President Paul Kagame has voiced concern over the growing number of young couples separating in Rwanda, questioning how marriages collapse so quickly despite family and societal support.
The President raised the issue on Sunday, January 1, 2026, while addressing participants at the National Prayer Breakfast held at the Kigali Convention Centre, where religious leaders, government officials and other stakeholders gathered to pray for the nation.
Kagame said he finds it difficult to understand how two people who freely choose to marry later fail to live together and tolerate one another, even when challenges arise.
“Children get married, their parents support them, even help them build homes and share what they have. How can two people fail to live together? Many people can live together—but just two? People are meant to tolerate and understand each other,” he said.
The President urged parents to take more time to engage their children on critical life issues, particularly marriage and family life, describing strong families as the backbone of a stable and prosperous nation.
He also cited a recent account he read highlighting the scale of the problem, in which an individual attended three weddings of young couples at the same time, only for all of them to separate within a year.
“He said he attended three weddings at once, and before a year passed, all those couples had separated. And when he said three, it could as well have been thirty,” Kagame noted.
President Kagame stressed that while mistakes and disagreements are inevitable in marriage, separation should not be the first option. Instead, he called on couples to face challenges through open dialogue and mutual understanding.
“Even when something goes wrong, couples should look each other in the face, talk, and agree that what happened will not happen again,” he said.
Addressing young people who choose to separate, the President challenged the assumption that life elsewhere would be easier.
“When you leave, where do you go? Do you think you will find a place without problems? Chances are you will find even worse challenges than the ones you left behind,” he said.
Kagame warned that the breakdown of families has far-reaching consequences beyond the household, affecting social cohesion and national development. He argued that many marital challenges are manageable if couples learn patience, resilience and compromise.
He called on religious leaders to play a more active role in addressing the issue by offering teachings that strengthen individuals and promote stable families, noting that peace and unity at the national level begin at home.
The President also linked family stability to personal growth, saying individuals must learn to endure and manage difficulties as a pathway to progress and improved well-being.
Judiciary statistics show that 2,674 divorce-related cases were handled during the 2024/2025 judicial year, slightly down from 2,833 cases recorded in the previous year—figures that continue to raise concern about the stability of young marriages in the country.
