Rwanda’s Paul Kagame – visionary or tyrant?

“He has pursued it with single-minded determination… and deals ruthlessly with his adversaries,” Mr Wallis explains.

Rwanda was in ruins when Mr Kagame’s RPF took power after the genocide but its economy is now growing at an average of 7% a year, and poverty levels have fallen.

Under Mr Kagame’s rule, Rwanda opened its first maize flour factory, improved its road network, established a national airline, is building a new $800m (£605m) international airport and plans to boost its status as a business hub with a conference centre that will cost at least $300m.

“Kagame is known as a doer and an implementer, not somebody who says things just like everyone else,” UK charity Oxfam’s Desire Assogbavi told AFP news agency.

As for his African peers, most of them appear to hold him in high regard, as he has been given the task of spearheading efforts to reform the African Union.

“Without an African Union that delivers, the continent cannot progress, and we face the likelihood of yet another decade of lost opportunity,” Mr Kagame said in a report, external tabled at a meeting of African leaders in January.

“Tens of thousands of young African bodies have been swallowed by the sea or abandoned in the desert, in pursuit of a decent life for which they are prepared to risk everything, because they believe there is no hope at home. They testify to the urgent need to act,” he added.

As far as Mr Kagame’s allies are concerned, his reputation as a visionary and a doer will guarantee him a landslide in Rwanda’s elections.

But for his critics, he is among Africa’s most repressive leaders, and has dashed hopes of turning Rwanda into a democracy that all its citizens can be proud of.