Saturday marks the 25th anniversary of the Rwandan genocide, which kicked off following the April 6, 1994 downing of President Juvenal Habyarimana’s plane, and resulted in hundreds of thousands of deaths over a 100-day span as Hutu extremists and their supporters butchered people in the streets and carried out other massacres in the small East African country.
A lot has changed in Rwanda over the last 25 years, though just one man has been in power for the majority of that span. Rwandan President Paul Kagame was a rebel leader, or military commander, who led Hutu forces in their fight to put a stop to the genocide. Since formally rising to power in 2000, Kagame has overseen rapid development and economic growth, prompting some commentators to dub Rwanda, “The Singapore of Africa.”
Josh Friedman reports from outside the flashy new convention center in Kigali about Kagame’s rule, which has garnered notable praise, yet also criticism for authoritarian tendencies.