As Paul Kagame went to Nyamasheke District on Saturday, June 29, the seventh day of his election campaign trail, local residents said they want the incumbent President and RPF-Inkotanyi candidate to stay longer and spearhead Rwanda’s development.
RPF supporters, who spoke to The New Times ahead of Kagame’s arrival at the Nyamasheke campaign site, recognized the achievement recorded during his previous terms as president.
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"Kagame has done a lot of good things for us; I can’t exhaust them all,” Theresie Mukamuhirwa, a resident of Nyabitekeri Sector, said as she joined the thousands of enthusiastic RPF supporters gathered at the site. "He gave us cows and milk. All we can ask him is the construction of Bushenge-Ntango road.”
Mukamuhirwa said she couldn’t wait to vote for Kagame in the July 15 elections.
For Patrice Nkurunziza, a resident of Bushenge Sector, attending the campaign rally in Nyamasheke was nothing short of a celebration of the what Kagame has achieved as President of Rwanda. "All we can do is pray for him to live longer and continue to lead Rwanda.”
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Elysee Cyubahiro, another Nyamasheke resident, said Kagame is "a parent who cares for the youth.”
"We were able to attend school because of him. He also built playgrounds for us, which I appreciate as a football player,” Cyubahiro said, adding that in the next five-year term, Kagame should to invest more in the development of talents of the youngsters living in rural areas.
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Nyamasheke is the ninth stop of Kagame’s campaign trail which he launched on June 22.
He has held rallies in Musanze, Rubavu, Ngororero, Muhanga, Nyarugenge, Huye, Nyamagabe and Rusizi. At each of the rallies the candidate of the RPF and its allied parties attracted hundreds of thousands of supporters.
In the July elections, Kagame will face Frank Habineza of the Democratic Green Party of Rwanda and Philippe Mpayimana, an independent.
The three candidates are competing for the Presidency for the second time. In the 2017 elections, Kagame won by a landslide, garnering over 98 per cent of the votes.