Rwanda's parliament to debate Kagame third term

Rwanda's parliament is to debate changing the country's constitution in order to allow President Paul Kagame to stand for a third consecutive term in elections in 2017, an official said.

The debate, set to take place over the next two months, was prompted by parliament being handed petitions signed by a total of two million people - or roughly 17 percent of the population - asking for the constitution to be changed, the head of the chamber, Donatilla Mukabalisa, said on Wednesday.

"We have received two million requests," she said, explaining that parliament has been receiving a number of what she insisted were spontaneous letters and petitions from individuals, groups or associations.

Rwanda's constitution does not allow for a third term so it would need to be modified.

Kagame, 57, has been at the top of Rwandan politics since 1994, when an offensive by his ethnic Tutsi rebel force, the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), put an end to a genocide by Hutu fighters that left an estimated 800,000 of his community dead.

He first served as minister of defence and vice president, and then took the presidency in 2003, winning 95 percent of the vote.

He was re-elected in 2010 for a second seven-year term with a similarly resounding mandate.

Rwandan officials have strongly denied that it is Kagame who is seeking a third term, insisting that there is popular demand for the president - hailed by his supporters as a guarantor of stability and economic development - to stay.