Rwanda’s President Kagame re-elected with 99.18% of vote, full provisional results show

Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame looks set to be re-elected for a fourth term after full provisional results released Thursday showed he received 99.18% of the vote.

The outcome of Monday’s presidential election was never in doubt, with only two other candidates — Democratic Green Party leader Frank Habineza and independent candidate Philippe Mpayimana — allowed to stand.

They took just 0.37% of the vote in total, according to the National Electoral Commission.

Human rights groups have criticized Rwanda’s elections as neither free nor fair, but Kagame’s staying power may also be based on his ability to provide stability in a country where the legacy of genocide still looms large, a professor of international politics argued in The Conversation. For the so-called “Kagame Generation” — twenty-something Rwandans who have known no other leader — the idea of voting for anyone else remains “inconceivable,” New Lines Magazine reported.