By Kayinamura Lambert
The current virtual President of Rwanda Paul Kagame has resurfaced talking again digitally in World Economic Forum’s “Davos agenda” 2021. This is defined as a pioneering mobilization of global leaders to shape the principles, policies and partnerships needed in the challenging new context of the pandemic. The week of programming will be dedicated to helping leaders choose innovative and bold solutions to stem the pandemic and drive a robust recovery over the next year.
It is our role to remind the reader that Paul Kagame has never appeared in public to address fellow Rwandans since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic. His absence in this so grueling times for the people of Rwanda, the dictator has used his well installed oppressing machine to govern rudely the country without any form of criticism and any form of room to account the government on how the crisis has been dealt with.
Instead, the tired President is appearing on Davos screen to give a credit on what any citizen of Rwanda understands well, the Rwanda’s government response to Covid-19 pandemic and its economic consequences.
When Paul Kagame was addressing the youth in one of his many one man show up in Kigali, he said it loudly and repeated that he feels only comfortable when he is sitting on the high table. This time he got his fish. Alongside with the Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, Paul Kagame took the opportunity to lie the world, and to rule the people of Rwanda that Rwanda has done better in dealing with the disastrous economic crisis caused by the Covid-19 in Rwanda.
1st lie: The Rwanda Economic Recovery Fund:
This Kagame Covid-19 portrayed “success” is nothing else than a scheme of loaned money to secure the RPF dominated private sector which hardly benefit the Rwandan totally lambda citizen. According to the National Bank of Rwanda this ERF main objective is “to support the recovery of businesses hardest hit by COVID19 so that they can survive, resume operations and safeguard employment, thereby cushioning the economic effects of the pandemic”. This money is translated in loans provided to economic operators in Microbusinesses, Hotels and Large SMEs. Anyone dealing with Rwanda current economics knows very that these three sectors are mainly made of Crystal Venture, The Rwandan Patriotic Front’s business empire[1], owned enterprises such as NPD Cotraco, Umutara Enterprises, Inyange Industries, East African Granite Industries, Hotel Marriot, Gorilla Hotels, etc.
On the other side of the door, the basic social infrastructure affected by the Covid-19 is down completely. The private universities have closed and their rectors jailed. The private economic operators are suffering in silence in a closed country where a simple questing asking why brings you to justice.
The Rwanda Economic Recovery Fund is a mirage, presented to the World through Davos digital window, to say what free and independent auditors can’t analyze to the detriment of the 12 millions of Rwandans.
2nd lie: Agriculture reserves distributed to the population.
Really? Did Rwanda had enough agriculture reserves to be used as a response to the so repeated lockdowns affecting the poor people in Rwanda but particularly in Kigali city? This is a pure lie. Online leaked videos showed two images that contradicts this narrative: people complaining about the scarcity of food in Kigali city reported by the few media houses like the Voice of America and Independents YouTube freelance journalists, and a big crowd of people forcing to leaving Kigali marching on the main roads to East, West and North, after the one night lockdown decision taken by the government this January 2021.
3rd lie: 2,000,000 free medical insurances offered and Social protection in Rwanda?
While Paul Kagame’s governments is well known for its own publicity in similar programs, it has been an astonishing announcement in the Davos panel that 2,000,000 poor citizens have been offered a free medical insurance in Rwanda. This would have been in almost all the pro RPF tabloids in Kigali even before the announcement. Why waiting for Davos to announce it?
Just simply because Kagame want to convince the world that in Rwanda, everyone is able to afford medical expenses covered by Mituelle de Sante. A simple look at a glance will reveal the contrary: It is even hard in Rwanda to afford “Agapfukamunwa”, a face mask for self-protection.
It is a shame to watch Kagame talking about the social protection as an example of what should be done to encounter the covid-19 economic harsh. Just in the midst of this pandemic his government destroyed the houses of Kigali City residents without any form of compensation leaving them in limbo with no pity. Many voices have been raised this problem with no compassion in back. It is this phenomena that the Nobel Prize Archbishop Desmond Tutu described in his review of the so waited Michela Wrong Book as follows: “The whole world wanted to believe in the miracle that was Rwanda – a country built from the wreckage and devastation that intertribal violence and ethnic cleansing had caused. The whole world ignored the few voices pointing out the silencing of political opponents through imprisonment, kidnapping or torture. To our shame,
our need for Rwanda to succeed far exceeded our desire or ability to see the cost at which that success was bought.”
Kagame who closed by force the second hand clothes market in Rwanda, whose paramilitary force run every day after women and youth doing their informal business in Kigali City is taking the microphone telling the world about the importance of formal and informal sector, small scale business, workers of all background, to revamp the economic welfare affected by the Coronavirus pandemic. What a lesson!
While Davos continue to cover Paul Kagame failures into successes let’s remind the world the following:
- Paul Kagame has never appeared in public to address Rwandans since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic
- The so called Economic Recovery Fund is a loan scheme financed by grants and loans from abroad to the benefits of Rwanda Patriotic Front business entity, the Crystal Ventures Companies, which also is in financial difficulties.
- No social protection program has been proposed by the government, debated in parliament, neither implemented at local level.
An old German proverb says: Show me a liar, and I’ll show you a thief!
Kayinamura Lambert
[1] https://www.economist.com/business/2017/03/02/the-rwandan-patriotic-fronts-business-empire