Davos, 22 January 2012

President Kagame is expected to arrive in Davos, Switzerland today to attend the three day World Economic Forum held under the theme, “Resilient Dynamism.”

A regular participant at the World Economic Forum, President Kagame will be attending a variety of panels with topics including Africa's economic growth as well as the largely untapped potential for agriculture investment.

On Thursday, January 24th, President Kagame will be a panelist in a session entitled “Challenges and Transformation shaping Leadership Context in Africa. On that same day, President Kagame will join African Heads of State and Government including Ali Bongo of Gabon, Hailemariam Desalgn of Ethiopia, Jakaya Kikwete of Tanzania, Jacob Zuma of South Africa and Raila Odinga of Kenya in an interactive discussion entitled “Africa's Promise: How can Africa's leaders deliver on the continent promise" moderated by African Development Bank President, Donald Kaberuka.

Addis Ababa, 1 September 2012

President Kagame has sent a message of condolence to the Government and people of the Federal Republic of Ethiopia, as well as the family of Prime Minister Meles Zenawi who passed away on Tuesday. President Kagame described Prime Minister Zenawi as "a visionary and gallant leader with a genuine concern for the socio-economical transformation of Ethiopia, and Africa as a whole – with a commitment for Africa’s rightful place in the world." President Kagame said Rwanda was deeply appreciative of Prime Minister Zenawi's exceptional friendship and continued partnership over the years, and expressed solidarity with Ethiopia during this period.

London, July 12, 2012,

Zeinab Badawi: Welcome to HARDtalk with me, Zainab Badawi. Is Rwandan President Paul Kagame in danger of losing international community’s goodwill for a country still haunted by the ghosts of Genocide?

Paul Kagame has been President since 2000 and is not due to leave office until 2017. He’s being accused of autocratic behaviour, of being unrealistic about the prospects for the economic transformation of Rwanda and, perhaps most damagingly, a recent UN interim report claims the Rwandan government is breaking UN sanctions by backing rebels in the neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo by supplying arms and forces. My guest today on HARDtalk is President Kagame of Rwanda. Can he reclaim his reputation as a bold and visionary leader or is he destined to go down as another African strong man who failed to live up to expectations?

Zeinab Badawi: President Paul Kagame welcome to HARDtalk.

President Kagame: Thank you.

Zeinab Badawi: You have been credited with trying to reunite a divided country, make it more prosperous after the genocide of 1994. But truly you are now in danger of squandering the international community’s goodwill, aren't you?

President Kagame: No. It doesn't make sense because there is nothing that suggests that on the ground, as a matter of fact, that there’s any danger as to what Rwanda looks like or President Kagame looks like. The facts on the ground speak for themselves. I don't see where this story comes from.

Kigali, 19 June 2012

Gaaki Kigambo, The East African Newspaper: Your Excellency, yesterday you acknowledged that Gacaca Courts, successful as they might have been, have imperfections. What are the imperfections and what measures has Government put in place to address them?

President KAGAME: It was put clearly yesterday, the success of the process and how the court performed and the impact. This is in relation to the results measured according to quality and how this resulted in our country benefiting from stability and how our people were able to overcome their past, accepted to listen, speak and agree on many things in their mutual interest. Gacaca brought together communities and our society at large through exchange of ideas; victims and perpetrators together moving forward. The imperfections acknowledged arise out of saying that this process was built on certain traditions and values that were applied a few centuries ago and being applied in modern times. There was a clash that made people think that this could not work. But we discovered that the modern systems and institutions have even more imperfections when it comes to dealing with situations which why we went back to old traditions. If we are talking about imperfections, you realise that we have imperfections in both systems, so you have to choose what works for you. We chose Gacaca because of all solutions; nothing else was going to work for us. We chose a system that had imperfections but could give us the results we wanted rather than one with imperfections and could give us less results, which is why I made the comparison between Gacaca and the ICTR.

12 June 2010

Rwanda's Kagame: 'It takes a lot of time, it takes a lot of effort'

Books have been written about it, films have been made about it: Rwanda is best known for a genocide that claimed more than half a million lives in 1994.

But in the ensuing years, quiet changes have taken place there. So much so that "The Economist" magazine now asks: is Rwanda "Africa's Singapore?" The World Bank ranks it 45th in the world for ease of doing business, higher than any African country barring South Africa and Mauritius. And Transparency International says it is less corrupt than Greece or Italy.

Kigali, May 2012

As the President of a small poor country whose economic and social progress is indisputable, the Head of State elaborates on his concept of good governance, and reveals the two sides of him: both democratic and authoritarian.

Power has not made Paul Kagame any heavier, literally and figuratively. One morning in the Eastern Province, a hundred kilometres from Kigali, in front of 50,000 people who descended from all the surrounding hills to attend his meeting, the President dressed in black jeans and blue shirt keenly listens to the voice of the people. Behind a microphone, a crowd of ordinary Rwandans form a procession to ask him questions: issues of cows, land, compensation, minor conflicts with the administration, lyrical poems chanted in Kinyarwanda, poorly healed wounds of the genocide ... Kagame responds when he does not call the Mayor, the deputy, Madame the Governor or the Minister concerned to answer in his place.

The latter do not seem at ease, as the boss demands that they be concise, clear and convincing. At 54, the man Time magazine ranks among the hundred most influential people in the world and American universities are competing to invite for their inaugural lectures, whose eldest son is studying at West Point Military Academy and whose only hobbies are tennis and reading books on development economics, continues, twelve years after his accession to the presidency, to lead Rwanda Inc. as a mwalimu - ateacher, in Swahili - leads a class where each student is seated in front of a computer. Here everything is calm, order, vigilance. No noisy music to be heard from ngandas as in neighbouring DR Congo, no screaming people drunk with beer or banana wine, everyone is at home, quiet and busy working to an unreasonable degree.

Kigali, 20 March 2012

President Kagame arrives in Istanbul, Turkey on Wednesday at the invitation of members of the Turkish business community.

During the three-day working visit President Kagame will meet with prominent Turkish business people, including several investors who have already been to Rwanda. President Kagame is also scheduled to tour manufacturing companies in Istanbul.

On Friday President Kagame will receive an honorary doctorate from Fatih University in recognition for his leadership in Rwanda as well as his contribution within the international community.

Turkey and Rwanda enjoy cordial relations and the country is represented in Rwanda through its Embassy in Uganda. Rwanda is represented in Turkey since 2009 by an Honorary Consul, and as of September 2011, has a full-fledged Honorary Consulate and an office of the Rwanda Development Board, both in Istanbul.