Rwandan president votes in election expected to hand him third term

Record ID: 905298

  • Title: Rwandan president votes in election expected to hand him third term
  • Date: 4th August 2017
  • Summary: KIGALI, RWANDA (AUGUST 4, 2017) (REUTERS) ***WARNING CONTAINS FLASH PHOTOGRAPHY*** REPORTERS WAITING INSIDE AND OUTSIDE POLLING STATION, RWANDAN PRESIDENT PAUL KAGAME WALKING INTO POLLING STATION KAGAME REGISTERING FOR VOTING KAGAME'S WIFE, JEANNETTE NYIRAMONGI KAGAME CASTING HER VOTE REPORTERS STANDING OUTSIDE POLLING STATION KAGAME CASTING HIS VOTE KAGAME TALKING TO ELECTORAL OFFICIAL KAGAME WALKING OUT OF POLLING STATION
  • Embargoed: 18th August 2017 13:00
  • Keywords: Rwandan presidential election Paul Kagame casting vote Rwandan president voting
  • Location: KIGALI, RWANDA
  • City: KIGALI, RWANDA
  • Country: Rwanda
  • Topics: Government/Politics,Elections/Voting
  • Reuters ID: LVA0016SQQX53
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: Rwandan President Paul Kagame cast his vote on Friday (August 4) in a presidential election expected to extend his 17 years in power.
    Kagame declined to speak to reporters waiting outside Kigali's Rugunga polling station, but the deputy head of the ruling Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) party expressed confidence of a win and said he did not see any reasons why Kagame, 59, would not stand for re-election in seven years' time.
    Kagame has won international plaudits for presiding over a peaceful and rapid economic recovery in the Central African nation since the 1994 genocide, when an estimated 800,000 people Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed.
    But he has also faced mounting censure for what critics and rights groups say are widespread human rights abuses, a muzzling of independent media and suppression of political opposition.
    Some dissidents were killed after they fled abroad, in cases that remain unsolved. The government denies any involvement and the cases appear to have done little to blunt Kagame's domestic standing among Rwanda's 12 million citizens.
    Kagame won the last election in 2010 with 93 percent of the vote and during this campaign for a further seven-year term, said he expected an outright victory.
    Kagame's main opponent, Frank Habineza, told reporters shortly after voting that his campaign had been hobbled because it could not compete with the machinery of the state.
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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