Rwanda’s President, Paul Kagame told a French TV channel he would stand for President again at the next election in 2024.
Mr. Kagame has already been in power for twenty years, and in 2015 the constitution was changed, allowing him to stay until 2034.
Five years ago, he won 99% of the vote, in Rwanda’s last election.
Many outside the country dismissed it as a sham.
Asked if he would seek re-election, Mr. Kagame, who is 64, said: “I would consider running for another 20 years. I have no problem with that. Elections are about people choosing.”
The BBC reports Human Rights Watch’s Central Africa Director Lewis Mudge responding to Kagame’s hint as a “surprise”.
“… Some people are indeed surprised,” he said.
“Rwanda is a country where it’s very, very dangerous to oppose the government, let alone to be a political opponent… and this authoritarian system is going to be the system for the foreseeable future,” he said.
Charles Kambanda, a prominent Rwandan academic who now lives in the US is reported as saying if Kagame stays for 20 more years he will ruin the country. “If he continues for another 20 years Rwanda will be real hell.”
Mr. Kambanda claims Rwandans already live in a climate of fear, and alleges that more than one minister has told him that they remain in government because they fear being assassinated if they leave.
President Kagame however has fiercely defended Rwanda’s record on human rights, most recently at a Commonwealth summit in the capital Kigali in June.
Months earlier, in April, the UK announced controversial plans to send some asylum seekers who reach its shores to Rwanda for processing and potential asylum there instead.
That was condemned by the UN who likened it to “trading commodities”, but the British Prime Minister’s office has vowed to press ahead with the policy despite Boris Johnson’s departure.
Mr. Kagame himself came to power in 1994 after his rebel forces helped end the genocide.
Since then he has positioned himself as a champion of development, but his critics say he maintains a tight grip over what is an authoritarian regime.