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At Remera-giporoso bus station (gare) two touts for the Rwamagana bound buses attracted onlookers by surprise when they engaged in a fight that was meant for their drivers. It started as a minor quarrel between the two counterparts.

The driver of taxi RAB148L Steven Bayirinjiye said he had the right to get passengers before his counterpart of taxi number RAA 238F because he does not want to pay the money he is meant to and his always convincing and sweet talking passengers not to board Bayirinjiye’s taxi which allegedly stays longer at the bus terminal.

Chris babu one of the eye witnesses said the fight between the two conductors started when the conductor of taxi RAA 238F told passengers to get out of the other taxi and go to his, he hit at the rival’s door hard an action that incited violence.

Bayirinjiye’s driver slapped his rival on his left cheek and the other punched him in the stomach .They pulled and pushed until they fell onto the ground. Rwamagana bound Passengers were puzzled about which bus to board.

The onlookers were so excited and other taxi drivers came to stare for awhile keeping the passengers waiting. While the fight was going on passengers to Rwamagana sought protection in the taxis of the two who were fighting and by the end of the fight each taxi was full.

The two drivers were just left with time to settle their disputes but the two conductors did not want to talk about what had just happened but hurled insults against each other. Bayirinjiye’s conductor promised to hit him again and his rival was pointing at him reminding him how it is not over.

Smallholder farmers in Rwandan and the rest of Africa will soon be better able to weigh up the cost and benefits of adopting new practices supporting most overlooked contributors to global food security; the insects, animals that pollinate crops and boost yields.

“Three quarters of all food crops need insect pollinators to get good yields. 35% of all food production globally comes from crops dependent on pollinators.However, there are reports of declines in pollinators from several regions of the world,” says Barbara Gemmill-Herren of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).

Maryanne Grieg-Gran of the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) and Gemmill-Herren have co-authored a handbook that smallholder farmers and organizations that work with them can use to identify such pollinator-friendly practices and evaluate their impacts on livelihoods, incomes and health.

“Sharing information with farmers about pollinator-friendly practices is a good first step. But farmers will adopt pollinator-friendly practices only if they can see that these practices will bring benefits to them – and while cash always helps, other less tangible benefits may also be important,” says Grieg-Gran.

There are striking examples of farmers managing for pollination services – in Ghana, a mango farmer realized some of the common weeds growing under his trees attracted pollinators into the orchard.

To conserve those pollinator species, the farmer chose to hand-weed rather than use herbicide even though weeding was four times more expensive.

The handbook, to be officially published on 8 March by FAO, draws on work with farmers in Ghana, India, Kenya and Nepal.

To improve pollination of their horticulture crops, farmers in the Mankessim area of Ghana chose to try out reducing pesticide use, protect riverside vegetation and sacred groves that provide habitat for pollinators and allow flowering plants to grow along field borders.

In Uttarakhand State, in India, farmers who plant grasses to prevent soil erosion at the edges of their fields could instead use plants that also attract pollinators.

The handbook provides a five-step approach, centred in the farmer field school tradition, for smallholders to assess current production systems, identifying and testing new practices, and evaluating their impacts. It will enable farmers to weigh up the costs and benefits of adopting different approaches to farming.

“Wild pollinators are some of the most important contributors to global food security, but farmers often overlook them,” says Maryanne Grieg-Gran of IIED. “Farmers need to be directly involved in testing practices that encourage pollinators to visit their crops so that they can assess the benefits and costs for themselves.”

Barbara Gemmill-Herren of FAO adds, “As agriculture intensifies with large-scale monocultures and greater use of agricultural chemicals, pollinators are increasingly threatened. There is a critical need to develop agricultural practices that sustain and increase yields, based on the ecosystem services such as pollination provided by wild species.”

The publication has been produced under the Global Pollination Project, a Global Environment Facility-supported project, implemented by United Nations Environment Programme and executed by the Food and Agriculture Organization, with seven national partners.

The production of the handbook was facilitated by funding from the International Fund for Agricultural Development.

TV10, the first privately owned television station in Rwanda will go on air in July 2012. Its broadcasts seek to display the ambition to give voice to the entire Rwandan population without distinction said the boss, Eugene Nyagahene this Sunday.

“We will have a new way of presenting the news.” Historically, most of the news we had on national radio, was the government news. This time we’re going to give an opportunity to the civil society to talk, the business community and every citizen will have a say for the viewers,” said Nyagahene.

Nyagahene is the promoter and director of the TV10 Group, and also owns a private station called Radio 10.

However, Nyagahene said the chain was initially forbidden to open its branch in political debates and focuses exclusively on the political, commercial, cultural and above all entertainment.

“It will focus on training young people especially in the fight against AIDS and education. It will be more supportive of economic players,” added Nyagahene.

TV 10 will broadcast for 24 hours daily and in three official languages that are French, English and Kinyarwanda.

The National Electoral Commission of Rwanda (NEC) has organised an Open Day for the public from March 13-15 aimed at celebrating 12 years of achievements.

The Executive Secretary, Charles Munyaneza said that the day will be held on March 13 where the public will be able to visit NEC headquarters in Kiagli. Those expected are members of the general public, diplomats, Government officials, civil society and the media among others.

“The public will visit some departments and also erect stands from where NEC staff will orient visitors about NEC activities,” Munyaneza says adding that the Open Day will bring together stakeholders that have been working with the Commission during the past elections.

During this event, NEC will register those who have never registered to vote especially as we prepare for next year’s parliamentary elections. “We shall also showcase a documentary about NEC achievements in the past 12 years” he notes.

On March, 15 NEC will conduct field activities with volunteers and donate cows to poor households in different districts to support the One Cow per Family Programme (Girinka). They also participate in community work by cleaning genocide sites.

The activities, Munyaneza, says are one way of the Commission getting closer to the people, more so to appreciate their cooperation exhibited during the last elections.

This morning a woman was intercepted by the Local Defense personnel that had spotted her while trying to hide a one month old baby girl in the nearby bush. The baby was reportedly found quickly after crying loud.

This prompted local defense personnel in the area to immediately arrest the mother before she could escape.

The local defense responsible for guarding the area reported the discovery of the child to the residents after they had forced the woman to take her child back and escorted her to the local authorities for fear that she might try to dump the baby again once out of their sight.

Ndagirimana Gaspard and Jean de Dieu Umucyo the Local Defence personnel at the scene told IGIHE.com that the woman had been seen lurking around the area suspiciously so they kept quiet as to find out what she was up to.

Ndagirimana said they at first couldn’t see the baby for she was carrying the child in a traditional wrapper “Kanga” she looked like she was carrying a basket of fruits, “it was not until she started hurrying down the road and the baby started crying at the spot she had deserted so quickly that we realized what she was attempting to do”.

The mother of the baby refused to give her name for fear of being found out by her husband. She told the Local Defence personnel that her husband had left for work late in the night and had not returned. She said that they were unable to feed the baby saying it would be better off with other people.

She said she was trying to save her baby from starvation for they have nothing to live on, when asked why she hadn’t asked for help from the authorities, she said she was afraid of that they would tell her to take her baby back, so she decided to leave her somewhere where she believed she would be rescued.

Having previously seen orphans at the center who came to dance and play she presumed someone would save her child.

The woman was handed over to the local authorities.

The grand finale of Inspire Africa reality TV show will be held at Kigali Serena Hotel on 1st April this year where more than 60 million people in the region are expected to view the show.

So far the show is in its 9th week and has 24 contestants from all East Africa member states. Participants are competing for the best business idea. In Rwanda the show airs on Rwanda Television every Sunday and Monday at 10pm.

It was initiated by Nelson Tugume a Uganda and also the founder of Inspire Africa, his aim is to promote entrepreneurship among the jobless.

While addressing members of the press in Kigali recently Tugume who rose from a humble beginning explained that Rwandan youth have the potential to do better in business due to government’s support and stable policies of enhancing self employment.

Tugume announced that a state of the art academy to teach on entrepreneurship will be constructed in Rwanda and will educate people who have potential business ideas in the region.

However, in the meantime, a hundred renowned CEO’s in the world will be present during the final show after which they are expected to mentor the best emerging contestants.

Viewers will vote for their best contender through SMS and the winner will take home with US$50,000 which they will use to start up a business of their choice.

Considering his rise from a humble beginning, Tugume believes everyone can make it with a focused mind of doing business. He now runs a chain of transport companies in Uganda and has shares in best performing companies in the region.

Before being successful he once rented his grandmothers fridge then started a small kiosk, later became a bus tout after which he saved his income to start small income generating activities.

A local pastor Jimmy Muyango from Rwanda For Jesus Church, Kicukiro District has published his debut book titled“The Path To Your Destiny”

Written in English for four years, the pastor tells the aspiring readers to stay focused no matter the challenges they have to meet in life.

At a colourful launching ceremony arranged with a mixture of music from one of the celebrated gospel artist Simon Kabera, Passy, worship team from Rwanda for Jesus, and upcoming cultural gospel troupe, pastor Muyango signed autographs including the one to someone only identified as Aimable who bought one copy at over Rwf 600,000.

“Many of the successful people in the world were more focused than others, it does not mean they did not meet challenges.Probably they meet more challenges than any of us but they never gave up,” Pastor Muyango said.

“In this book, I am reminding everyone that there are barriers to your destiny or achieve your goal no matter how hardworking or wise you might be any yet no one makes a choice which barrier and when to meet,” Muyango added.

“Nobody made a choice to be born an African, or a Rwandan, to be born a man or a woman, to be born on a certain day neither would you make a choice whether to meet barriers or hindrances while you are driving to your goal, therefore I talk about principles that you should have if you need to stay on track,”

Muyango said that writing a book was also a contribution to promote a reading culture in Rwanda which would help in finding the hidden wisdom in many books.

“You cannot read if you can write, reading culture in Rwanda cannot grow if there are no writers or if there is no reading writing culture, am glad that I have become among a few people that are contributing to this knowledge development course,” Muyango emphasized.

A reading culture can be defined as a learned practice of seeking knowledge, information or entertainment through the written words.

An estimation of over 500 copies sold in just four hours of launch while earning him close to Rwf 2million on-launch sales.

Pastor Charles Mugisha of New Life Bible Church, Kicukiro District who presided over the function reminded the invited guests and the Rwandans at large that the wisdom or knowledge one may need is found in a book.

“One person said, that if you want to hide wisdom or knowledge from an African, put it in the book, because they discovered that Africans don’t have a reading culture but the trend has changed now, Africans have started reading and writing and so is Rwanda where we have come to celebrate some of our first fruits of authors in the country,” Mugisha said.

Promoting Reading Culture

The culture of reading is not part of Rwandan tradition. It has been necessary that NGOs like edition BAKAME coming up with Rwandan story telling books for children accompanied with reading competitions.

However, the mission of the Ministry of Education is to transform Rwandan citizens into skilled human capital for socio- economic development of the country by ensuring equitable access to quality education focusing on combating illiteracy, critical thinking and positive values among others.

None of those above is expected to be achieved with no reading or writing culture of which the government has embarked on.

The ministry believes that achieving that mission is surely contributing to the overall goal of the Government to reduce poverty and improving the well-being of the Rwandan population.

ENDS

The co-founder of the umbrella of all women associations in Rwanda Suzanne Ruboneka has urged women to respect their husbands despite the needed gender equality in Rwanda.

Ruboneka was speaking at the Rwanda Television and Radio joint show dubbed Kubaza Bitera Kumenya(asking is knowing) at Telecom House, Kacyiru on Sunday.

She said that some women have used gender equality as an escape route to exercise their wickedness yet it does not take away the values of an African woman or a house wife.

“Gender equality means that a woman is no longer kept inside doors, or pushed into limitations of having freedom as human being and not allowed to access the culturally denounced culture like working or public speaking but that does not give her a right to disrespect her husband, a man will always be the head of the family,” Ruboneka said in a show hosted in preparation of the international women’s day to take place March 8, 2012.

The radio show was attended by women leaders from National Women Council, Avega-Agahozo,Parliament and from the ministry of Gender and Family promotion.

A lot of questions that were asked by the audience in a call-in session and the participants at the show reflected the equality between girls and boys and violence between men and women.

They highlighted that even boys have been denied or have faced barriers in life making it hard for them access their basic rights or deny them their basic needs.

Similarly, men were also said to have faced enormous domestic violence, where they panel jointly agreed and said there is a lot being done to fight such violence.

The panel also tackled on mistreatment of girls who conceive unwanted, planed and premature pregnancies from their respective homes or by their said spouses.

Rwanda will celebrate International Women’s Day with the rest of the world on March 8th 2012. This year, International Women’s Day will also be the beginning of Rwanda Women and Girls’ Month.

This year’s International Theme is ‘Connecting Girls, Inspiring Futures’ while the national theme has been adopted as ‘Empower Women and Girls to Sustain Families’
Rwanda Women and Girls’ Month will be focusing on the activities across the country fighting Malnutrition with ‘Eat Healthy, Live Healthy slogan.

Other include promoting Economic Empowerment of Women, promoting Girls’ Education and women and Good Governance.

As mothers, home makers and care takers, women play a vital part and are well placed to end malnutrition if properly educated and equipped with resources, knowledge and the skills they need to prepare nutritious meals for their families and ensure that the children under their care are well fed and healthy.

The Ministry of Health (MINISANTE) and the Ministry of Agriculture (MINAGRI) will lead activities on this focus.

MINISANTE will engage in creating public awareness of the health sector services available in this initiative in collaboration with various stakeholders and community members.

Activities at the community level will include but are not limited to agricultural demonstrations on how to establish a good kitchen garden, what composes and how to plan and prepare nutritious meals.

Gender equality has been a government policy in Rwanda for many years now and the positive political will and various strategies have gone a long way in achieving a status for women that is above many other countries.

ENDS