A few weeks before a summit between the European Union and the African Union in Brussels (February 17 and 18), the President of Rwanda Paul Kagame spoke out on topics that will be the subject of discussions during This meeting. For the Rwandan leader, the recurrence of putsches in Africa is “the fruit of bad governance”.
“It is, to some extent, the result of a failure in governance. It is not just the fault of the military, civilians also have a responsibility. Admittedly, the role of the military is not to carry out this kind of action, but we cannot ignore that, in some cases, civilians also commit questionable acts,” said the Rwandan Head of State in an exclusive interview with Jeune Afrique.
“If, under a civilian government, the situation deteriorates and people die, the problems accumulate and the authorities use the military to rig the elections, who is to blame when the army overthrows these governments? I find it inappropriate to only criticize the military and not blame the civilians who used them to hold on to power. I imagine that it is from this kind of analysis that some say that there are good and bad coups d’etat, “insisted Paul Kagame.
This statement by the Rwandan president, who is also a former military leader , comes a few days after the coup against the regime of Roch Christian Kaboré in Burkina Faso. The soldiers gathered within the MPSR, headed by Colonel Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba, put an end to Mr. Kaboré’s functions.
Source: Jeune Afrique