What 30 years of Rwanda’s Tutsi minority-led government in power says about ethnic representation

Thirty years ago, the Rwandan Patriotic Front, a predominantly Tutsi armed group, took over Kigali, Rwanda’s capital city – and soon after, the country’s governance. This victory occurred amid a horrific genocide masterminded by a Hutu-dominated regime. Rwanda’s main ethnic groups are the Hutu, who make up a majority of the population, and the Tutsi.

Since 1994, the Rwandan Patriotic Front – led by Paul Kagame, who was first elected president in April 2000 – has been at the country’s helm. Kagame is expected to extend his rule in the July 2024 elections. The law allows him to serve two more five-year terms.

We are researchers who study political representation in post-conflict contexts. We recently sought to understand to what extent Rwanda has managed to overcome the fault lines that got it to a dark place in 1994. In recent research, we looked at how the country has fared in managing the fissures in society that led to the violence.

Our findings show that the country’s Hutu majority have over time reported feeling more represented by government. This is despite it being largely made up of a Tutsi ruling elite.

What has made the ruling elite legitimate among the Hutu?

We found that the Kagame regime has rolled out policies that seek to improve state-citizen relations and highlight the state’s capacity to deliver. The...

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