Resignations said to hold danger for Tutsi elite

The recent resignations of former president Pasteur Bizimungu and former Prime Minister Pierre-Celestin Rwigema reflected a policy of suppression by the Rwandese Patriotic Front (RPF) of moderate Hutus within the government, and was likely to reinforce opposition to it, according to an assessment of the political situation by 'Oxford Analytica' on Thursday.
The resignations reflected "serious rifts" between Tutsis and moderate Hutus within the government, the report stated. "There is no legal framework for moderate Hutu to oppose the RPF. Hutu opposition, divorced from both extremist groups and the RPF, is being systematically marginalised," it added. Yet, unless a democratic, power-sharing arrangement could be worked out between the Ugandan Tutsi-led elements within the government and moderate Hutus, the small electoral base of the
RPF within Rwanda would mean that acting president Paul Kagame and the Tutsi elites risked losing power in the long term through the ballot box, 'Oxford Analytica' stated.