Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates/Paul Kagame/archive1

Resolved comments from Cryptic C62

• "the minority Tutsi were ... while the majority Hutu were ... The third group, the Twa, are" Inconsistent tense.

• This is because currently the Hutu and Tutsi ethnic groups officially don't exist anymore, but the status of the Twa is more or less unofficially acknowledged (representation in parliament etc). Lemurbaby (talk) 04:26, 21 May 2013 (UTC)

  Done the easiest way round this is just to make the Twa part past tense as well; this doesn't have to imply that any or all of the groups do or don't exist today, and makes it consistent with the rest of the paragraph dealing with the situation at the time of Kagame's birth.  — Amakuru (talk) 12:42, 24 May 2013 (UTC)

• "He was initially hosted by family members of Rwandan classmates in Uganda" I had to read this a few times to understand what it meant. Here's a simpler phrasing that still gives the same idea: "He was initially hosted by family members of his former classmates"

  Done  — Amakuru (talk) 12:22, 21 May 2013 (UTC)

• "trained him in espionage and information collection." This seems a bit redundant to me. Isn't the purpose of espionage to collect information?

  Done - I've remove information collection.  — Amakuru (talk) 12:22, 21 May 2013 (UTC)

• Throughout Military Career I see some repetitive word usage. There are plenty of appropriate substitutes for "aim" in this context.
  • "aimed to overthrow the government"
  • "aiming to protect the new Ugandan regime"
  • "The army's aim"
  • "aiming primarily to ease conditions"
  • "aiming to link up quickly"
  • "aimed to encircle the cities"

  Done - removed all but one occurrence of "aim" from 'Military Career' and reworded accordingly.  — Amakuru (talk) 12:22, 21 May 2013 (UTC)

• "the change caused them to accelerate their plans to invade Rwanda." but then two sentences later, "Rwigyema ... began to plan the invasion." How could they have accelerated the plans that they hadn't begun planning yet?

  Done yeah, I guess it was more like finalising them. Wording changed.  — Amakuru (talk) 12:37, 21 May 2013 (UTC)

• I am somewhat concerned by the first paragraph of Rwandan Civil War, for the simple reason that it is not about Paul Kagame. The amount of detail devoted to Rwigyema's death is, in my opinion, inappropriate in an article about someone else.

  Done - I have curtailed the stuff about Rwigyema's death down to once sentence, and merged in the second paragraph with the first. I think this still provides a good summary of the war but let me know if yuo think it needs more detail on any point.  — Amakuru (talk) 21:40, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

• "capturing some border areas but not inflicting any major defeats" Weird double-negative phrasing. Why not "capturing some border areas but not winning any major victories" instead?

  Done - I have gone with "not making significant gains in the war against the Rwandan army"  — Amakuru (talk) 21:42, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

• "campaigns of large scale violence and killing" Redundant. I suggest replacing "and killing" with "against Tutsis and moderate Hutus" or whatever would be most accurate.

  Done - I don't think moderate Hutu were targeted at this stage so just changed to "against the Tutsi"  — Amakuru (talk) 21:42, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

• "the resulting agreement, known as the Arusha Accords, was signed in August 1993" Singular-plural disagreement.

  Done well OK. It was kind of a singular agreement, but I've changed it to "set of agreements".  — Amakuru (talk) 21:44, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

• I noticed an oddity in the Rwandan Genocide section. Take a look at these two phrases:
  • "On 6 April 1994, President Habyarimana's plane was shot down near Kigali Airport,"
  • "Historian Gérard Prunier, in his book written shortly after the incident, concluded that..."

  Both of these people have already been mentioned earlier in the article, which allows us to choose whether to fully introduce them again, or to simply use their last name. Given how many countries are mentioned in the Military Career section, I don't understand why it would seem worthwhile to fully reintroduce a historian but not a president. I think the first phrase should include "Rwandan President Habyarimana", and the second phrase can be shortened to "Prunier concluded that..."

  Done - I've kept the full name for Prunier here, and wikilinked him, as it seems to be the first occurrence in the text. Subsequent usages reduced to "Prunier" only though. And I've prepended "Rwandan" as you suggest. See below for my comment on the wider balance of this paragraph, and let me know what you think.  — Amakuru (talk) 10:40, 1 June 2013 (UTC)

• However, the above point might be moot, as my larger concern is that, like the first paragraph of Rwandan Civil War, the first paragraph of Rwandan Genocide features far too much detail about someone else's death. I think it is necessary to discuss the events leading up to the genocide in order to provide context for the rest of the section, but the Habyarimana inquiries do not seem directly relevant to Kagame.

  Actually in this case the uncertainty is directly related to Kagame, as he was at the primary suspect named in the 2006 report. My initial version of this story was shorter, but was criticised during the GA process because it failed to provide sufficient context to the differing view points. That was how I ended up with the description of what was suggested by whom in a kind of timeline.  — Amakuru (talk) 21:50, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

• "while the Rwandan government's estimate of the number killed was about 338." That seems like an unusually specific estimate. The phrasing could also be tightened: "while the Rwandan government claimed the death toll was only 338."
• "along with the appointmenting of local government officials" Made-up word. Should be either "appointment" or "appointing".
• "Many returned to Rwanda despite continuing to fear the RPF" Clunky phrasing. How about this: "Many returned to Rwanda despite the presence of the RPF"

  Done - OK.  — Amakuru (talk) 09:42, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

• "the Rassemblement Congolais pour la Démocratie (RCD)" All of the previously mentioned groups were given by their English names. Why is this one in French?

  Done - changed to English name.  — Amakuru (talk) 09:42, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

• "The 2001 United Nations Report ... alleged that Kagame ... The report also claims that the Rwandan Ministry of Defence..." Tense disagreement. "Alleged" is past tense, "claims" is present tense. These should be consistent.

  Done - both past tense now.  — Amakuru (talk) 09:42, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

• "before being sold on by contacts on the Congo Desk." Extra word? What does "sold on" mean?

  Fixed - wiktionary:sell on is apparently a legitimate phrase, not sure if it's slang or primarily British usage, but anyway since it's confusing I've changed it to the equivalent "resold". Also clarified that it is resold on the international market. Thanks  — Amakuru (talk) 09:42, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

• "... but had focused more on military, foreign affairs and the country's security than day-to-day government." Just a hunch here, but I think "government" should be replaced with "governance".

  Done  — Amakuru (talk) 12:20, 3 June 2013 (UTC)

• "... elected by government ministers and the national assembly rather than through a national election" I suggest replacing "national election" with "direct election", assuming that that is the intended meaning.

  Done  — Amakuru (talk) 12:20, 3 June 2013 (UTC)

• "Bizimungu started his own party following his resignation, which was explicitly forbidden by the Arusha Accords." What exactly was forbidden by the Arusha Accords? Was it the forming of a political party by anyone, or former presidents in particular?

  Altered - I think the original source may have got this one wrong. Other sources I've checked appear to indicate that in fact Arusha did allow party formation, so this was a divergence from the Accords. Others still say that party formation was allowed but must be approved by the government. I've changed the sentence so that it simply comments on the fact that the party formation was quashed for "destabilising the country", with a new source. Let me know if you dig.  — Amakuru (talk) 12:20, 3 June 2013 (UTC)

  Y Dug --Cryptic C62 · Talk 01:43, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

• "The government gave the referendum a high profile, which meant that ultimately 95% of eligible adults registered to vote and the turnout on voting day was 87%." I'd like to avoid using "which meant that" here, as the first clause does not imply the second. Also, it's not immediately clear what it means to give something a high profile, particularly for non-native English readers. Here's one idea: "The referendum was widely promoted by the government; ultimately, 95% of eligible adults registered to vote and the turnout on voting day was 87%."

  Done - that wording looks fine to me.  — Amakuru (talk) 11:33, 6 June 2013 (UTC)

• "Two other candidates also planned to run: Alvera Mukabaramba ... and Jean Nepomuscene Nayinzira" Considering that Nayinzira did run, and Mukabaramba pulled out very late in the process, I think it would be less confusing to simply say "Two other candidates ran:"

  Done  — Amakuru (talk) 11:33, 6 June 2013 (UTC)

• I find the organization of the Presidency section to be a bit odd. After reading about the first election, I expected the next subsection to be about his first term. I was very surprised to see it jump ahead seven years to the next election. The rest of the article is presented in chronological order. Why is this section organized differently?

  Well the basic formatting is somewhat similar to Richard Nixon#Presidency (1969–74) in structure, with subsections on domestic policy and foreign policy etc. These things are not really chronological in nature, but more a series of observations which hold true for the entire time that PK has been in office. Or where they are chronological (for example what's happened with regard to the DRC during the presidency), that information is presented chronologically within one subsection rather than across the whole presidency section.

  In terms of elections, the Nixon article presents the re-election towards the end, which is fine. The difference with Kagame, however, is that in fact his first election campaign occurred three years into the presidency, not right at the beginning, and the second occurred ten years in, i.e. also not at the very end. So given that there's no natural chronological flow there I decided to group Accession, New constitution and the two election campaigns chronologically first, then move on to the general stuff after that. If you can think of a more logical way to lay it out, then I'm all ears! Thanks  — Amakuru (talk) 11:26, 6 June 2013 (UTC)

• The Vision 2020 section would benefit from a sentence describing what progress (if any) has been made on reaching the goals.

  Done I have added a new paragraph indicating a couple of reviews that have been done on this. Thanks  — Amakuru (talk) 09:53, 8 June 2013 (UTC)

That's all, folks! --Cryptic C62 · Talk 20:08, 20 May 2013 (UTC)