Kagame’s Team In New York Steps Up: The Aggressive Ground Game to Save Mushikiwabo’s OIF Seat

The high-stakes world of multilateral diplomacy is currently playing out in the corridors of the
United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in New York, and Rwanda has deployed its
absolute heavy hitters.

While President Paul Kagame is absent from the UN floor, his proxy machine is working
overtime. Led by newly minted Prime Minister Justin Nsengiyumva, Rwanda’s diplomatic
core has launched a highly coordinated, aggressive ground campaign to lock down an
unprecedented third term for Louise Mushikiwabo, the incumbent Secretary-General of the
International Organization of La Francophonie (OIF).

The New York Blitz

Multilateral elections are won on the margins of large global gatherings, and Rwanda knows
it. This week, Prime Minister Nsengiyumva hosted a major high-level reception in New York
specifically to honor Mushikiwabo and pitch her platform directly to voting Francophonie
member states.

The message being pounded into the ears of delegates is simple: continuity and deep reform.
Rwanda's team is aggressively marketing Mushikiwabo’s eight-year track record, highlighting
her sweeping financial, administrative, and institutional overhauls of the OIF. By
emphasizing her focus on youth employment, women's economic empowerment, and
digital education, Kigali is trying to frame her as an indispensable, stabilizing force during a
period of intense global instability.

Why the Panic? Breaking 56 Years of Tradition

If Mushikiwabo’s record is so strong, why is Kigali campaigning with such aggressive
urgency? Because the rules of the game have fundamentally changed, and her seat is no
longer guaranteed.

For the first time in the OIF's 56-year history, the traditional "art of compromise"—where a
single candidate is quietly agreed upon behind closed doors—has been dismantled. It has
been replaced by a transparent, democratic, one-country, one-vote process. Worse for
Kigali, Mushikiwabo faces a heavily politicized battlefield against three major challengers:

• Juliana Lumumba (Democratic Republic of Congo)

• Coumba Ba (Mauritania)

• Dacian Cioloș (Romania)

The challenge from the DRC's Juliana Lumumba carries massive geopolitical weight,
effectively dragging the bitter regional tensions between Kinshasa and Kigali onto the global
stage.

The Bottom Line

Kagame has historically used leadership positions in global bodies to elevate Rwanda's
brand and exercise soft power. Losing the OIF seat would be a massive blow to Kigali’s
international prestige.

By pulling out all the diplomatic stops in New York this week, "Kagame’s Team" is making it
clear they are treating the upcoming vote at the 20th Francophonie Summit this November
in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, as a must-win battle. While Mushikiwabo remains the
frontrunner, the open-voting format means Rwanda cannot afford to take a single ballot for
granted.