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  • Cargo Truck Crashes two Taxis, 3 Injured

    A heavily loaded cargo truck (today) knocked down two commuter taxis at Kinamba in Kigali city leaving three people seriously injured.

    There were no deaths but the injured were rushed to CHUK hospital for immediate medical attention.

    The truck crashed into the first commuter taxi carrying passengers, which both later rammed into another commuter taxi forcing them to overturn.

    The vehicles were headed in one direction towards Nyabugogo when the tuck trounced a commuter taxi carrying passengers (REG: RAA 740 T ) which later crashed into another.

    Eye witnesses said, the truck was trying to overtake the passenger taxi when suddenly another car approached from Nyabugogo.

    It’s also said that the truck tried to return to its lane but the guard shields on the truck looped into the passenger taxi trouncing it into the air carrying passengers and later rammed into another commuter taxi (REG: RAB 431) ahead in the same lane.

  • Rwandan Traders Dominate Dar es Salaam Trade Show

    Traders from Rwanda have overshadowed Tanzanians at the 36th Dar es Salaam International Trade Fair in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

    The Rwandan dealers have specialised in setting pavilions of handicraft products made in Rwanda.

    They are said to have done enough preparations for setting pavilions to exhibit their commodities.

    Commodities on exhibition ranged from clothing materials, foot-ware, computer accessories, electric and electronic equipment, building materials to various forms of cellphones and automobile spare parts.

    Chinese traders have also meticulously presented their pavilions and products at the famous Kikwete ground, which was occupied by the Tanzania Health and Social Welfare ministry in 2011, is now occupied by Chinese dealers who have erected over 50 pavilions.

    Tanzania’s acting director general of TanTrade, Samuel Mvingira, says the Chinese had fielded more than 20 companies adding that, “This time there are many Chinese and Rwandese exhibitors.

    In fact, they have overtaken others in terms of preparations.

    There are some exhibitors from China that have failed to occupy pavilion spaces.”

    Mvingira said, Tanzanians did not show up in big numbers, including private and public institutions.

  • AU Commission Boss Lobbying for Re-Election

    Jean Ping, the chairman of the African Union Commission,is on a West African tour which political strategists perceive as intended to woo west African leaders ahead of the next round of electing the Commission chief.

    Ping is being challenged by South Africa’s Home Affairs Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma that already enjoys the support of the 15-nation Southern African Development Community (SADC).

    The AU summit convenes this July to elect the AU Commission chairman.

    The incumbent AU commission boss Ping ,met Sierra Leonean President Ernest Bai Koroma on Wednesday before leaving for Monrovia for talks with President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf.

    Earlier in January, a tight election last failed to come up with a clear winner with neither candidate able to secure the necessary two-thirds majority vote.

    South Africa has also been lobbying African nations to back Mrs Dlamini-Zuma.

    However, West Africa, under the leadership of regional power Nigeria, is said to be backing Ping from Gabon.

    Ping has accused the continent’s largest economy of disregarding an unwritten agreement which bars it and other regional powers like Nigeria, Algeria and Egypt from vying for the presidency of the AU Commission.

    It is understood that Ping has personally enlisted the support of Gabonese President Ali-Ben Bongo Ondimba in the lobbying campaign.

    Leaders of the four-nation Mano River Union (MRU) comprising Sierra Leone, Liberia, Guinea and Ivory Coast, during their recent gathering in Conakry, agreed to adopt a common position on the AU Commission chairmanship election.

  • Surgeon Removes 5-inch Worm from Patients Eye

    In India, a 75-year-old man had a 5 inches long worm removed from his eye after a thrilling operation at Mumbai’s Fortis Hospital this week.

    After thorough examination, the surgeon Dr V. Seetharaman pin-pointed a threadlike creature under a microscope on Wednesday.

    The patient had previously complained of persistent pain in his eye for more than two weeks with redness and irritation.

    “He was also confused and very much disturbed,” said Seetharaman.
    The eye expert was shocked by the highly unusual sight of the writhing parasite and had to operate speedily to remove it before serious damage was caused.

    “It was wriggling under the conjunctiva,” Seetharaman said, referring to the thin membrane lining the eye. “It was the first time in my career of 30 years that I had seen such a case.”

    The specialist removed the 13-centimetre (five-inch) worm by making a small opening in the conjunctiva — a 15-minute operation that was observed by the patient’s horrified wife, Saraswati.

    “It just kept moving and jumping; it was scary for a bit,” she told Indian Press.

    The patient was relieved of his symptoms while the worm, which was alive for another 30 minutes after surgery, was sent to the hospital’s microbiologists to be identified.

    Seetharaman had previously only heard of worms of about two to three centimetres being removed. “Probably this is a record,” he said.

    He suggested the creature could have entered the patient from a cut in his foot or from eating raw or improperly cooked food, before entering the bloodstream and travelling to the eye.

    “If the worm was not removed it could have gone into the layers of the eye and caused visual loss,” he said. “It could have entered the brain and caused major neurological problems.”
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  • Army Week Medical Services Exceed Target

    Towards the conclusion of Army Week medical services to the communities of Rusizi and Nyamasheke,12,232 people received treatment.

    The number exceeded the target of 10,000 that had been planned, with two days ahead for completion of the Army Week.

    The achievements have been due to great dedication and cooperation from local authorities, Security Forces and Rwanda Military Hospital (RMH) Medical Team in the field.

    People have responded by turning up in big numbers since the launch of medical services on Monday 25 June.

    The population has appreciated the opportunity for them to have specialists’ doctors in their communities as they had to make long distances to the main Hospitals at Huye or Kigali City.

    Kigali is about 6 hours from Rusizi by road transport. Many people using “mutuel” or medical insurance can benefit from services at main Hospitals only when they are recommended by Districts Hospitals.

    However, during the Army Week, residents had specialist doctors at their Health Centers.

    The outreach program organized by Rwanda Military Hospital is done by a multidisciplinary medical team of orthopedic surgeons, general surgeons, ophthalmologists, physiotherapists, dermatologists, radiologists, gynecologists and others.

    It is being conducted at different health centers of Bushenge, Kibogora and Karengera in Nyamasheke district and Gihundwe, Nkanka, Muganza, Mibirizi and Bweyeye in Rusizi district in commemoration of 50 years of independence and 18 years of liberation.

  • ICPAR, Stakeholders Review EAC States Budgets

    ICPAR together with the key stakeholders and all participants June 26, in a one day seminar reviewed the previous East Africa states budget pronouncements.

    This is to provide the opportunity for participants to fine tune their knowledge and gain strategic insights on the previously read budgets of Rwanda, Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania; their effects on business and to find way forward in aligning them to business growth strategies.

    Peter Rutaremara ICPAR president narrated, “We are the key stakeholders of the government because as accountants, we are the implementers of the budget proposals, so we intended to critically understand the budgets read recently so that we can submit them correctly to the tax payers.”

    “We are the link between tax offices, Rwanda Revenue Authority, and also tax payers and therefore, we have to be very critical and go through everything to bring significant levels of expectations and professionalism,” Rutaremara added.

    The seminar brought together among other participants and from different institutions; employees from public and private sector organizations, Professional Accountants, Tax Managers, Internal Auditors, and Practicing Auditors.

    Henriette Nishimwe an Internal Auditor at Rwanda Social Security Board (RSSB) said that “the budget review gave me wider knowledge because we saw how Budget proposals from different countries are being prepared.”

    Among others, insights looked on during the seminar were; the Implications of the 2012/2013 finance bills, Income Tax, VAT, Customs and Miscellaneous Pronouncements, Cross Boarder Pronouncements and their implications.

    Tax payers have been mainly complaining about reverse charges on VAT but Rutaremara further during the press interview said that ICPAR as government stakeholder will spearhead the process and review the possible adjustments.

  • BK Rolls out MTN ‘Mobile Money’

    In an effort to enrich the experience of its customers, Bank of Kigali (BK), the largest Bank in Rwanda, has entered into a partnership with Rwanda’s leading telecoms operator MTN Rwanda to offer services under its mobile money platform.

    Under the partnership, BK will offer MTN mobile money existing and new subscribers the full bouquet of mobile money services including; account opening, cash deposits, transfers and withdrawals.

    At present, 41 of our 56 branches are offering the services but BK will continue to roll out the service to the remaining 13 branches by the end of the year.

    MTN pioneered the mobile money platform in Rwanda in February 2010. Since its inception, the service has transacted volumes of over Rwf70 billion.

    “This is probably the biggest partnership between a telecom and a financial institution in Rwanda. We remain committed to bringing financial services closer to the people and we believe this partnership will further expand the potential that mobile money services have on banking the unbanked,” Lawson Naibo the Chief Operating Officer, BK said.

    An estimated 45 percent of households in Rwanda have access to a mobile phone and MTN mobile money can leverage our extensive branch network to increase the penetration of their service, while we can capitalize on the increased footfall to bring these customers into the formal banking sector,” he added.

    Mr. Naibo also said that since the mobile phone is the most ubiquitous distribution channel on the continent at the moment BK believes that the delivery of financial services through mobile telephony is where the real innovation and development is taking place in the retail market.

    MTN Rwanda’s CEO Khaled Mikkawi said that with looming and growing competition in Rwanda’s financial industry, MTN as the market leader in the country also leads the way by creating partnerships with financial institutions, to widen access to services.

    “The mobile money platform should not be seen as competition to consumer banking but instead as a catalyst to services offered by leading financial institutions like BK. Rwandans can only benefit from greater convergence between conventional banking services and the mobility that mobile telephony offers,” Mr. Mikkawi said.

    Albert Kinuma, Head of MTN Business said that the partnership is in tandem with the company’s strategy of stretching the mobile money’s footprint beyond the regular agent outlets.

    “Through MTN’s innovative products, we may deploy different channels as a way of promoting customer satisfaction. It is now possible for senders from outside Rwanda to register online (MTNMMO.COM) and send funds from their debit card or bank transfer to MTN Mobile Money in Rwanda,” Mr. Kinuma said.

  • 42 Immigrants Discovered Dead in Truck

    About 42 people have suffocated to death in a truck in Tanzania. Security officials say the truck was carrying immigrants. 74 have survived.

    The bodies were discovered on Tuesday in the truck in Dodoma province, about 400 kilometres (250 miles) west of Tanzania’s economic capital Dar es Salaam.

    Tanzania Police said the truck driver fled the vehicle after finding the dead bodies.

    Deputy Interior Minister Pereira Silima said, “Police and immigration officials are questioning the survivors to establish their identity including names and nationality.”

    It was initially reported the migrants were from Malawi, but officials said that they were suspected to be originating from the Horn of Africa region to the north, and were on their way southwards to Malawi.

    “Preliminary reports noted that the immigrants were destined to Malawi,” Silima said.

    In December, 20 Somali migrants were found dead in Tanzania.

  • UN Wants To Fully Arm AU Force Hunting Kony

    The United Nations wants an African Union force hunting fugitive warlord Joseph Kony and his Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) to be fully equipped by December, according to a U.N. strategy due to be presented to the world body’s Security Council on Wednesday.

    The AU force, which has U.S. backing, aims to have a full strength of 5,000 troops from South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Central African Republic (CAR) and Uganda, but lacks equipment, training, food and transportation.

    “These troops lack almost everything,” AU special envoy on the LRA Francisco Madeira told a news conference at U.N. headquarters in New York on Tuesday.

    “They lack boots, they lack uniforms, they lack food rations and sometimes they lack training. So there is a need for these things to be supplied.”

    Abou Moussa, U.N. special envoy and head of the U.N. Regional Office for Central Africa, is slated to brief the 15-member U.N. Security Council on Wednesday on the U.N. regional strategy to address the threat and impact of the LRA.

    The strategy, obtained by Reuters, requires U.N. countries and agencies to ensure the AU force is “adequately equipped, including with regard to air capabilities, communications, office and living accommodations, medical support, and fuel and rations, as soon as possible, and no later than December 2012.”

    The Security Council is likely to release a statement endorsing the strategy on Wednesday, diplomats say.

    Kony, accused of terrorizing northern Uganda for 20 years, is wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes.

    His LRA is accused of abducting children to use as fighters and sex slaves, and of hacking off living victims’ limbs as a method of intimidation and revenge.

    In a report released this month U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon said the AU force lacked the necessary resources to “enable troops to mount effective operations against the LRA” and urged U.N. member states to provide what was needed.

  • Rwanda Recieves UN Public Service Award 2012

    Rwanda has received the United Nations Public Service Award (UNPSA) 2012 2nd place in the category of “Promoting Gender Responsive Delivery” of Public Services.

    UNPSA is the most prestigious international recognition of excellence in public service.

    The award was handed over to the Inspector of Police Goreth Mwenzangu the coordinator of Isange One Center which operates at Police Hospital in Kacyiru. The event took place Tuesday at the UN Head Quarters in New York.

    The confirmation announcement for the award was made a month ago by the UN, office of the Director Division for Public Administration and Development Management.

    The award dubbed “Promoting Gender Responsive Delivery” of Public Services is in recognition of the success of the Isange One-Stop Centre, which operates under Rwanda National Police.

    The secretary General of the United Nations Ban Ki Moon commended the innovative projects by different countries and emphasized the importance of sharing of knowledge, experiences and best practices throughout the world in sound public policies, effective public administration and efficient civil services, through capacity-building and cooperation among the United Nations Member States.

    Isange One Stop Center was established in 2009 through the advocacy of the First Lady, Jeannette Kagame, to offer free medical assistance to victims of GBV.

    The Center is part of a broader national campaign against Gender Based Violence.

    Present at the awarding ceremony included; Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) Jimmy Hodari, the Rwanda National Police Attaché to the UN, New York, Sha Zukakang the United Nations under- secretary- General for economic and social affairs.

    Also present were Dr. Mutlak Al- Qahtani the representative of the president of the UN General Assembly, Inspector of Police Goreth Mwenzangu the coordinator of Isange One Stop Center Kigali among others.