Local media was recently awash with news that President Paul Kagame, the chairman of the ruling Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), had encouraged members of the party to commence discussions on the country’s future after his constitutional term limits end in 2017.

Then, President Kagame will have clocked 23 years of centrality to Rwandan politics and his departure will definitely mark be a big shift in the national polity worth discussing and paying attention to, making the ongoing debates wanting as they are vital – but only if that is the purpose they are meant to serve.

Quite worrying though is that these mob-like debates carry very dangerous insinuations that should be condemned in the strongest terms possible.

These discussions, that RPF officials say are meant to work out a formula to achieve change, continuity and stability after 2017, should be maintained as such and be devoid of dangerous and careless talk by party hawks agitating for the removal of the presidential term limits enshrined in Article 101 of the Constitution.

The supreme law categorically states that under no circumstance should the President be elected for more than two terms of seven years each.

That RPF members are discussing the third-term question because it has been posed to the Head of State by a journalist and other citizens is evidence of lack of political insight or outright selfishness.

The relatively young Constitution has been amended several times already and, if amended further, it is likely will lose focus as its foundation is shaken.

Article 101, which is a target of third-term agitators, has not been put to test and there has never been peaceful transfer of power from one president to another yet – our political convulsions have been marred by blood-letting, the latest being the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi.

Under the farsighted leadership of RPF, Rwandans did exhibit an unequalled level of resilience in the aftermath of the genocide by embracing unity and reconciliation during very difficult times, without which this country would have been a failed state.

There is no doubt that RPF should be pre-occupied by retaining power for as many years as possible, so long as that is done through the confines of democracy and it can without tampering with the Constitution.

President Kagame ought to rise to the occasion and resist this dangerous scheme; he should not succumb to any form of pressure to seek a third term.

Those agitating for it should be informed that they are afoul of history because this is not the sustainable way to retain power in the modern era.

For this country, which is becoming the destination of foreign direct investment and high-end tourism, political uncertainty is the least it needs and the onus is on the President to rein in party fanatics.

He should come clean on whether he is going to seek another term in office in 2017.