new ones are opening. One FPR official called the party’s election strategy ‘measured democracy’. The new constitution, GAMBIA 7 voted in by referendum, and the state-controlled election commission, set down strict rules against exploiting ethnic sentiment. Several supporters of Kagame’s main challenger, Hutu leader Faustin Friends new and old Twagiramungu, were arrested and accused of breaching them. President Yahya Jammeh’s ties to Poor farmers in the north-west said they hadn’t seen a Twagiramungu poster and weren’t sure what he former Liberian leader Charles looked like. His campaign material, including 20,000 leaflets setting out his manifesto, was held at Taylor seem to have escaped customs. British-based Amnesty International was highly critical, reporting that his former party, the scrutiny as relations warm between Mouvement Démocratique Républicain, was banned this year (AC Vol 44 No 12). Twagiramungu’s new Banjul and conservatives in political group, the Alliance pour la Démocratie, l’Equité et le Progrès-Mizero (ADEP-Mizero, which Washington. means ‘hope’ in Kinyarwanda) was denied legal status because of its foreign funding; its leaders were called in daily for police questioning and some are said to have had their passports seized. The other two POINTERS 8 presidential candidates, Jean-Nepomuscene Nayinzira and Alivera Mukabaramba, were also intimidated, said Amnesty. Sudan, Côte d’Ivoire, Critics accuse Western states (which, writhing in guilt over their inaction during the 1994 genocide, Congo-K/Uruguay & provide about 70 per cent of Rwanda’s aid) of selective indignation on election malpractice: Rwanda Congo-K/Morocco good, Zimbabwe bad. France, Belgium and the United States want credits from the World Bank and 29 August 2003 Africa Confidential Vol 44 No 17 Winning hearts and budgets Doubts about President Paul Kagame’s landslide election victory are travelling with the Foreign Minister: a glimmer of hope for Kagame’s unlikely to bring a fall in Western aid to Kigali but funding will come under opponents that will not affect the Netherlands’ longer term aid to Rwanda. heavier scrutiny as concern grows about authoritarianism and human rights French and Belgian policy remains resolutely sceptical, if not actively abuses. The biggest concern remains Rwanda’s operations – overt and hostile, towards Rwanda. Some in the Quai d’Orsay worry that a policy covert – in neighbouring Congo-Kinshasa. of ‘containing’ Rwanda’s regional ambitions might become too successful General Kagame got on well with United States President George W. and prompt the ultra-martial faction in Kigali to oust the fragile power- Bush in Washington in March, thanks to the Rwandan leader’s diplomatic sharing government in Kinshasa. French Foreign Minister Dominique de skills and strong endorsement from National Security Council Africa Villepin and his British counterpart Jack Straw are due in Kigali and Director Jendayi Frazer. But Assistant Secretary of State for African Kinshasa next month to endorse the new order there and warn Rwanda Affairs Walter J. Kansteiner, sceptical on Kagame, wasn’t informed of against more adventures in Congo. the visit. A strong letter advising Kagame to set up an inquiry into Rwandan Even if the Foreign and Commonwealth Office has doubts, Britain’s looting in Congo and asking about the whereabouts of ‘disappeared’ Department for International Development remains Rwanda’s staunchest oppositionists has been sent from Kansteiner’s State Department. foreign ally. Development Minister Baroness Valerie Amos, visiting US Ambassador to Kinshasa Aubrey Hooks, close to William Swing Kigali in July, offered funding for the presidential and parliamentary (the United Nations Secretary General’s Special Representative in Congo), elections (unlike the European Union) and pledged continuing strong is also sceptical about Kigali. So far, US diplomats have done little more budgetary support. DfID officials say in reports to Whitehall they list than abstain on votes for credits to Rwanda at the World Bank and security as a component of this. International Monetary Fund. If Rwanda overtly sent its troops back into If defence was soaking up 20 per cent of government spending, a DfID Congo, that would almost certainly prompt a US ‘no’ vote on future loans. official said, that was ‘factored in’ (Finance Minister Donald Kaberuka During a pre-election visit to Kigali, Netherlands’ Foreign Minister insists just 3 per cent goes to defence). DfID says it doesn’t ‘pretend that Jaap de Hoop Scheffer made much of his decision to withhold 250,000 it all goes to education’ but it sees defence (and security reform) as vital euros (US$272,000) because of human rights and accountability concerns. to development. So it’s unperturbed by Kigali’s acquisition of 32 T-54 But the move, announced after what appeared to have been an otherwise tanks via Israel, which were sent north towards the Ugandan border affable meeting with Kagame, appears to have been aimed at Dutch earlier this year. The tanks, DfID says, were funded openly from the opinion. The new tough line was relayed by the 20 Dutch journalists Defence Ministry budget. International Monetary Fund to be conditional on Rwanda ending its to be demonised for what I have been and what I did.’ Congo operations but care less about its internal politics. The FPR’s tactics may strengthen Hutu extremists at the expense of moderates such as Twagiramungu. There is a lengthening list of Hutu, A monopolised landscape untarnished by genocide, who have disappeared or fled into exile. Twagiramungu says he will not recognise a Kagame victory. Five senior figures have disappeared this year, including Lieutenant Interviewed just before the elections, he seemed a beaten man. ‘I don’t Colonel XC Cyiza, a former Vice-President of the Supreme Court, have umbrellas, I don’t have hats and I don’t have buses,’ he complained.