January 31, 2011
On Jan. 20, Rwanda’s High Court once again rejected the bail appeal of Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza, chair of Rwanda’s FDU-Inkingi coalition of opposition parties.
October 17, 2010
The Permanent Consultative Council of Opposition Parties in Rwanda is calling for the immediate and unconditional release of Ms. Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza and the release of all other political prisoners.
August 18, 2010
In January this year, Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza returned to her native Rwanda to run against incumbent Rwandan President Paul Kagame. Many observers believe that she would have been the leading candidate had she been able to officially enter the race.
July 25, 2010
For many Western observers – Tony Blair, Bill Clinton and Bill Gates among them – Rwanda’s economic growth is the foundation of its democratic transition. Yet, as Rwandans head to the polls next month to elect a president, Paul Kagame’s ruling Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) has perverted the very democratic ideals it claims to uphold.
July 21, 2010
In less than weeks, Rwandans will go to the polls to elect a president. The incumbent, Paul Kagame, head of the ruling Rwandan Patriotic Front, continues to exert total control over the country’s election process. “In 2010, the people will vote as we instruct them,” said an aide to the Minister of Local Government.
July 20, 2010
The bell tolls for the chains of the dictatorship. It is time for Rwandans to claim their inalienable rights, to refuse the abject feeling of being despised. Our response to sham elections is a non-violent resistance to challenge the legitimacy of the looming masquerade and its subsequent results.
July 14, 2010
First Vice President Andre Kagwa Rwisereka of the Democratic Green Party of Rwanda was found dead, his head almost completely severed from his body, near Butare, Rwanda, on the morning of July 14. All three viable opposition parties, including the Greens, have been excluded from the country’s 2010 presidential election, with polls now scheduled for Aug. 9.
July 2, 2010
Rwandan opposition leaders Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza and Frank Habineza report ongoing torture of opposition party members arrested in Kigali on June 24, 2010, as they attempted to protest exclusion from this year’s presidential election. Ingabire also reports that her Rwandan lawyer, Mr. Theogene Muhayeyezu, has been arrested, tortured and detained incommunicado.
April 27, 2010
On Monday, April 26, police detectives in Kigali, Rwanda, interrogated Didas Gasana, editor of the weekly African language newspaper Umuseso for eight hours. Gasana now fears extrajudicial abduction or a prison sentence of up to 25 years.
April 16, 2010
Godwin Agaba, Rwandan correspondent for the African Great Lakes regional outlet 256.com, is now in hiding, though still reporting. This week Godwin Agaba confirmed that Rwanda’s presidential election is effectively closed; all the viable opposition has been excluded.