The year 2017, seems to be drawing lots of anxiety from Rwandese as well as our friends and the country’s stakeholders alike. This is the year His Excellency President Kagame’s second term ends.

And although he has made it clear that he will not seek an extension of his term, the recent RPF top cadre meeting held on Friday 8th February, has but thrown the debate into the air.

Going by the contributions of most cadre members present in that meeting, it is really one of the most intriguing political home work we have ever faced as a country.

A political home work given to RPF top brass by the party Chairman, and one who understands better than most, that the change we need in our country, must ensure STABILITY, and CONTINUITY.

One can add on CERTAINTY. The President is the architect of our present hopeful Rwanda, and, like many other Rwandans, was a victim of our tragic past.

He, like most of Rwandans knows the two extremes of our nation which invokes emotions that only Rwandans understand, as they faced it squarely and will face it as such, if this home work is not done with sobriety.

Political Change

However, unlike political changes that occur in other African countries, Rwanda’s political panorama must be viewed in its unique context. Present and past contexts. Losing sight of either contexts makes change any other change or at the very least change of guards.

Far from it! Such straight jacket mindset typical of simplistic advocates of change, sometimes sponsored by beneficiaries of chaotic changes (and they are many) is one we must avoid no matter the cost (our account is overdrawn anyway).

Change is not an end in self. For us it is a means to end that is too dear to gamble with.

The RPF meeting deliberations drew from achievements of President Kagame, which to all of us who either have participated in the same; albeit in a small way, or other compatriots in general, is certainly a miracle.

None of us expected a written off country in 1994, and a total failed state for that matter, to be a beacon of hope today, and a point of reference to most not least development economists who view our development as unprecedented in the history of Africa, if not in the world.

Economy

That the economy which had shrunk beyond measure can rebound this much this far in a span of 18 years, is by no means a miracle in itself.

Available statistics indicate that, our GDP (the best available measure of a country’s wealth) has increased in aggregate by 800% since 1995.

A record growth by any account, for no country in economic history has attained this economic feat.

That is also true to other sectors of the economy, from defense (security), to health, education, to agriculture, commerce, to finance, Infrastructure, name it, have all grown to unimaginable measures that testifies to underlying causation. Which is the exemplary leadership by President Kagame. Period!.

It is this leadership that has defined who were are as a country and for which every Rwandan is proud of. Even the skeptics (they exist in every system) acknowledge this transformational leadership by Present Kagame, a leadership that arouses lots of anxiety and uncertainty among all stakeholders as they move towards 2017.

Nonetheless, if one factors all impediments to economic development of Africa’s post colonial states, leadership stands out as the critical factor, and one that other nations (especially East Asia) that lagged behind in 1950s/60 used to surpass our development.

Thus for instance, SSA (Sub-Saharan Africa) took off at the same time and indeed pace as East Asian economies (all after their independence in late 1950s and early 1960s).

A major question arises as to why such growth episodes ended much earlier for SSA (not sustained) than in East Asia. Indeed researchers such as Easterly and Levine (1997) who have conducted extensive research on development note that, in the 1960s African economies were predicted to grow faster than East Asia , by many if not all development economists, given their abundant resource endowment, but this was not to be.

Many African policy makers and indeed some academics in SSA have for some time now attributed Africa’s tragic/crisis of proportions in her past development to post colonial legacy especially the so called neo-colonial manipulation of western powers that be. Yet East Asia had a similar historical environment which negates this argument.

Governance

However, recent empirical evidence suggests that, failure of African nation state holds clues to her dismal performance over the past three decades.

The same research points out that; this is underpinned by poor governance ( read leadership) that has been witnesses in these countries over this period.

A leadership that ranged from extremes of military dictatorships to tyranny; all of which undermined any development Endeavours.

It is also pointed out that, countries that fared better had good leaders, but changes that happened after they left office were not for better and in most cases gains made were fundamentally reversed.

Stability and Sustainability

The new thinking and one which is pertinent to the political home work for Rwandans is: can we have change with stability and sustainability? Its is a difficulty home work given our environment which is too unique to compare with other African nation states.

As pointed out earlier, the country has registered incredible gains in all sector and these have to be, not only sustained, but also scaled up to another level for betterment of our people’s welfare.

The problem is; a change in the equation (change- with – stability and – sustainability) has a higher probability of changing the whole equation for better as it can possibly be for worse.

Numerous examples abound on our continent and elsewhere which is why our change has aroused lots of emotions, anxiety and rhetoric, a combination of which makes the political home work even extremely difficult.

The uncertainty and thus anxiety underlying the change is premised in not only on the possible losses to the gains our current leadership under President Kagame have registered, but also fears of sliding back into our past.

A past that is so horrific and traumatic that no Rwandan would want imagine later on face.

Our past history has been characterized by serious sectarian leadership that, no other post independence African nation witnessed, so much so that the loss more than 1 million of our compatriots in 1994 genocide epitomized the kind of leadership we had in our a country at the time.

This is a permanent and indelible scar on our conscious as a people and a country, that will among other things be factored in all decisions of building a country void of this horrific past.

This past when factored into the equation change-stability-sustainability makes the out comes very scarily for most Rwandans that have a historical memory of our tragic past. A past that no Rwandan would imagine changing to.

To be continued…