The efficiency of a President at the beginning of his term depends on their capacity to get everything under control. That was my case. But once the institutions have been put in place, and the responsibilities delegated, the leader becomes a reference, a referee, a symbol and unifying figure for the nation. The issue is how and when to recognize the moment when staying in power becomes counterproductive.

My purpose is to develop a country, to empower its population. It's from that same population that will emerge the man or woman who will succeed me. And they will be chosen based on the consensus that they have the capacity to lead the country.

Rwanda is rebuilding itself once again as one nation and that is the reason why we are making progress. Now many Rwandans are making their ends meet and others are able to do better than they have before.

I know that the fact that I am candidate to my own succession in 2017 can be perceived to be a bad thing by some part of the public opinion outside Rwanda and I don't mind because I know that I am doing it for a good cause. It really doesn't matter to me that my name is associated to those critics as long as I know that I am doing the will of the people.

National security is vital for economic and social progress.

Aid makes itself superfluous if it is working well. Good aid takes care to provide functioning structures and good training that enables the recipient country to later get by without foreign aid. Otherwise, it is bad aid.

Rwanda is not over needing aid, but we can survive with less aid than before.