The New Rwanda II

Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

THE NEW RWANDA II SUCCESSES AND CHALLENGES ON THE GROUND

Sondra Myers, Editor

A Publication of The University of Scranton

Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

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A

s we commemorate the 20th anniversary

of the genocide in Rwanda, the world has reason to take note of this small nation’s steady movement toward the future. It exemplifies the passion and extraordinary capacities that Rwandans have for reconciliation and recovery combined with resilience and the indomitable sense of purpose that make all things possible.

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PART ONE: Traditions and Mindset: Where the Past Meets the Present • 1

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The journey from having the idea for a book to publishing the book can be a long and arduous one. One starts off alone and even a bit lonely. But since this book is a handbook—a collection of stories contributed by many writers—some of them active participants in creating the new Rwanda and others who are thinkers who have observed Rwanda’s extraordinary progress as well as its challenges—it turns out to be a joint venture.

I have many people to thank. First let me extend my gratitude to all those who took the time to tell their stories. Needless to say there would be no book without them. Next I must acknowledge Nicole Umutoni, my assistant in Kigali who has been my guide to people (she knows just about everyone in Kigali), ideas and organizations that are making Rwanda what it is today. Nicole has a razor-sharp mind and a heart of gold. The book would not have been possible without her.

Photographer Gabriel Dusabe captured the beauty of Rwanda and Rwandans in his compelling photographs.

They speak to us in a language that is more powerful than words.

Emily Brees, here at The University of Scranton, came to work with me as editorial assistant on the handbook rather late in the game. But Emily swiftly embraced the project, bringing to it the energy, intelligence and technical skills that I needed to bring the project to fruition. I am deeply in her debt.

Valarie Clark, who worked with me on the first handbook, is managing the production of the sequel—from graphic design to printing. She has been generous with her time and knowledge and determined to satisfy my needs every step of the way. Val has kept us on schedule; she’s been a friendly taskmaster. Who can get a job done without that?

Ray Burd, director of printing at The University of Scranton, died suddenly as we were going into the final stage of making the book a reality. I will always remember Ray as the one who showed me how to get a project of this scale done—and done well. Kevan Bailey, interim director, is on the job now and I am confident that he will follow in Ray’s footsteps with regard to high standards.

There are several others that I single out for my very special thanks: Michael Fairbanks, who persuaded me to come to Rwanda in 2008 to hold a roundtable discussion on the role of universities in strengthening civil society. That trip changed my life. Bishop John Rucyahana, a venerable pastor, educator and advisor, who opened my eyes to issues that need to be addressed in Rwanda and in the world. Dr. Laszlo Gyulai, a friend and distinguished professor of psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania medical school, came to Rwanda in 2013 to volunteer his services in helping to deal with post-genocide mental health issues. He has been captivated by Rwanda and deeply committed to making a contribution to it.

Special thanks also go to the members of the staff at the Umubano Hotel in Kigali. They have always made me feel at home there, treating me well and taking an interest in my work.

While conceiving and editing The New Rwanda II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground was my responsibility, making it happen has clearly been a joint venture. Thanks to all!

2 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

TABLE OF CONTENTS DEDICATION......................................................................... 1 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS..................................................... 2 INTRODUCTION.................................................................. 4 PART 1: TRADITIONS AND MINDSET: WHERE THE PAST MEETS THE PRESENT...................... 6 Section Introduction.................................................................. 7 The New Rwanda....................................................................... 8 Gacaca Courts............................................................................ 9 Itorero...................................................................................... 10 The Culture of Citizenship....................................................... 12 Rwanda: History and Hope...................................................... 13 Mindset Matters: A Tale of Two Countries............................... 14 Discussion Questions............................................................... 16 PART 2: SUCCESS STORIES COME IN ALL SHAPES & SIZES....................................... 20 Section Introduction................................................................ 20 A Shining Symbol of Transformation....................................... 21 Rwanda Library Services: A Dream Becomes a Reality............. 22 CMU-Rwanda: On the Cutting Edge...................................... 24 Akilah Gaining Ground........................................................... 26 How Health Builders Transformed Mayange............................ 27 Foundation Rwanda: A Path to the Future for Rape Victims and Their Children........................................ 28 Sweet Dreams........................................................................... 29 It’s a Cycle: Success Breeds Challenges and Challenges Breed Success................................................... 30 Discussion Questions............................................................... 31

PART 4: REFLECTIONS FROM FOREIGN OBSERVERS AND SOJOURNERS..................................... 46 Section Introduction................................................................ 46 Dignifying Design.................................................................... 47 Rwanda’s Historic Health Recovery: What the U.S. Might Learn..................................................... 48 A Minister Without a Convoy.................................................. 49 Yes, We Can Aid Ourselves: Rwanda’s Agaciro Fund and Lessons for Africa........................................ 50 Emerging Voices: Women’s Employment in Rwanda................ 51 Empowering Genocide Survivors ............................................ 53 Public Spaces Bring People Together......................................... 54 Discussion Questions............................................................... 55 PART 5: YOUNG PEOPLE SPEAK— DREAM—AND CHOOSE................................................... 58 Section Introduction................................................................ 59 The Next Twenty Years: Giving the Young a Voice.................... 60 Successes and Challenges.......................................................... 62 The Post-Genocide Rwanda, Successes and Challenges on the Ground................................................. 63 Higher Expectations for Higher Education ............................. 64 The Wounds of a Voice from the Post Genocide Generation.................................................. 65 Discussion Questions............................................................... 67 LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS................................................. 70 ABOUT THE EDITOR......................................................... 73

PART 3: CHALLENGES— ADDRESSING THEM HEAD ON...................................... 34 Section Introduction................................................................ 34 I Felt At Home—I Wanted to Help the Healing Process in Rwanda................................................. 36 The Psychological Legacy of Genocide, The National Commission for the Fight Against Genocide............................ 39 Take Note: Talking Points from Shirley Randell’s January 2014 Newsletter................................ 40 The Office of the Ombudsman: Curbing Corruption............... 42 Discussion Questions............................................................... 43

Copyright 2014 The University of Scranton, Scranton, PA Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

INTRODUCTION

THE NEW RWANDA II: SUCCESSES AND CHALLENGES ON THE GROUND

Since The New Rwanda: Prosperity and the Public Good was published in November 2008, Rwanda has continued to move at a steady pace along its path to the future. I have been tracking its progress through the years and am amazed by the ever-growing array of organizations, agencies, businesses and institutions that are transforming Rwanda from a developing country to a developed country. That journey is not easy and it is never over—but being on the road, diligently and strategically, is important in its own right.

The publication of The New Rwanda: Prosperity and the Public Good was the result of a recommendation that grew out of a roundtable discussion held in Kigali in April 2008 on the role of the university in strengthening democracy and civil society. The recommendation called for an increase in opportunities for public discussion in Rwanda.

And so the handbook was designed to provide a text for “The National Conversation on Prosperity and the Public Good.” That conversation, which has been taking place over the last several years wherever people gather—in their homes and schools, workplaces, churches, community centers and in the media—has come a long way on that path. I hope that it has played and will continue to play a role in encouraging Rwandans to enjoy their rights and assume their responsibilities for the public good; that is—encouraging them to be good citizens.

Here are some highlights in the handbook’s history over the past five years: • In 2010 at the request of President Kagame, the handbook was translated into Kinyarwanda.

• In the same year, on the advice of a number of Rwandan readers, there was a second printing of the English version of the book featuring a new cover that better reflected “the New Rwanda.”

• Through the courtesy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the handbook is now featured in Rwanda’s embassies around the world.

• Every Member of Parliament has received a copy of the handbook in both English and Kinyarwanda.

• In November 2011, The New Times, Kigali’s English language newspaper, serialized the handbook, publishing an essay each Saturday; and Radio 10 followed by airing a one-hour talk show featuring distinguished Rwandan leaders discussing the essays on the day after.

When I returned to the US from a week’s immersion in Rwanda in August 2012, my mind was boggled by my numerous visits—to NGOs and government agencies, to the new Rwanda Library Services Building, to the Carnegie Mellon Institute, to the Millennium Village, to the Akilah Institute to witness its first graduation, and especially by my conversations with individuals—men and women, young and old, professionals in all fields, hotel staff and an assortment of visitors from abroad.

I learned of the exceptional progress in health care and education along with entrepreneurship and technical innovation. The can-do spirit and the passion for progress have become increasingly evident each time I’m in the country. There is a steady rhythm, a heartbeat that keeps the nation moving along, notwithstanding enormous challenges. Employing a combination of tradition and innovation, Rwandans are shaping their future.

Seeing and feeling the dynamic energy that is pervasive in Rwanda today inspired me to publish a sequel to the first handbook, featuring a sampling of stories of the significant successes on the ground in the past five years and at the same time giving a candid picture of the challenges that still exist. Rwanda attracts people— health care workers, teachers, student volunteers, international NGO workers—because it has a special ineffable “something,” a je ne sais quoi, that is downright seductive. Rwanda is a poor, landlocked country with a vivid memory of a genocide that took place just 20 years ago—Rwandans killing Rwandans. Prior to that were years of subjugation by colonial powers—French, German and Belgian. The remarkable recovery, though not complete or even complete-able, is as mysterious as the debacle itself. Rwanda comes into its own each day—remembering its past and shaping its future.

I’ve discovered that successes and challenges are cut of the same cloth. Success stories are not ends in themselves; they open doors to new possibilities—new challenges. Success and challenge, as it turns out, are inextricably joined.

As an example I have chosen to feature Rwanda Library Services in the new handbook because of its transformative potential and because it exemplifies both success and challenge. The construction of a magnificent modern

4 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

library set majestically on one of Kigali’s thousand hills is indeed a success story—but as important is the heroic challenge it faces: to play a major role in creating a reading culture in Rwanda. It is clear that Rwanda needs to make a leap into the 21st century so that its citizens can become part of the global community. We are a knowledge-based planet and it is critically important for Rwandans to know what is happening, when and where and why, as they determine their own place in the world, exchange goods and ideas and skills with others, and ensure that they will be integrated into the global community as equals. That requires the development of a reading culture.

I have selected other success stories—regarding education, technology, civic and cultural life. Each is a component in linking Rwanda to the world. Rwanda has an obligation to strengthen itself for its own sake and for the sake of the world. Because the youth of Rwanda are the most important cohort of this and any society—as they have the greatest stake in its future—I am devoting the final section of the handbook to their voices.

There is much more to tell: new institutions and new chapters in the life of existing ones; ongoing problems, new challenges and new promise. I hope and believe that the handbook, The New Rwanda II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground, will be a useful tool for Rwandans and perhaps for other countries on the African continent and beyond, in demonstrating what people can do who choose a future that is committed to both prosperity and the public good, who are fiercely independent and at the same time embrace a constructive, mutually respectful interdependence.

Gradually but emphatically, Rwandans have taken ownership of the heroic project of creating a new Rwanda, artfully blending tradition and innovation. The sequel focuses on the development of the civic and economic aspects of Rwandan life, citing specific projects and trends and demonstrating how they are linked in a harmonious partnership to ensure economic, political and civic justice.

As an American observing Rwanda’s progress, I have been increasingly amazed at the origins of my own country—a nation designed and invented by a group of

wise men in the 18th century. It still gives me a thrill to recall how the founders aimed to create a nation that stood for liberty and justice for all its people. While that project is and always will be a work in progress, setting lofty goals and high expectations created an unprecedented sense of direction, optimism and energy in America that have been our greatest strengths. I believe that Rwanda, coming from very different origins on a different continent at a different time in history, shares the spirit that has guided my nation. The leadership of His Excellency President Paul Kagame has already converted some dreams into realities and some wishes into strategies for the future. The direction and momentum for constructive change is palpable. The more that citizens become actively engaged in the process of progress, the sooner Rwanda will shine as a beacon of light, not only for the African continent, but for the world.

The more I travel around the world and observe nations in transition to democracy the more I appreciate the value, indeed the “sanctity” of citizenship. Democracy does not run on automatic pilot. It requires the will and the skills of informed and engaged citizens who assume responsibility for the public good. That means not only providing for physical needs such as food and shelter but also for the political and spiritual needs of freedom, justice and dignity. We are not born with civic sensibilities; they need to be learned. They are based on trust and the hope that the efforts and actions of citizens will be respected and validated. In oppressive societies civil society is often discouraged—or corrupted or even criminalized. And in societies that have long been free, like my own, citizenship is sometimes taken for granted, ignored or co-opted by other trends and values. Personal rights sometimes trump public responsibilities.

My own credo that appears on the back cover of the first New Rwanda handbook and on this sequel as well is that “…the most precious right that an individual can have is the right to be responsible for the public good.”

Sondra Myers Editor

INTRODUCTION • 5

6 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

PART ONE Traditions and Mindset: Where the Past Meets the Present

INTRODUCTION TRADITION PLAYS A CRITICAL ROLE in the life of Rwanda.

For Rwandans traditions are not objects of nostalgia or sentimentality but rather guides for living today. Most remarkably we have witnessed the effectiveness of the Gacaca Courts in hearing and adjudicating the cases of genocide perpetrators in a matter of a few years.

I think that it is the most successful, proactive example of truth and reconciliation that has appeared in modern times. And Itorero as well has extraordinary contemporary relevance—restoring the civic values of Rwandans that were deliberately eradicated under colonial rule.

These traditions and so many more--are practices for the present and future, enduring codes of behavior that are directed toward building and strengthening community. They are deeply rooted in Rwandan history and provide a roadmap and a mindset for the future. They are a necessary guide to understanding the remarkable story of the post-genocide period in Rwanda and the mindset of the people who are shaping it.

PART ONE: Traditions and Mindset: Where the Past Meets the Present • 7 Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

THE NEW RWANDA

Bishop John Rucyahana

THE RWANDA THE WORLD ONCE ABANDONED, the Rwanda that was known for the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi, has grown from mere survival to become a progressive nation in keeping with Rwanda Vision 2020* as defined by our strategic leadership.

Rwanda has reconciled her people as a means of healing their social wounds and repairing their social fabric.

Unity and reconciliation have created the energy to engage in sustainable development. Rwandans are reminded that we have no power to change the past but we have a mandate to shape a bright future for ourselves and for the generations that come after us.

Our destiny resides in our obligation not only to shape our society but also to work hard to build it, sustain it and protect it. This deliberate ideology and commitment have caused Rwanda to emerge as a leading growing economy—6.5%—in the sub-Sahara zone. This is not a static ranking for Rwanda; we are hoping to move from being good to being better. We are a work in progress.

* Rwanda Vision 2020 aims to create a modern nation that is politically stable with a non-discriminatory, united people that are proud of their culture and values. Through economic growth, Rwanda strives to eliminate hunger and poverty by providing economic opportunities to Rwandans of all socio-economic classes which will in turn lead the country towards middle income status.

The program includes pillars such as the following: the reconstruction of the nation and its social capital driven by good governance; creating a market sector for agricultural products; developing the private sector through competitiveness and entrepreneurship; developing human resources including education, health, and ICT skills; infrastructure development; addressing demographic, health and gender issues; promoting regional economic integration. Information on Rwanda Vision 2020 can be found at http://www.minecofin. gov.rw/home/ministry/key-documents/rwanda-vision-2020.html.

8 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

GACACA COURTS

Sam Rugege

GACACA COURTS WERE ESTABLISHED specifically to try genocide cases. They were an adaptation of traditional courts whereby members of the community came together and resolved their disputes. They were introduced because it was realized that the hundreds of thousands of genocide suspects could not be prosecuted in the regular courts within a reasonable time. It was estimated that the process might have taken 100 years!

Gacaca Courts were comprised of lay men and women selected on the basis of their reputation for high integrity and wisdom. Lawyers were not permitted as their involvement, even if enough were available, would have delayed proceedings and denied justice to suspects and victims alike. The courts were less formal than conventional courts and not intimidating to witnesses. Anyone in the community who knew something about the case was allowed to testify. This relaxed atmosphere encouraged people to speak and assist the judges to arrive at the truth.

The perpetrators had the opportunity to acknowledge wrongdoing, tell the truth and ask for forgiveness. The victims or relatives of the victims, if present, came face to face with the perpetrators and if forgiveness was asked for, it could be given. There was a great opportunity for forgiveness, healing and reconciliation.

The punishment meted out to convicted persons was often a term of imprisonment although those who confessed and asked for forgiveness were given much shorter terms and would serve only part of their sentences in prison and the rest outside doing community service (called TIG or Travaux d’Interet general). TIG, which also imparts skills, includes the building and repair of rural roads and the repair of public buildings as well as environmental protection, e.g. planting forests, clearing rivers and lakes, etc. Thus the perpetrators who did so much destruction could participate in the on-going reconstruction of the country. Community service is intended to rehabilitate and ease the perpetrators’ road back into normal society, promoting reconciliation and peaceful coexistence with the aim of avoiding future conflict.

Gacaca Courts achieved what would have been impossible without them. By the time they closed in June 2012, they had decided over 1.2 million cases. Many victims of genocide crimes saw justice done and are living peacefully side by side with families of perpetrators. Of course those who suffered personal atrocities and those who lost loved ones can never be compensated for their pain and loss but many have at least been helped by Gacaca to know how and where their people died and to bury them in dignity.

There are, however, still challenges to be addressed. Some perpetrators still harbor hatred and would probably commit genocide again if they had the chance. Hence there is a need to fight the genocide ideology by continuing to educate our people, especially the youth, against such ideas and inculcate in them a sense of unity for a better future.

PART ONE: Traditions and Mindset: Where the Past Meets the Present • 9

ITORERO

William Ntidendereza PRE-COLONIAL AFRICAN SOCIETIES relied on mutual aid, kinship and community support to meet human needs. Traditional cultural beliefs and practices encouraged collective responsibility, solidarity and reciprocity. They had roots in social development approaches which are mainly concerned with harmonizing economic and social policies and programs. They were culturally appropriate and context-specific programs that promoted people-centered development, human capabilities, social capital, participation and active and civic engagement in achieving human development.

Before the colonial period Rwandans lived in harmony as a result of the Rwandan school known as Itorero, a channel through which the nation could convey the message to the people regarding national culture in different areas such as language, patriotism, social relations, sports, dance, song and the defense of the nation. As a result young citizens could grow up with an understanding of and attachment to their culture. Participants were encouraged to discuss various national programs and the positive values of Rwandan culture. The Itorero tradition also provided the formative training for leaders of the nation.

“ Today Rwanda’s socio-political history and geographical setting necessitate a value system that guarantees the existence of a nation governed by its own people.”

When the colonizers arrived in Rwanda, they found Rwanda’s leadership to be very strong and their first mandate was to suppress the Itorero by changing its mission to focus only on dancing. This situation impacted relationships among Rwandans and the way the country was governed; discrimination and genocide ideology spread. As a consequence Rwandan society was destroyed and many Rwandans fled the country to live in exile. The ultimate consequence was the 1994 genocide perpetrated against Tutsi in which more than a million people died, leaving a society of poor disabled people as well as a large number of refugees.

Today Rwanda’s socio-political history and geographical setting necessitate a value system that guarantees the existence of a nation governed by its own people. Rwanda aims to ensure security that goes beyond military considerations to include all aspects of community life: economic, social, political and environmental. In addition to developing the nation socially and economically, Rwanda looks back to its pre-colonial roots to restore its cultural values and norms and protect itself against genocide ideology.

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10 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

THE DISTORTIONS OF OUR CULTURE during colonial times resulted in a breakdown of our social fabric that ended the selfless service to the nation that people were educated to give. Since 1994 the culture of volunteerism has been reinstated and manifests itself in Rwandan society in different sectors. Mediators, Gacaca Court judges, community health workers, national youth council members, national women’s council members and local government council members are a few examples of volunteer groups that deserve special recognition for their contributions to the rebuilding of the country. In order to enhance the culture of volunteerism the government has charged Itorero with inspiring positive values among Rwandans and strengthening and increasing volunteer efforts already going on.

Through Itorero and similar initiatives, the government is re-introducing the culture of service to the country at no financial reward. These initiatives encourage patriotism, positive values, responsibility and selfless service— attributes that contribute to promoting social cohesion, peace and reconciliation and democratic governance.

PART ONE: Traditions and Mindset: Where the Past Meets the Present • 11

THE CULTURE OF CITIZENSHIP

Edward Kalisa

I DEFINE CITIZENSHIP as the way individuals get involved in societal activities including their participation in democratic processes, their obligations to contribute to the well-being of their society, the way they respect and promote societal norms and values and the way that they themselves are accountable and hold their leaders accountable for their decisions and actions.

I define culture as a system of knowledge shared by a relatively large group of people. It involves the language, values, belief system, norms, rituals and symbols that distinguish one group of people from another.

The culture of citizenship is a combination of values and a belief system that shapes how a particular group of people understands its role in society and participates in the decisions that govern it. In most cases people’s participation is influenced by their cultural values and practices. As their life styles evolve because of the influence of globalization and modernity, cultural values and practices also evolve, as does the people’s understanding of citizenship. Rwandan culture has played a significant role in encouraging citizens to participate in the development of their country by using home-grown solutions.

The traditional Itorero program that the government of Rwanda has re-established was a school through which the nation could convey the messages to the people regarding national culture in different areas such as language, patriotism, governance, social relations, sports, dance, songs and the defense of the nation. The values and skills acquired through Itorero helped the participants to love their country, work for it, fight for it whenever it became necessary and promote a governance system that emphasized the participation of all Rwandans irrespective of their social class, religion or region.

Rwandan culture teaches Rwandans, especially the youth, to be good citizens and to understand that cultural values are foundational to strengthening social fabric, mutual support and a common vision for the future of our country. The bad* regimes that characterized Rwanda in the years leading up to the genocide ignored our cultural values that bound people together and concentrated on teaching the hatred, exclusion and discrimination that culminated in the genocide. Cultural institutions were completely suppressed and eventually died away.

Our culture has played a very influential role in the daily life of Rwandans—in their political, social and economic participation—through re-establishment of the value systems that characterized citizens before and during the colonial times. The restoration of the cultural connectors by the current leadership has reestablished a sense of identity, unity and reconciliation which have become the pillars of the new Rwanda.

People have a strong sense of citizenship and self-worth through democratic processes and they have taken the development of their country in their hands. In this regard, culture and citizenship are mutually reinforcing. * The reference is to the regimes of former Rwandan leaders who continued to promote divisions and hatred among Rwandans.

12 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

RWANDA: HISTORY AND HOPE

Margee M. Ensign and William E. Bertrand

Imagine a nation with the highest proportion of women legislators in the world. Imagine a country where a democratically elected president is committed to gender equality and poverty reduction, where urban and rural schools are being wired to the Internet and where the government is committed to becoming a knowledge-based economy and middle-income country by 2020. Imagine that this country is located in the heart of sub-Saharan Africa and that this progress comes in the wake of one of the 20th century’s worst nightmares.

Rwanda today presents a model for hope, justice, innovation and human development. In fact, Rwanda is now a leader in achieving economic, political and social progress in this beleaguered continent. A new model of governance has emerged in this poor African country. This model, that draws on the century’s old Rwandan customs called Ubudehe and Imihigo, is inclusive, transparent, empowers the poor and holds leaders accountable for improving the well-being of people in their districts. No other country has developed and implemented such an innovative development program.

Going around the United States talking to various groups, we have discovered that these paragraphs may be difficult for many in the West to accept. We are accustomed to hearing and accepting negative news, particularly when it refers to Africa, the second largest continent in the world composed of 54 different states. The terms failed state, AIDS pandemic, and war and conflict are among the most frequently-used terms when discussing this large continent, especially in the Western media. When one of the authors made a presentation on progress in Rwanda to a group of foundation employees charged with funding projects on the continent, she was told simply that the story couldn’t possibly be true—this was Africa, this was Rwanda. Potential editors said more than once that this book contradicts everything we have heard about Rwanda.

Yet it [Rwanda], is a country with a vision and a plan to reach that vision. It is a country full of honest, dedicated leaders who understand that the stakes are high. It is a government that has decentralized power and instituted a way of measuring whether leaders perform as the people expect. Rwandans call this process Ubudehe and the contract that people sign with their leaders, Imihigo. It is a novel method for understanding what poor people want in their lives and ensuring to some degree that leaders respond to their needs. This is worth repeating. Rwanda is implementing a system that asks poor people to express their needs that are then developed into a compact—called Imihigo—with their leaders—who are held accountable, by being removed from office by citizens if these needs are not met. This is not just a theory; we have watched it in action. In 2008, the Ubudehe program was awarded the United Nations Public Service Award. 150 countries participated in the program, 12 were nominated and Ubudehe took first place.

From “Rwanda: History and hope,” by M.M. Ensign and W.E. Bertrand, 2010, p. 1, 2 & 8. Copyright by University Press of America.

Reprinted with permission.

PART ONE: Traditions and Mindset: Where the Past Meets the Present • 13

MINDSET MATTERS: A TALE OF TWO COUNTRIES

Michael Fairbanks

There is increasing evidence that mindset matters to economic and human development. Weber, Banfield, Harrison, Fukuyama, and Huntington are well known adherents to that theory. But they are not economists and have been dismissed by the “priestly” caste of quantitative economists. Three Nobel laureates in economics have expressed their opinions on the matter: Paul Krugman says “Economists are notoriously uninterested in how people think and feel.” Douglas North writes that humans use “both mental models and institutions to shape the performance of economies.” And according to laureate Joseph Stiglitz, “Development represents a transformation of society, a movement away from traditional relations and traditional ways of thinking….”

Rwanda and Haiti have a lot in common. Both are emerging from catastrophic events: the genocide in Rwanda in 1994 killed more than 800,000 people and the earthquake in Haiti in 2010 killed almost 300,000.

Both have a long history of interference and exploitation by the French and Americans.

In Haiti the French insisted on 120 years of punitive payments following that country’s independence in 1804; the USA feared a slave uprising and did not recognize a free Haiti until 1862; American Marines invaded Haiti in 1915 to protect American sugar and banking investments. The US kept total fiscal control of Haiti until 1946 and then propped up its dictator, “Papa Doc” Duvalier, as a “bulwark against communism” in the region.

In Rwanda in 1994 the French supported the Hutu power regime with guns, machetes and money; senior American officials, who were notified as much as eight weeks in advance of the onslaught, stood by due to domestic political concerns: a mid-term congressional election.

It is easy to understand the propensity for fatalism. Outside actors and natural disasters would make any group of people believe they could not control their future. But this is where the comparison ends.

HAITI Many Haitians see wealth as finite and believe that it is based on location and natural resources. They tend not to trust people outside their family or class, see laws as constraints, and are paternalistic and fatalistic. One expresses futility in Haitian Creole; Nan mal, nan mal nèt, which means “if you are in a bad situation, you are in deep.” Mariano Grondona, Larry Harrison (who worked in Haiti) and I have written about this as an “anti-innovation” or “anti-progress” mindset.

Haiti is divided by geography, economic class and skin color, and has had 17 transfers of power in the last 23 years. Tensions persist between the executive branch and the parliament. Elites are power-seeking; women are subordinate. There is no common economic zone with their neighbor, the Dominican Republic, and less than 2% of all aid goes to the Haitian government. Between eight and ten thousand NGOs, none of which pay taxes or import duties, are registered to work there. Many of their activities overlap and they crowd out

14 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

small business initiatives and share little information. A recent report on NGO-health care activities shows that most do no better than anemic government efforts.

Direct foreign investment, measured in the low millions, only exists based on low wages, government favors and low tariffs into the US market. Donor fatigue is increasing; patronage and opaque management systems persist.

There is growing frustration with food prices and credit is allocated to trading and consumption that favors the elite rather than productive activities that help everyone. Inevitably there will be more natural disasters.

RWANDA Many Rwandans, especially those in leadership, believe that competition fosters initiative and spurs innovation, that a consistent ethical standard, punctuality (the best proxy for many good values), systems thinking, trust in institutions and self-determination are requisites of a strong society. This is pro-innovation thinking.

Rwandans, who had a rich and complex culture and governance system until colonial powers destroyed them in the 1920s, are putting their ethnic issues in the past. They demonstrate their self-determination every day. Rwandans switched one of their official languages from French to English and joined the British Commonwealth. They also integrated into the East African common economic zone of 120 million consumers.

Rwandans borrowed and internalized the best of the West’s ideas for macroeconomic management and business strategy, but they also built modern institutions based on their own traditional values. Gacaca courts adjudicated the cases of 1.5 million perpetrators in the genocide—under budget and in record time. Imihigo is a tailored performance contract by which all officials must adhere. Umuganda builds civic engagement by insisting that all citizens, including the president, sweep in front of their homes, pick up litter and plant trees the last Saturday of every month.

All NGOs in Rwanda must submit their plans to a relevant ministry and be evaluated. Non-performers are asked to leave the country each year. Growth has averaged 8% per year, a million and half people were recently lifted from poverty over a 36-month period, women represent 56% of the parliament, aid as a percent of budget has decreased from 95% to less than 40% and foreign direct investment hit the 2013 half-way target of USD 1.5 billion in June.

Both presidents understand the role of mindset. Though they have different styles, different substance and very different outcomes, both are hugely popular.

THE NEW CASE STUDY The new case study for economic development is the case of Haiti and Rwanda. It demonstrates and teaches us that mindset and values matter. Among the most important of these values is self-determination.

PART ONE: Traditions and Mindset: Where the Past Meets the Present • 15

Photo by Sean Scanlin

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS FOR PART ONE •H ow does the power of forgiveness make progress possible? Are there any other countries that have achieved success through forgiveness?

•H ow did colonialism contribute to the genocide ideology?

•W hy is self-determination so important to a developing nation?

•H ow do Rwanda and Haiti differ in regard to their disaster recovery efforts? Did either have a choice in how NGOs and the government responded to their respective crises?

•H ow important have traditional values been in helping Rwanda’s recovery and its adjustment to modernity?

16 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

PART ONE: Traditions and Mindset: Where the Past Meets the Present • 17 Photo by Jonathan Torgovnik / Foundation Rwanda

18 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

PART ONE: Traditions and Mindset: Where the Past Meets the Present • 19 Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

PART T WO Success Stories Come in All Shapes & Sizes

INTRODUCTION THERE ARE FAR MORE SUCCESSES IN RWANDA than we can include in this handbook. We have selected a few that represent a range of projects of various size and importance—from the library to the ice cream parlor. There are thousands more. They all demonstrate the remarkable energy, creativity, resilience and determination that course through Rwandans wherever they are. Rwandans see opportunity everywhere!

20 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

A SHINING SYMBOL OF TRANSFORMATION Sondra Myers THE PUBLIC LIBRARY IN KIGALI (Rwanda Library Services) is the quintessential example of success and challenge that defines Rwandan transformation. The library opened its doors in 2011 after years of determination and hard work. Rwandans knew that a library was needed, not only for the valuable service it offered the community, but also as a change-engine for moving Rwanda forward from its oral culture to a reading culture—a necessary step toward the nation taking its place in the global community. Building the library—a magnificent glass building perched on one of Kigali’s legendary hills, was an arduous but necessary task, nobly initiated by the Kigali chapter of Rotary with the full approval and investment of Rwanda’s government.

The long-awaited success is in evidence—a bustling institution that serves people of all ages. The challenge remains: to develop a reading culture in Rwanda. That work has begun—and it will continue through the generations. It will be a definitive example of the evolution of a nation from poverty and illiteracy to education, culture and community—and to connectedness in an increasingly interdependent world. It is both the light at the end of the tunnel—and the light that brightens the pathway to the larger world.

PART TWO: Success Stories Come in All Shapes & Sizes • 21 Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

RWANDA LIBRARY SERVICES: A Dream Becomes a Reality Jolly R. Mazimhaka THE IDEA TO CONSTRUCT a public library in Kigali was born in 2002 at a committee meeting of the Rotary Club of KIGALI-Virunga held at the home of Beth Payne, then a staff member at the US Embassy in Kigali. Among the topics discussed was the concern about the scarcity of books and the virtual absence of a culture of reading in Rwanda. Soon thereafter the subject was revisited at a meeting of the entire club.

Members noted that Rwanda has very few written materials, be they newspapers, magazines or books. The traditional reliance on the oral transmission of knowledge not only limited Rwandans’ access to new ideas, but also kept literacy rates extremely low.

There were no libraries to speak of and the only available bookshops were ill-equipped. Rotary members recognized the need for a permanent institution—a public library where all Rwandans could access books and ideas freely. They saw it as a necessary first step toward creating a knowledgeable, free and democratic society.

They envisioned a public library serving Kigali and its environs, with branch and mobile libraries and teachertraining resource centers spread throughout the country. The club believed that ignorance played a large role in Rwandans accepting the genocidal ideology without question. People followed orders and killed their neighbors, their friends and even family members without question.

One of the major contributors to the genocide was Rwanda’s isolation from the world. For decades most Rwandans had no access to information except through government and extremist-controlled radio. They were prohibited from traveling and had no books or magazines that offered alternative views of the world. In such a closed society it was not difficult for the group in power to manipulate the people to commit one of the world’s most horrific atrocities.

Club members argued that a public library would fulfill many needs, healing the wounds of loss and physical, mental, and spiritual devastation that the genocide brought on and opening the hearts and minds of Rwandans to knowledge of themselves and the world. Rotary members aimed to replace the tools of destruction with the building blocks of construction through the development of a reading culture.

The Club gave the effort a kick-start with a sale of used books donated by members and well-wishers. Sales were hosted at the Hotel Umubano every weekend. Rwandans, including factory workers, teachers, government officials and hundreds of children were given access to affordable high-quality books. Even Rwanda’s president, His Excellency Paul Kagame, bought books at the sales to support the reading awareness effort.

As for fundraising the Club drive brought in more than $1.3 million from both local and foreign friends of Rwanda. The initial reception was hosted by then-US Ambassador George M. Staples. President Kagame

22 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

pledged government support of more than $250,000 in cash and in-kind donations.

Other supporters included American Friends of the Kigali Public Library, Marshall Scholars for the Kigali Public Library, the Ruetgers Family Charitable Foundation, SORWATHE, the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund International, the MTN Rwanda and the SORWATHE, and Rwandan Tea factory. Other major Photo by Gabriel Dusabe donors were the European Union and UTEXIRWA and VIP donors included Boeing Corporation, the Canadian government, Clare and Nigel Richardson, and Rwanda’s Tri-Star Investments Company, a South African telecommunications company, MTN, the National Bank of Rwanda and the Bank of Commerce, Development, and Industry.

Today the magnificent building that houses the Rwanda Library Services stands tall and proud. Opening its doors to the public on April 16, 2012, it contains, among other treasures, special collections on Rwandan history, literature, and culture, selections for children, teenagers and adults, an American corner and a French corner. The Executive Director of the Library Services, Jennifer Turatsinze, has put numerous structures and programs in place.

The children’s sector provides an inviting reading environment and is planting the seeds of a reading culture in children. They are beginning to respond to reading in a whole different way from the generations before them. Their experiences will undoubtedly have an impact on the future of their society.

The now familiar phrase “developing a reading culture” has found its way into the media’s daily vocabulary. There is a gradual realization that nurturing reading, especially in children, is the best way to build a literate nation that can transform itself into an informed and knowledgeable society—capable of playing a role in a globalized world.

The library has helped Rwandans move beyond their painfully fractured past into a unified nation of one knowledge community—one culture.

The dream has turned into reality. Rwanda Library Services stands as a symbol to all who strive to create a better world. In the words of Andrew Carnegie, it will become a “never-ceasing foundation of good” to all Rwandans.

A SAMPLING OF LIBRARY PROGRAM OFFERINGS: • The American Corner promotes mutual understanding between United States and Rwanda. It offers children’s book readings, book discussion groups for adults, films, speaker programs, workshops, English language learning, and exhibits.

• Literacy and reading promotion programs • Knowledge-building workshops • Foreign language programs • Computer Literacy workspace • Mobile library programs

PART TWO: Success Stories Come in All Shapes & Sizes • 23

CMU-RWANDA: ON THE CUTTING EDGE

Michel Bezy

SINCE THE PUBLICATION of Rwanda’s Vision 2020 document in 2000, the country has engaged in transforming Rwanda from an agrarian to a knowledge-based economy with information and communication technology (ICT) as the key economic development driver. One of the initiatives to support that vision was the decision by Rwanda to lead the development of an ICT Center of Excellence in Kigali for the East African Community (EAC) region.

In order to fulfill that ambitious goal, the Government of Rwanda strategically targeted Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), a world-class university, to establish and operate a master’s degree granting program in Rwanda. CMU was selected because of its strong culture of research and innovation.

CMU-Rwanda opened in September 2011, making it the first world-class university to invest in Africa with an in-country presence and a resident CMU faculty. The first Master of Science in IT graduate program started in August 2012. It is committed to delivering the same MSIT degree offered at its main U.S. campus in Pittsburgh so that course credits earned at CMU-Rwanda are fully transferable to CMU’s main campus and vice-versa, allowing students to spend a semester studying in Pittsburgh if needed. Students are developing expertise in all aspects of ICT including computer science, telecommunications and computer networks, cyber security and wireless systems and are exploring areas of business management including market analysis, strategic business planning and entrepreneurship. They are designing and creating mobile applications and products and are learning how to leverage broadband Internet and cloud computing to solve real business problems in Africa.

“ There is no question in my mind that the government of Rwanda has done its part in creating a favorable ICT environment. It is now time for the government to encourage private initiative.”

Coursework is complemented by practical experience in a three‐month industry internship in the region and in a full-semester practicum where students work together in teams to solve problems contributed by local industry.

The Rwandan students of the first class impressed the faculty by their eagerness to learn, their enthusiasm and interactivity during lectures and their dedicated hard work. “The students at CMU-R are incredibly bright and inquisitive. Most lectures turn into guided discussions rather than the linear push through notes that I see in other places,” said Tim Brown, a professor at CMU-Rwanda who joined the program from The University of Colorado.

24 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

Photo by Carnegie Mellon University in Rwanda (CMU-R)

CMU’s program is expected to have a positive impact on the quality of education at other local higher education institutions through close collaboration and student exchanges.

Instead of adding to the ever-increasing number of young Africans leaving the continent in search of quality higher education, CMU-Rwanda’s goal is to develop a new model for delivering quality education in Africa that is adapted to regional needs and is integrally linked with economic development. In addition to the ICT Center of Excellence, CMU-Rwanda will also include an innovation incubator, a mobility research center and an executive education and advanced practical training program. This approach will ensure that graduating students will have a direct impact in a region booming with opportunities in technology innovation. Already some major IT companies are partnering with CMU-Rwanda, providing job opportunities for its students to collaborate with their best employees.

With this critical mass of expert skills, Rwanda is on its way to becoming a leader in developing the breakthrough ICT solutions needed for the future of Africa. These innovations will not come from the West; they will come from inventors and entrepreneurs in Africa who understand the challenges and needs that are unique to Africa. This could represent Africa’s best chance to control its own ICT future and lead the new mobile Internet revolution in emerging markets.

There is no question in my mind that the government of Rwanda has done its part in creating a favorable ICT environment. It is now time for the government to encourage private initiative.

PART TWO: Success Stories Come in All Shapes & Sizes • 25

AKILAH GAINING GROUND

Lisa Martilotta

Committed to putting all graduates into market-relevant jobs, the Akilah Institute for Women is now celebrating its 5th anniversary of economically empowering low-income young women. We have decided to do more of what works—expand our campus and diploma programs in Kigali rather than build a rural campus in Bugesera that would be somewhat disconnected from the bustling job market. This decision was taken with the usual question in mind: what will offer the greatest benefit to our stakeholders—East African women? Already the results are visible: our application numbers tip 1,000 annually and our student-body has doubled in size.

Looking back at 2013, we are proud of many achievements, but one that stands out is Akilah’s official accreditation as an institute of higher education that was awarded by the Rwandan Ministry of Education. This seal of approval puts currency in the hands of Akilah graduates as they launch their careers Photos by Sean Scanlin and enterprises.

We closed out 2013 by awarding 56 more women diplomas. Of our 95 graduates to date, an incredible 37 are productively engaged working and training with Marriott International in Dubai and Doha, preparing to return home this year and launch Marriott’s first-ever sub-Saharan Africa hotel in Kigali. The majority of the other alumnae are employed in Kigali-based businesses within the service industry.

A few of the young women have become entrepreneurs and established businesses in Kigali; Florence Mukundwa is one of them. Florence is the owner of Aniflo Standards, which successfully uses local fabrics and labor to manufacture affordable and stylish clothing for children and women in East Africa.

January 2014 marks the birth of Akilah’s expansion across the region as we invite Burundian women to learn and grow at the new Bujumbura campus. In large part the new campus was made possible by the Segal Family Foundation and the 2013 Clinton Global Initiative, as we believe in the power of educating and connecting talented young women to the professional workforce. Burundi is a country full of bright young leaders with grace and a rich culture who simply lack the resources to move into meaningful careers. Burundi’s public and private sectors have welcomed Akilah with open arms, given the increasing need for the empowerment of girls and women and the simultaneous need for a skilled workforce to cater to the growing tourism industry. In addition to hospitality management, Akilah will offer Burundian students the opportunity to study entrepreneurship.

2014 will be a year of milestones for sure, with Akilah turning 5 years old and Rwanda celebrating 20 years of peace, reconciliation and growth.

26 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

HOW HEALTH BUILDERS TRANSFORMED MAYANGE

Josh Ruxin and Jennifer Lee

MAYANGE IS A CLUSTER OF FIVE VILLAGES located approximately 25 miles south of Kigali and has a population of about 22,000. From the bustling streets, thriving cassava flour plant, numerous cooperatives and development of modern homes, it is difficult to picture the community as it once was: Rwanda’s “Warsaw Ghetto.”

Historically Mayange was one of Rwanda’s poorest areas with a high concentration of Tutsi inhabitants.

Many Tutsi were forced to migrate there in 1959 despite its poor living conditions and endemic tsetse fly population which spread deadly sleeping sickness throughout the population. When the government began organized massacres in the 1960s, Mayange was an easy target. During the height of the genocide in 1994, it was a virtual epicenter of the organized violence. In the years following the genocide, many of those who managed to escape returned to the area along with tens of thousands of refugees from neighboring countries.

The conditions of the region were among the worst in the country: the soil was depleted, the water supply was intermittent at best and electricity was non-existent. When Health Builders arrived in 2005, a third of the population was severely malnourished, people were starving, and children were dying at alarming rates.

The conditions of the Mayange Health Center were no better. The front door to the facility was almost always locked while sick patients languished on the steps. We soon learned that nurses only saw patients a few times a week due to the lack of management, payroll, drugs, supplies and infrastructure. Some sick people had stopped showing up altogether because they could no longer stand to see so much death. Although the clinic was built to serve a catchment of 25,000 people, fewer than 10 patients were seen on days when the nurses could be found to open the center doors. Health Builders wasted no time in getting to work.

Our first priority was to reestablish respect for the nurses and restore dignity to the dilapidated facility. Together with the staff we took up mops and paintbrushes and turned the clinic into a place where nurses would be proud to work and the community would want to receive care. Working alongside the Ministry of Health, we then reframed the health center as a small business, complete with customers, products, and employees and implemented simple management interventions such as job descriptions, work plans, budgets, and drug procurement systems. Our goal was not only to improve performance in the short term, but to build management systems that would work long after we left. The new efficiencies enabled patients to receive higher quality care faster and by 2007, more than 150 individuals were being treated daily. By 2012 Health Builders ended its day-to-day support as the staff and leadership had demonstrated their ability to maintain the center’s finance and management without outside assistance.

Photo by Jennifer Boeun Lee, Health Builders

Today Health Builders works hand-in-hand with the Ministry of Health to bring its management interventions to 89 health centers across six districts. Where no health centers exist or are too run-down to function, we build them. By doing so, we are helping to transform the public health care system of Rwanda. Our longterm goal is to put ourselves out of business and leave behind a deep bench of experienced management in every health facility in the country.

PART TWO: Success Stories Come in All Shapes & Sizes • 27

FOUNDATION RWANDA: A Path to the Future for Rape Victims and Their Children Jules Shell AN ESTIMATED 20,000 children were born of rapes committed during the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

Due to the stigma associated with rape, these children and their mothers have been severely marginalized by their families and communities and have not received help. In 2008, Foundation Rwanda was established to support their specific needs by partnering with local Rwandan NGOs to improve the lives of the children by 1) providing funding for their secondary school education, 2) linking their mothers to medical support services, income-generating activities and trauma counseling and 3) raising awareness of the consequences of genocide and sexual violence through photography and new media.

Currently all of Rwanda’s estimated 20,000 children born of rape will be turning eighteen and eligible for secondary school. While primary school in Rwanda is free, the annual cost for secondary school is $350, which includes school fees, books and uniforms. Foundation Rwanda is currently sponsoring the secondary school costs for over 800 children with the goal to sponsor as well as link them to higher education and vocational training. By partnering with local NGOs to establish outreach programs throughout the country, we confidentially identify these families, pay the mandatory secondary school fees directly to the partner schools and supply the necessary books, uniforms and transportation to enable the children to attend school.

Foundation Rwanda and Survivors Fund (SURF) recently piloted the first ever community trauma counseling initiative in partnership with local NGOs for 40 women with children born from rape and expanded trauma counseling to 200 women in 2013. Foundation Rwanda also connects families to a range of psychological, social and medical services provided by existing local partners such as Survivors Fund (SURF), Kanyarwanda, AVEGA, Indego Africa and Solace Ministries.

28 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground Photo by Jonathan Torgovnik / Foundation Rwanda

SWEET DREAMS

Judy Hochman Photo by Lisa Fruchtman

Photo by Lisa Fruchtman

A MIXTURE OF DELIGHT and amazement lights up the faces of customers tasting ice cream for the first time in their lives! They have come to Inzozi Nziza, or Sweet Dreams, the first-ever local ice cream shop in Rwanda.

The shop is a simple and, literally, sweet endeavor that came into being soon after an anything but sweet chapter in Rwandan history.

Opened in 2008 the shop brought to reality the inspired vision of Rwandan drummer and playwright, Odile Gakire Katese. Katese, known to most as Kiki, was fiercely determined to help restore her homeland and recognized that doing so required new ways of thinking and behaving.

Sweet Dreams was built on the “shoulders” of another of Kiki’s innovative projects. In 2004, only ten years after the genocide, Kiki brought together a group of women to form the country’s first female drumming troupe. Until then only Rwandan men were considered strong enough to drum. Kiki and her troupe set out to prove otherwise. Through practice and hard work they became a vital unifying force, providing a safe space for members, and signaling that the status of women in Rwanda was changing.

Then at a workshop at the Sundance Film Festival (Utah, USA) in 2008, Kiki met Jennie Dundas, co-owner with Alexis Meisen of Blue Marble Ice Cream in Brooklyn, New York. They discussed the fact that ice cream was unknown to most Rwandans—and Kiki made up her mind that despite the country’s erratic electricity supply and the opinions of many naysayers, ice cream would be a sweet way to create jobs and joy in the town of Butera.

She solicited the involvement of Meisen and Dundas and with $80,000 in funds raised from grants and donations, Sweet Dreams was launched. Established as a cooperative, the shop began with women selected from the drumming troupe who committed their time, the discipline that they had developed in drumming and some minimal funds. Blue Marble’s owners provided the initial training and support.

Today the Rwandan women are the sole owners, and their shop’s success has spilled over into the surrounding economy. Ingredient suppliers including bee keepers, dairy farmers and coffee bean growers are all benefitting as well.

The Sweet Dreams Ice Cream Shop, which offers a variety of flavors from passion fruit to Rwandan black tea and coffee along with sandwiches, salads, coffee and cakes, has become a community gathering place for people of all ages. Sweet Dreams is, indeed, a welcome example of the entrepreneurship that is on the rise in Rwanda— among women and men.

Photo by Lisa Fruchtman

PART TWO: Success Stories Come in All Shapes & Sizes • 29

IT’S A CYCLE: Success Breeds Challenges and Challenges Breed Success Faustin Mbundu RWANDA HAS WITNESSED remarkable growth over a period of 19 years. The country has seen improvement in different sectors such as agriculture, tourism, Information and Communication Technology (ICT), health and education—just to name a few. This is due to the country’s leadership that set the stage for economic growth as follows: to start, the leadership created a conducive social environment through the unity and reconciliation initiatives as well as attracting refugees back home, and embracing the “Vision 2020” strategy with development goals that aim to make Rwanda a middle income economy by the year 2020.

Today, the above and other reforms in doing business make Rwanda the second best place in Africa to do business. The country has invested heavily in agriculture so that food production has increased greatly hence guaranteeing food security. Investments in infrastructure have led to good roads, water and electricity access to more people each year.

With a previously huge illiterate population the education sector has seen great success by investment in schools and a policy for universal primary and secondary education.

The healthcare system has continued to offer insurance to about 90% of the population and healthcare workers equipped with phones and bikes to reach those in need of services in most parts of the country.

As a major part of the growing economy the ICT industry has seen interest from investors which led to new systems like fiber-optics that provide cheaper Internet options for the country. Owing to the existing peace and security due to a disciplined defense force and professional police, huge success continues to be seen in tourism, which is the fastest growing sector as the country continues to be internationally recognized as safe to visit. The tourist attractions are currently national parks and gorilla tracking.

However, some challenges still exist in the area of skills. There’s a need for a better trained and experienced workforce for rapid growth. The private sector has grown but is not yet strong enough to lead the way in steering the nation’s economic direction and more needs to be done in private investments. And as long as the rail network to the seaports is not in place, the cost of goods into and out of the country remains a big factor affecting competitiveness.

As far as growth of exports is concerned, it’s still a challenge, since it takes longer to grow the volumes and value of exports; still the import bill continues to rise!

Rwanda has registered remarkable progress and I believe that the challenges mentioned are being given the necessary attention.

30 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS FOR PART TWO •W hy is creating a reading culture in Rwanda important for individuals, for the nation and for international relations?

•M others reading to their children from an early age is a good start in creating a reading culture. Can such a program be launched throughout Rwanda?

•W hy is it important to develop ICT programs within higher education in Rwanda—and throughout Africa?

•W hy is private sector development so important in the push for self-determination in Rwanda?

•H ow does Health Builders work to change the health system in Rwanda to become self-sustaining?

PART TWO: Success Stories Come in All Shapes & Sizes • 31

32 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

PART ONE: Traditions and Mindset: Where the Past Meets the Present • 33 Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

PART THREE Challenges—Addressing them Head On

INTRODUCTION THE MAGNITUDE OF THE CHALLENGE that Rwandans have faced in the past twenty years is only exceeded by the unique demonstration of will and ingenuity that has made this small and poor country into a model for all of Africa and the world. Not only have Rwandans coped with the dread legacies of genocide; they have created and continue to build upon the foundations for a free society that can, if sustained, ensure that such a tragedy never occurs again.

34 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

PART THREE: Challenges—Adressing Them Head On • 35

I FELT AT HOME— I Wanted to Help the Healing Process in Rwanda Laszlo Gyulai I HAD NEVER BEEN IN AN AFRICAN COUNTRY before but I have been aware of the post-colonial struggles of many. As a boy in the 1960s I celebrated the liberation of African nations from colonial oppression and admired the new leaders of these countries. The first shock came to me when Patrice Lumumba was killed. I was young and it was the first experience I had that a national hero—as I saw him—was killed. It made me sad. As a young man I was also horrified by the mass killing by the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia and the fact that in the Yugoslavian civil war concentration camps were set up brought shivers through my body.

I am a second generation Holocaust survivor. I have lived all my life with the memory of those, including most of my family, who were brutally killed by the Nazis. My father survived the Matthausen Concentration Camp and as I became an adult he shared his experiences with me—but not before I turned 25 years old.

The genocide in Rwanda in 1994 was a tragedy that I took personally. It had the character of fueling artificiallyconceived ethnic hatred—people divided falsely as races; it had the brutality of cold-blooded murder with the intention of making a group of people disappear from the face of the earth. The horror of raping women before murdering them was beyond my ability to comprehend; it reminded me of the European Holocaust.

Before going to Rwanda I read all I could about the country. As a youth I had studied traditional cultures and visited villages in Hungary, which prepared me to understand another traditional society in the middle of change.

I was touched by the intense efforts at reconciliation among people in Rwanda despite the horrors they endured.

The Gacaca trials made sense to me. I was amazed at how these efforts helped to heal those who survived the terror.

And so I was prepared to pour my heart and mind into exploring whether I, as a psychiatrist, could do anything to help the healing of Rwandans. I felt that I had a responsibility to soothe those who suffered mentally because my parents helped me not to feel like a victim even though they had not gone through a process of reconciliation with their torturers. I am doing it for them; they taught me about fairness, the skills of survival and the moral obligation to help the less fortunate.

Sondra Myers encouraged me and invited me to go to Rwanda. She helped to make contacts with the stakeholders of reconciliation and the mental health services. I also made new friends outside this circle because I was intent on understanding how people live now and how they lived during the genocide. I made it a priority to respect the local culture and not propose anything that was not Rwandan. I did not want to be an American who has only American solutions for problems in the world—and specifically in Rwanda.

Let me describe some of my impressions and reflections:

36 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

I noticed that Kigali was orderly and clean. It was a relief for me to feel safe in a country that I did not know yet. I did notice the security personnel with guns on the street. I said to myself that this was needed after what happened there less than 20 years ago.

The mass graves at the Genocide Memorial in Kigali touched me as a stark reminder of the enormity of the genocide. As per Jewish custom I put a stone on one of the graves for the deceased to rest in peace as I was thinking of the unnamed mass graves in the garden of the synagogue in Budapest and my grandfather’s name carved on the wall of “Our Dead Heroes” in the Jewish cemetery there.

I saw a gardener using a machete to take care of the flowers. “What a contrast,” I thought! The instrument of killing is used in the Genocide Memorial for the most peaceful tasks. It is a striking symbol of our human capabilities for both kindness and brutality. How careful we must be to cultivate the good in us and to extirpate our most evil impulses. Indeed, it has become my quest to find the source of this murderous potential in our minds and souls. The members of the Ministry of Health I met emphasized that their efforts were to help ALL Rwandans to achieve reconciliation. The exceptional Bishop John Rucyahana said that all Rwandans survivors suffered—whether they were the victims of the atrocities or the perpetrators. This speaks to the universality of our strengths and failings as humans. The machete is in all of us.

At the first mental health facility I visited, I heard that many Rwandans did not know about this facility and the availability of any mental health services. I was not surprised as even in the USA many people are not aware of how to get help from mental health services. It was then that I got the idea to explore the possibility of a self-help group movement in Rwanda. Then and there we organized a round table discussion about the challenges of mental health treatment in Rwanda.

“ The exceptional Bishop John Rucyahana said that all Rwandans survivors suffered—whether they were the victims of the atrocities or the perpetrators. This speaks to the universality of our strengths and failings of humans. The machete is in all of us.”

Bishop John had identified the problem to Sondra in a conversation they had in August 2012. He emphasized that all Rwandans need help NOW no matter what role they played during the genocide, and that all must take full responsibility for it in order to heal and avoid future calamaties. I learned that many Rwandans have difficulty talking about their experiences and feelings outside their family. For the month of April they commemorate the genocide and the hidden pain finds an outlet, but what can people do during the other eleven months to mourn the women who were raped and the horrific moments when children discovered that their fathers were perpetrators? The effects of genocide are trans-generational—and poverty exacerbates the trauma.

PART THREE: Challenges—Adressing Them Head On • 37

On the other hand, I was inspired by the efforts being made by many organizations and by the Ministry of Health to help patients. They approach Post-Traumatic-Stress-Disorder (PTSD) not as a single illness but as connected syndromes including depression and other mental illnesses; it is an enlightened approach that takes the totality of human experience into account.

I proposed to Bishop John that we start a support group while I was in the country to demonstrate how it works and then organize a movement. He agreed. We had the first organizational meeting on the last day of my stay—poolside at the Umubano Hotel. We established the board of the start-up organization that is now led by Omar Ndizeye.

In Rwanda, ideas are put into practice quickly! I could hardly keep up with their pace!

The country is much more than Kigali. I was lucky to see villages and weddings; to talk to old people who survived the genocide and meet orphans who were raised by good families. I went to a high school dance performance and a cattle market; made friends with shopkeepers, butchers, drivers, artisans, lawyers, businessmen and villagers. The way people related to me was very similar to village people in Hungary. I felt at home. Rwanda and Hungary are different in appearances but the human experiences are the same.

I approached Rwanda with humility. I know “my” Holocaust is not “their” Genocide. We share the experience of suffering and surviving in our own ways, but underneath the surfaces, we connect. I hope my friends there will consider me their friend. I felt at home.

38 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

THE PSYCHOLOGICAL LEGACY OF GENOCIDE The National Commission for the Fight Against Genocide Odeth Kantengwa THROUGHOUT THE 20TH CENTURY genocides claimed many lives across the world. In Rwanda the genocide against the Tutsi was perpetrated with unprecedented violence and took more than one million lives.

It resulted in human and material losses, psychological trauma and serious social problems. In the aftermath of the genocide, programs have been put in place to deal with its psychological and social consequences.

Drawing on interviews conducted with 122 orphaned young survivors coming from all districts in Rwanda, as well as focus groups with survivor organizations, we conducted a study to examine the current psycho-social state of unmarried orphaned young (18-35) survivors. Using qualitative and quantitative analyses, we sought to: 1) identify ongoing psychological problems experienced by young genocide survivors 19 years after the genocide; 2) explore current interpersonal relationships among genocide survivors and their communities; and 3) explore young survivors’ perceptions of the psycho-social support provided to them since 1994.

Findings reveal that significant traumatic memories and psychological and social problems continue to affect survivors, related to factors such as genocide reminders, social isolation and lack of family. Participants expressed a negative or unclear outlook toward their future. The analyses indicate that orphaned survivors also face complex issues in their everyday lives related to rural isolation, property and educational resources.

The research presents a mixed picture about government-supported resources for orphans. It found that while the emotional support in survivors’ associations and various compensations are very helpful, resource access, timeliness, and information distribution remain problematic, especially in rural areas.

This research has major implications for how effectively the services and resources provided to survivors are promoted and distributed, raising questions and recommendations about possible structural flaws in the current aid system. It thus informs policy makers and planners in the field of post-genocide intervention of potential ways to modify or identify appropriate programs for genocide survivors.

PART THREE: Challenges—Adressing Them Head On • 39

TAKE NOTE: Talking Points from Shirley Randell’s January 2014 Newsletter Shirley Randell 1. Rwanda has increased its record top-of-the-world majority of women in Parliament to 64%.

2. As part of streamlining the country’s tertiary education sector and aligning it to international standards, the seven public universities in Rwanda have been merged into one, the University of Rwanda.

3. The Ministry of Health is collaborating with the Ministry of Education to integrate family planning into the curricula of higher learning institutions, engaging with the private sector and the clergy.

4. Statistics from last year’s Rwanda’s population census show a high probability of its population doubling by early 2030s. The country is currently growing at 2.6 per cent per annum with the population density rising to 412 from 321 in the 2002 census, second in the world after South Korea, threatening to overwhelm the country’s resources and service delivery. Kigali is the most densely populated region within Rwanda with 1,556 people per square kilometer, almost four times that of the entire country.

5. Esperance Muziganyi, the officer in charge of adult literacy in the Ministry of Education has announced that 8,600 literacy centers will be set up countrywide by 2015 to ensure that all Rwandans can read, write and count.

6. Rwanda is tracking to eliminate mother-to-child transmission of HIV by 2015.

7. In celebration of the 2nd Annual International Day of the Girl in October, Rwanda won the UN’s global My World People’s Choice Award for the distribution of 70,000 My World Surveys on the post-2015 agenda this spring. Her Excellency Madame Jeanette Kagame, Rwanda’s First Lady, said of the win, “We believe our youth are the present and the future. That’s why we continue to invest in them with specific attention to girls and young women.”

8. Clarisse Iribagiza, a young Rwandan technology entrepreneur, has been listed among the top 100 global thinkers by an Italian think tank, LSDP; another Rwandan information and telecommunication technology entrepreneur and guru, Violette Uwamutara, country director of Digital Opportunity Trust, has won the prestigious Anita Borg Institute Change Agent Award in the US. 9. As the world marked 16 Days of Activism against Gender Based Violence, Rwanda, which has a zero tolerance policy to GBV, decided on the theme: “Fighting GBV is my Responsibility.” The campaign brought on board various actors, agencies, faith-based organizations, and civil society to raise awareness about the occurrence and magnitude of GBV and its impact.

40 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

Photo by Jonathan Torgovnik / Foundation Rwanda

10. The Minister for Gender and Family Promotion, Oda Gasinzigwa, has declared that peace-keeping missions can only be successful if women are brought on board.

11. The Government has appointed Ambassador Valentine Sendanyoye Rugwabiza as a Cabinet minister and CEO of the Rwanda Development Board (RDB). In May 2013 Jeune Afrique magazine named Rugwabiza and Clare Akamanzi, who has been acting RDB CEO and is now its chief operating officer, among the 25 most influential women in business on the African continent.

PART THREE: Challenges—Adressing Them Head On • 41

THE OFFICE OF THE OMBUDSMAN: Curbing Corruption Nadege Nzeyimana

THE OFFICE OF THE OMBUDSMAN was created in 2004 to prevent and fight injustice, corruption and other related offences. The office conducts programs that raise public awareness of the rights of citizens and the evils of corruption, solves cases of injustice, verifies the accuracy of the declaration of assets of senior public officials and civil servants who manage public funds, conducts operational audits in public and private institutions to detect whether there are any loopholes and monitors the code of conduct of high-ranking officials.

The office organizes fieldwork for solving cases of injustice. Fieldworkers analyze the cases at the grassroots level in the presence of local leaders and concerned citizens, facilitating settlement of complaints by avoiding long journeys and eliminating transportation costs associated with travel. The office also uses other channels to receive complaints including a toll-free line, a website and anti-corruption cyber cafés that are managed by youth in various districts.

Rwanda’s fight against corruption is visible at the international level. The Transparency International Corruption Index ranks Rwanda among the least corrupt countries in the world and the least corrupt country in Africa. In addition the 2010 World Bank World Governance Indicator Report showed that Rwanda made good progress in combating corruption compared to other countries in sub-Saharan Africa. This anti-corruption reflects Rwanda’s political will, a zero tolerance for corruption and the country’s legal framework and enforcement.

Although Rwanda is on the right path in the war against corruption, curbing it is a long process that requires the cooperation of many stakeholders. The government partners with public institutions, the private sector and other organizations on a national anti-corruption policy. To raise public awareness, the office organizes an anti-corruption week every year.

In addition, a National Anti-Corruption Advisory Council has been formed to ensure strong collaboration and information exchange between all public institutions involved in the fight against corruption. It is comprised of the Ministry of Justice, the Ministry of Local Government, the Supreme Court, the National Public Prosecution Authority, the Rwanda National Police and the National Intelligence and Security Service.

The office invests in Rwanda’s youth by enhancing the role of anti-corruption clubs in secondary schools and higher education institutions. In May 2013 we held a cartoon competition for primary and secondary school students with the intention of increasing public awareness. The Ministry of Education also plans to promote the value of integrity within the curriculum of Rwanda’s primary and secondary schools.

To eradicate corruption fully will require the development of international collaborations to trace assets from the embezzlement of funds as well as an increase in the staffing available to monitor the development not only of e-procurement, but also e-payment systems. Because of the need for international collaboration, the Office of the Ombudsman is a member of several regional anti-corruption associations in East Africa and the Commonwealth.

42 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS FOR PART THREE •W hy is access to mental health services so important to genocide survivors and their families?

•G iven the shortage of psychiatrists in Rwanda, what is the most effective way to deal with mental health issues, particularly those related to the genocide?

•W hat measures are being taken towards research into the history of the genocide and both the understanding and treatment of post-traumatic disorders related to it?

•W hy is corruption a serious problem in developing countries? Describe the ways in which Rwanda deals with the problem of corruption.

PART THREE: Challenges—Adressing Them Head On • 43

44 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

PART ONE: Traditions and Mindset: Where the Past Meets the Present • 45

PART FOUR Reflections from Foreign Observers and Sojourners

INTRODUCTION RWANDA IS UNIQUE IN MANY WAYS. Its vigor and commitment to the present and future are extraordinary. People take notice of that but also wonder about the impact of the genocide on individuals and the nation itself. Foreigners who work in the country reflect on the place—its courage and compassion, its successes and challenges and what the future holds.

46 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

DIGNIFYING DESIGN

John Cary and Courtney E. Martin IN 2006 A 26-YEAR OLD ARCHITECTURE STUDENT, Michael Murphy, approached the global health pioneer Paul Farmer after a lecture at Harvard. Mr. Murphy asked which architects Dr. Farmer had worked with to build the clinics, housing, schools and even the roads he had described in his talk. An aspiring social entrepreneur, Mr. Murphy was hoping to put his design degree to use by apprenticing with the humanitarian architects aiding Dr. Farmer’s work. But it turns out, those architects didn’t exist.

“I drew the last clinic on a napkin,” Dr. Farmer told Mr. Murphy.

Soon after, Mr. Murphy flew to Rwanda, where he and a few other students, including Alan Ricks and Marika Shioiri-Clark, became Dr. Farmer’s architects. Mr. Murphy lived in the country for over a year while the Butaro Hospital, which laborers built with local materials, was designed. Now, a site that was once a military outpost is home to a 150-bed, 60,000-square-foot health care center that served 21,000 people in its first year and currently employs 270, most of them locals in an area with chronic unemployment.

The Butaro Hospital is a breathtaking building with intricate lava rock walls made of stones cut by Rwandan masons, and it is full of brightly colored accent walls and breezeways bathed in light and air. Deep-green flora blossom everywhere. For the 340,000 people who live in this region of Northern Rwanda, the project marks a literal reclamation: an area that was once a site of genocidal violence is now a center for state-of-the-art medical care. Healing happens there. An unmistakable grace permeates the place.

Building the hospital under the auspices of the nonprofit MASS Design Group (MASS stands for a Model of Architecture Serving Society), Mr. Murphy, Mr. Ricks, and Ms. Shioiri-Clark relied on Dr. Farmer’s theory of a “preferential option for the poor.” The idea—adopted from liberation theology—is that the poor deserve the best quality intervention because they’ve been given the least by luck and circumstance. The students’ naïve audacity, coupled with Dr. Farmer’s wisdom and experience, resulted in a building that has set a new standard for public-interest design.

It used to be that young people with humanitarian aspirations went into law or medical school or applied to Teach for America or the Peace Corps. But today, increasing numbers of the most innovative change makers have, like Mr. Murphy, Mr. Ricks and Ms. Shioiri-Clark, decided to try to design their way to a more beautiful, just world.

This new breed of public-interest designers proceeds from a belief that everybody deserves good design, whether in a prescription bottle label that people can more easily read and understand, a beautiful pocket park to help a city breathe or a less stressful intake experience at the emergency room. Dignity may be to the burgeoning field of public-interest design as justice is to the more established public-interest law.

From “Cary, J. and Martin, C.E. (2012, October 7). Dignifying Design. The New York Times.” Copyright by The New York Times, PARS International Corp. Reprinted with permission.

PART FOUR: Reflections from Foreign Observers and Sojourners • 47

RWANDA’S HISTORIC HEALTH RECOVERY: What the U.S. Might Learn Neal Emery Over the past decade in Rwanda, deaths from HIV, TB, and malaria dropped by 80 percent, maternal mortality dropped by 60 percent, life expectancy doubled—all at an average health care cost of $55 per person per year.

AMIDST THE BARRAGE OF STORIES about failing states and civil wars that characterize the dour American media coverage of the developing world, the reinvention of Rwanda offers hope. Since the genocide with which its name is still synonymous in the United States, Rwanda has doubled its life expectancy and now offers a replicable model for delivery of high quality health care with limited resources.

Dr. Paul Farmer, Chair of the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School and co-founder of Partners In Health, says that, “Rwanda has shown on a national level that you can break the cycle of poverty and disease.”

In the wake of the genocide that killed nearly one million people in 1994, such a turnaround seemed nearly impossible. Rwanda was a failed state mired in poverty and chaos. The genocide decimated Rwanda’s health facilities and workforce, allowing infectious diseases to run rampant and more than one in four children to die before their fifth birthday. Normally in such situations, economic development stagnates because disease cripples workers and the national economy, leaving the country too poor to effectively reduce the burden of disease.

With a life expectancy of only 30 the year after the genocide, Rwanda looked poised to follow this pattern.

Over the last ten years, Rwanda’s health system development has led to the most dramatic improvements of health in history. Rwanda is the only country in sub-Saharan Africa on track to meet most of the Millennium Development Goals. Deaths from HIV, TB, and malaria have each dropped by roughly 80 percent over the last decade and the maternal mortality ratio dropped by 60 percent over the same period. Even as the population has increased by 35 percent since 2000, the number of annual child deaths has fallen by 63 percent.

In turn, these advances bolstered Rwanda’s economic growth: GDP per person tripled to $580, and millions lifted themselves from poverty over the last decade.

The rest of the world, wealthy countries as well as poor, can learn from Rwanda’s rapid rise. Too often, though, experts imply that Rwanda’s results are inseparable from the genocide.

In this explanation, the genocide created a “clean slate” on which Rwanda could build a new health system thanks to an influx of health aid from wealthy countries feeling guilty about what happened. However, in the years immediately following the genocide, Rwanda received the least health aid of anywhere in sub-Saharan Africa, as many organizations wrote the country off as a lost cause. Even today, Rwanda achieves its superb improvement while spending only $55 per person on health care and public health per year—22nd among the 49 countries in sub-Saharan Africa.

From “Emery, Neal. (2013, February 20). Rwanda’s Historic Health Recovery: What the U.S. Might Learn. The Atlantic.” Used with permission of The Atlantic Copyright@2013. All rights reserved.

48 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

A MINISTER WITHOUT A CONVOY

Chika Ezeanya

KIGALI, RWANDA: I stood outside the beautiful Serena Hotel conference hall lobby chatting on my phone.

It was 8:35 AM and I had arrived a little too early for the conference that was slated for 9:00 AM. With a minister giving the opening remarks, and being in Africa, I reckoned that the event would commence at about 10:30 AM, giving the busy minister enough time to attend to other urgent matters.

At 8:55 AM an unremarkable jeep pulled up in front of the hotel. A man dressed in a suit I would consider not too fashionable alighted, clutching some files. He walked briskly past me towards the hall. Must be some civil servant conference participant, I noted casually. At about 9:05 AM the sound of opening activities came to me from within the hall. Excellent, I thought, no African time here.

I asked of my Rwandan colleague, “How could the conference organizers have commenced without the minister who was billed to be one of the very first to address the audience?”

“The minister is here,” he replied. I followed the polite nod of his head as his eyes rested on the simple looking man who passed me earlier.

“OK, he sent a representative,” I responded as I busied myself going through the event schedule.

“No. He is the minister,” my colleague insisted.

Welcome to Rwanda—the African country where government ministers are not entitled to any extra car allowance and definitely no sirens. A minister in Rwanda is the epitome of simplicity. Contrast this with the situation in several African countries. In Kenya, for instance, ministers on the bill of the government purchase a range of vehicles including top-of the-line Mercedes Benzes, Volvos and powerful four-wheeldrives like Range Rovers, Land Cruisers, Nissan Patrols and Toyota Prados. In his first year in power in 2002 President Mwai Kibaki’s government set to task purchasing high-end luxury vehicles. Between January 2003 and September 2004, the new government spent at least 878 million Kenya shillings (about $12 million) in the purchase of luxury cars that were largely for the personal use of senior government officials such as ministers, assistant ministers and permanent secretaries according to a Transparency International report.

A minister in Nigeria reportedly has over 30 aides and travels in long convoys of siren-blaring cars. Federal ministers, senior army, air force and naval officers, state commissioners, local government chairmen and others are entitled to cars and to the use of sirens. When in late 2011 President Jonathan announced—during the launch of the Federal Road Safety Commission’s new drivers’ license and number plates—a nationwide ban on the use of sirens by unauthorized persons, few Nigerians took him seriously.

Rwanda stands as an example for every African country. Government service is not for personal enrichment or self-aggrandizement. A minister is a servant of the people and should always present himself or herself as such, and not as their lord.

Chika blogs at www.chikaforafrica.com PART FOUR: Reflections from Foreign Observers and Sojourners • 49

YES, WE CAN AID OURSELVES: Rwanda’s Agaciro Fund and Lessons for Africa Chika Ezeanya I SAT STARING INCREDULOUSLY at my colleagues. Events were taking some time to sink in.

“Ariko, what I am saying,” continued the middle aged lecturer in Kinyarwanda, “is that although the university management is asking for one month of our salary, we should be allowed to give as much as we wish, sibyo?” I directed a dependent gaze toward the interpreter as he turned the speaker’s sounds into words that made sense to me. “I for one will want to give much more than one month’s salary and so will other people I know in this institution, murakoze.” The man concluded to a sounding ovation from the predominantly Rwandan faculty.

I mustered a heavy-handed clap in my dazed state. One year into my sojourn in Rwanda and things keep getting more absurd. Born and raised in Nigeria, I studied in Europe and the United States—culminating in a Ph.D. in African Studies. I thought I knew Africa from within and without until I came to Rwanda.

The meeting of that day was called by the management of the university where I worked to discuss staff contributions to the Agaciro Fund. Agaciro means dignity. The Agaciro Development Fund was set up as a voluntary contribution from citizens toward the development of Rwanda. It became necessary as a result of the unreliability of funds from aid donors—on which the country depends for about 45% of its annual budget. In mid-2012, and at a crucial moment in the nation’s fiscal year, donors, citing political reasons, suspended aid running into millions of dollars to this landlocked and mineral-poor African country. It was a calculated move that was aimed at making the Rwandans kneel before the ‘aid givers’ so that children would not die in hospitals nor be without education for the year.

The government and people of Rwanda decided otherwise. “Agaciro,” they declared; “we have dignity, value, self-respect. Yes, we can aid ourselves to be the best we can be.”

Less than one month after its August 23rd launch, the fund had gathered about 18 billion Rwf (roughly $30 million) in its coffers. It came from friends, colleagues and acquaintances and the press reported the most touching stories of students giving of their allowances, commercial motorcyclists turning over their daily earnings, workers giving as much as three months’ salary, business people selling landed properties—all to contribute to the Agaciro Fund. On television, radio and in community gatherings, passionate speaker after speaker denounced dependence on foreigners for sustenance and encouraged fellow citizens to contribute to the fund.

At my institution I raised my hand very high to give my one-month’s salary. I am not from Rwanda and my contribution may not amount to a drop of water in the Agaciro bucket, but everywhere Africans have determined to preserve their dignity. There is an obligation on all Africans to participate—be it in Rwanda, Nigeria, South Africa or in the Diaspora.

Chika blogs at www.chikaforafrica.com 50 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

Excerpts From EMERGING VOICES: Women’s Employment in Rwanda Lisa Martilotta THE ONLY INVESTMENT with the possibility of infinite returns is the investment in youth, and more particularly, young women. Nobel laureates, political leaders, and celebrity NGO founders all agree on this, but as Isobel Coleman* wrote on her blog in December, “the challenge remains: how can we bridge the everincreasing gap between youth development and the demanding market?”

We launched the Akilah Institute for Women (Akilah) in 2010 in the capital of Rwanda, Kigali, to meet the needs of both marginalized rural women and the booming private sector. Akilah is a college for young women offering three-year diploma programs in market-relevant fields. If you’re an East African woman, odds are that you will be married and pregnant before twenty rather than attending classes, since school is an investment that many families reserve for their boys.

Meanwhile, Rwanda’s private sector logs regular complaints of a poorly trained workforce that cannot meet the need for skilled professionals. Taking these phenomena into account, Akilah set out to build a bridge connecting young women to the fastest-growing sectors of the economy. We quickly realized that in East Africa, education and training institutes don’t typically collaborate with the private sector—and vice versa. They are also rarely affordable to the overwhelming majority of women. Our solution was to offer fairly priced higher education that incorporates two crucial elements: market-relevant curricula and professional development programs that connect graduates directly to the workforce.

Our vision is to expand into a network of campuses for women across East Africa. The demand definitely exists: the constant flow of new applicants, as well as requests by other local and national authorities for a campus in their jurisdiction, illustrates the dire need for such scalable institutions that invest in youth, women and the workforce. And the model is scalable for two main reasons: first, we have created a scalable package of specially tailored curricula and related academic programs for East African women to ensure ease of implementation at each new campus; and second, we have strong support from like-minded global investors.

Youth, workforce, and market development has consequences for all nations, especially low-income ones.

The World Bank and others have argued that insufficient job opportunities correlate with intolerance, low civic engagement, and low levels of optimism about the future. This creates the conditions for social strife everywhere, and may have been among the precursors for the genocide that cost the lives of almost a million people in Rwanda in 1994. So why aren’t more like-minded institutions popping up in areas where youth are unemployed? We see three reasons:

* Isobel Coleman is senior fellow for U.S. Foreign Policy at the Council on Foreign Relations.

PART FOUR: Reflections from Foreign Observers and Sojourners • 51

Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

1. Too many academic institutions do not firmly grasp the intimate connection between their mission and the growth of a nation.

2. It costs institutional time, energy, and resources to engage in deep and meaningful collaboration with private-sector partners. Academic institutions often prioritize other things that lead to donor dollars or income.

3. The private and public sectors too often fail to play a tangible role (most importantly, with funding) in the development of academic institutions. They either do not see their connection with national development or deem the investment too costly and instead adopt short-term approaches to profit. But for those educational institutions that embrace the maxim that the only investment with infinite returns is in connecting young people to growing organizations and markets, the benefits far outweigh the costs.

52 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

EMPOWERING GENOCIDE SURVIVORS

Archibald Henry

IN JULY 2012 I traveled to Rwanda with a friend from Canada to volunteer with the National Youth Council in the Kinyinya sector of Kigali. Our task was to bring new energy and excitement to projects of Kinyinya’s talented youth and to promote entrepreneurship and grassroots development in the sector. I came back to the U.S. with a strong interest in development issues, particularly at the local level, but also with a strong desire to learn more about Rwanda’s complex history. Thus during my final year of college, I wrote my senior thesis on Rwanda’s post-genocide reconstruction, exploring the powerful role of national unity in promoting peace and stability within society. As this academic exercise further fuelled my passion for this fascinating country, I returned in 2013 to visit friends and embark on a new Rwanda experience.

I currently intern at Rwanda’s National Commission for the Fight against Genocide (CNLG), dealing with such issues as genocide prevention, nation building and justice and reparation for victims of the genocide. I conduct research and assist the CNLG in planning its participation in the commemoration of the 20th anniversary of the genocide from April to July, 2014.

I have developed friendships with many genocide survivors and have come to know the leaders of the Association of Student Survivors of Genocide (AERG), an organization with more than 40,000 members in secondary schools and universities throughout the country. AERG provides survivors with a variety of social, financial, legal and moral support systems. Many are orphans or have no immediate relatives at all. Some continue to suffer daily from trauma and moral dilemmas and also struggle with legal issues related to land and inheritance.

In addition AERG runs a variety of programs that aim to empower young survivors by educating them for the job market. They include entrepreneurship training, ICT training, mentoring and English language training.

A major challenge that AERG national leaders face is securing the sustainable development of their organization. At this time it relies heavily on grants from the government, NGOs and other development partners.

In spite of its challenges AERG’s national leaders have big dreams; they are bright, dynamic and ambitious.

They plan to create hundreds of jobs for vulnerable youth through a variety of income-generating projects.

They are running a school called The Kigali Language Exchange which offers professional language training to companies and their employees and they plan to develop a large event-hosting business in Kigali. In addition they hope to jumpstart a meat production project in Rwanda’s Eastern Province. These initiatives testify to AERG’s commitment to becoming a financially independent organization that is more efficient and effective in addressing the needs of genocide survivors.

Though such challenges as trauma and unemployment persist, many survivors are completing their education, developing new skills and finding employment or starting their own businesses.

It is essential to keep listening to their stories. Education and the preservation of memory are the pillars of genocide prevention.

PART FOUR: Reflections from Foreign Observers and Sojourners • 53

PUBLIC SPACES BRING PEOPLE TOGETHER

Anjuli Solanki

PUBLIC SPACES COME IN A VARIETY OF FORMS—from streetscapes and bus stops to markets, public plazas, parks and sport and recreational arenas. What truly identifies public spaces is that the government—the public sector—typically owns them and that they are free of charge and equally accessible to all citizens. That makes them important areas where interactions can take place between and among different sectors of society. Through these opportunities of interaction and engagement, public spaces can act as a catalyst for strengthening civil society.

Kigali is a unique metropolis with a unique population and vision and fairly unified goals. At the same time, it is a city of polarized lifestyles, incomes, and built environments. The places that have the potential to reconcile this polarization are public spaces. But some of Kigali’s current public spaces have major limitations. Its roundabouts are too noisy, polluted and difficult to get to. Its parks are often small, beautiful green spaces that people can either not enter—or—that lack amenities such as adequate seating, and are inaccessible by public transport.

Even though there is a perception that recognizing the importance of public spaces requires a mindset change, it is also acknowledged that traditionally public spaces were present in Rwandan society. Traditional placement of homesteads, Kukarubanda*, Ihuriro*, Gacaca*, Urubohero*, and market spaces, are all examples of traditional public spaces. Further disputing this perception is that some of the most active users of Kigali’s existing public spaces are those of the lower and middle classes, who make up the majority of the population and have had the least exposure to western concepts of public space.

There is a demand amongst all sectors of society for public spaces that not only offer places for relaxation and recreation, but also provide opportunities for interaction between differing groups of society—a necessary component for civil society. The need and desire for public spaces have resulted in people appropriating nonofficial public spaces for that use. That indicates that there is a demand for public spaces and a willingness to transform existing places to meet that demand. This ‘appropriation’ not only shows the entrepreneurial nature of people finding their own solutions, but also offers the potential of improving these spaces to further enhance their function as public spaces. The common desire for more public spaces across demographics indicates a level of societal cohesion and recognition that it is a means to mitigate income and societal polarization —which negatively impacts all members of society. This social cohesion can be further facilitated through an increase of high quality, accessible public spaces. * Kukarubanda is a traditional public space, literally meaning ‘at the place of the people’: ku = at, ka = of, rubanda = the people/public.

The areas outside of the King’s house (and chiefs), where the public would wait to meet with the king and discuss their problems. *

Ihuriro is a gathering place where people used to meet.

* Gacaca were grasslands which acted like a village square where serious and general societal issues were discussed. Where complaints were heard and where elders used to recite cases. Today it is known as the community-based tribunal where genocide crimes were confessed, tried, and discussed. * Urubohero is the area where teenage girls would come together to weave near the wetlands. This place would be where girls would talk and educate each other about the transformation for girlhood to womanhood. This area was forbidden to boys and men.

54 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS FOR PART FOUR •H ow can architectural design make a difference in developing countries?

•W hat factors contributed to Rwanda’s rapid rise from disease and poverty and from the genocide itself?

•H ow has Rwandans’ generosity in contributing to the rebuilding of their country spurred a culture of citizenship—or was it their spirit of responsible citizenship that prompted them to give support to this important project personally?

•W hat is the role of public spaces in a democratic society? How can they build a sense of community?

•W hat role could/should a dynamic cultural life play in the rebuilding of Rwanda as a modern nation among nations?

PART FOUR: Reflections from Foreign Observers and Sojourners • 55

56 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

PART ONE: Traditions and Mindset: Where the Past Meets the Present • 57 Photo by Jonathan Torgovnik / Foundation Rwanda

58 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

PART FIVE Young People Speak—Dream—and Choose

INTRODUCTION RWANDA INSPIRES ITS YOUNG PEOPLE to think, to dream, to hope and to act. Perhaps that inspiration is the greatest gift a nation can offer its youth. It means that there is a future and the future is theirs to choose. Young women and men are both entrepreneurs and citizens, committed to prosperity and the public good.

They have strong opinions and high aspirations. They are encouraged to choose their own destinies, both personally and nationally.

They are the future that every nation desires.

PART FIVE: Young People Speak—Dream—and Choose • 59 Photo by Jonathan Torgovnik / Foundation Rwanda

THE NEXT TWENTY YEARS: Giving the Young a Voice

Nathalie Munyampenda

RWANDA IS A COUNTRY OF CONTRADICTIONS. Just 20 years ago the ground was littered with bodies; the stench of death was so strong that it was hard to escape it. Our recovery has been miraculous, and not only in terms of security or infrastructure. The greatest miracle in Rwanda is how people have recovered their dignity and hope.

Hope can be an abstract word. I’ve heard it used as an anesthetic that lulls people into complacency. In Rwanda however, we have reason to hope. We know the future is bright, not because we cross our fingers, but because we see that hard work and vision have paid off in the last two decades. We see what fighting for what is right: inclusiveness, consultative government and home grown solutions, has accomplished. It has given young people a model to admire and follow.

Rwanda’s successes are too many to enumerate but let me touch on a few that, as a young person, I see as key drivers of sustainable development. To start, the Rwandan government tells its citizens where it wants to go and aligns all projects in that direction. For example, the second poverty reduction strategy, building on the progress of the last 10 years, will focus on private-sector development, including rural renewal, affordable housing, energy, creating off-farm jobs and increasing technical and vocational training.

Second is the impressive amount of detailed planning that goes into long-term projects. Vision is important but so is result-based management. Questions you hear often in Rwanda are, “Does it work? Can it be adjusted? Do we scrap it all together? What have we learned?” These are important because we are dealing with people’s lives and futures!

“ The greatest miracle in Rwanda is how people have recovered their dignity and hope.”

Third, Rwanda’s leadership and strategic investments have spawned an entrepreneurial spirit among young people. A nation stagnates when young people are discouraged from innovating. When you present our President with a very serious problem, he will ask you, “So what should we do?” People are given room to think of new ways of solving problems. Almost every young person I know is working on side projects to fill an existing gap in the market.

Still challenges remain. The education system needs improvement. We need more than new text books and IT sources; we need new approaches to teaching. Studies have shown that participatory teaching that allows critical thinking and project-oriented problem solving equips students to face an ever changing marketplace.

We must focus on teacher-training and a curriculum overhaul.

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Relevant internships are also beneficial for students; they gain experience and exposure that make them more employable. Important too is on-the-job training for management positions, giving younger people the opportunity to aspire to management.

Another important challenge we have is strengthening the private sector. Our exports need to be diversified and our markets expanded.

“ We know the future is bright, not because we cross our fingers, but because we see that hard work and vision have paid off in the last two decades.”

We also have a growing need for energy while abiding by our environmental commitments.

Yes, we have challenges—but we have good reason for hope.

Twenty years ago our challenges seemed insurmountable. In 1998 I sat reading for my chemistry finals under candlelight because we hadn’t had power at home for weeks. Today one village after another is getting electricity and the government is signing key partnerships to expand our supply, especially for businesses.

In South Korea the government drove the private sector, specifically ICT and manufacturing, until the sector could sustain itself. Today South Korea runs on the private sector. We should examine that model of development in Rwanda.

Our strength has always been our people. Young Rwandans today have an undeniable advantage. They are given incredible opportunities to make a difference in their communities. They can innovate and lead, both here and beyond our borders. Most importantly, they have a voice.

It’s time to use that voice.

PART FIVE: Young People Speak—Dream—and Choose • 61

SUCCESSES AND CHALLENGES

Eric I. Gatera

SUCCESS IS A TRICKY WORD. Different people use it differently. The free online dictionary defines it as the achievement of something desired and planned. I have no reason to redefine it. My experience has been that success in Rwanda is a feasible process in some ways but not necessarily in others. Let me relate two personal experiences to capture that: First, I was successful in writing a book in 2011 that was published in the United States by the Xulon Publishing House. However I have had difficulty in selling the book in Rwanda. I believe that its topic and research were solid, but obviously that wasn’t enough. My suspicion is that the book would have done better in western countries where reading is a culture and quite an established habit.

Second, in late 2011 a friend and I were involved in a start-up company, El Puente ltd. In just one year in the business we reached preeminence. I was crowned as one of the top three young entrepreneurs in 2012 at the BPR Awards during Global Entrepreneurship Week. I went on the air and was written up in several news outlets. So how come El Puente ltd. has been out of the market since July 2013? What made us suspend our services in the second year of our business? Simple. The technical word for that is ‘margin of utility.’ In other words, the cost calculation was ambitiously short-sighted. In the desire to bring our services to the market, we cut costs and made it customer-friendly to the point that our margin of benefit started to weaken dangerously. So we jumped out of the Titanic before it shipwrecked; but, El Puente ltd. didn’t shipwreck. We saved it by freezing it for a while. It gave us breathing room to think about how to stay in business longer next time.

Not everything I have undertaken has ended in failure. I do hold hope for the future. Paradoxically, I base it on my performance in the past; I do see my own past achievement as a blueprint for the future.

In the past we believed that we could make gargantuan strides as a nation and today we are seeing the realization of those long-standing projects we believed in. Rwanda has gone through a metamorphosis and some of us have been fortunate to experience it—even to be a part of it! This experience leads me to believe that things will continue to get better if we keep on track, avoiding all sorts of temptation to go off-track. We hope that things will go as planned—even though we know by experience that nothing goes exactly according to plan. Hope may not be the best way to motivate all young people, but it certainly works with me. There is also hope for the future for those who walk with the assumption that there is a God who strengthens those who call upon him.

As for challenges, developing a reading culture is still a challenge in Rwanda. I am surprised that some people refer to the reading habit here as a reading culture.

I have accepted this hard reality, and I have no clue as to what should really be done to change this situation.

I leave this analysis and proposal to someone else who is better qualified to speak on how to change a cultural tendency or even better, on how to bring a new culture into existence.

62 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

THE POST-GENOCIDE RWANDA, Successes and Challenges on the Ground Eric Mahoro AFTER THE GENOCIDE perpetrated against the Tutsi in Rwanda in 1994 it was hard to believe that the country would recover. The communities suffered from the total devastation of their socio-economic systems.

Thousands of refugees, genocide survivors left in critical conditions, the pressures of rebuilding the unity of the people to live together again and the struggle to provide justice after the remarkable failure of the international community made it even harder to imagine how the country would come back into life.

It is now twenty years down the road. Rwanda has achieved remarkable progress. The fast-developing infrastructure, including in the rural areas, is one of the commendable results of a strong Economic Development and Poverty Reduction Strategy (EDPRS) put in place by the post-genocide government. This has been enhanced by multi-sector collaborations between the government, the private sector and civil society organizations.

The reconciliation of the people of Rwanda is another step made. Rwandans are enjoying an inclusive system in various domains including education, a non-discriminatory labor market and the governance systems.

Trust among ethnic groups is also progressing at its own pace.

However there are still many challenges. While there is a high infrastructure development rate, Rwanda is faced by the mismatch between the number of graduates and job market absorption. The government is multiplying job creation efforts through its EDPRS 2, but the small business mortality rate is still high, hence affecting youth empowerment.

There are also hardships in fully addressing the issues resulting from a traumatic past. Despite the fact that over one million Rwandans have been lifted out of poverty through EDPRS in the last 5 years, there are still a large number of people living in extreme need.

Besides, as the consequence of what many believe to be “the poor divisions of countries” at a conference held in Berlin in the 19th century, there are thousands of people who consider themselves more closely related to Rwandans who found themselves in the DRC, Tanzania and Uganda. It has made for cross-cutting conflicts based on ethnic and national issues still affecting Rwanda. Such has been the case for the conflict in the Eastern DRC and Tanzania where the displacement of Rwandophone populations constitutes a menace to Rwanda and to the region.

According to Rwanda’s president, Paul Kagame, “My vision of Rwanda is a united country that feels itself as integrated into the sub-region family of nations, a country that is developed and has eradicated poverty, a country that is democratic, and above all, a stable country at peace with itself as well as with its neighbors.”

Despite the challenges, Rwanda has the vision depicted in the above quote from President Kagame. The question remains as to whether we will keep our commitments for generations to come.

PART FIVE: Young People Speak—Dream—and Choose • 63

HIGHER EXPECTATIONS FOR HIGHER EDUCATION

Dominique Ingabe Kalisa

IN THE LAST 5 TO 7 YEARS a spotlight has been focused on Rwanda’s youth. The government has encouraged entrepreneurship and innovation. The community of young professionals is vibrant and competitive.

They are given a platform to express their ideas, to try something new, to make a difference. However, new graduates often fail to pick up on the challenge. Some explain that they need to learn the basics on the job before moving beyond. They feel a gap between the professional world and the academic world. To close the gap, higher education institutions will have to adopt a new approach; they need to prepare the youth for the actual demands of the professional world today. In short we need new graduates who are prepared for hard work and innovation. Our higher education institutions need to demand more—to integrate high expectations into every aspect of the students’ work.

Whatever the field, innovation only comes when there is a solid knowledge of the basics along with the will to improve on what’s already available in order to meet the ever-changing demands of the market. It is the role of higher education to impart such knowledge but also to go a little further and instill the will to do better, to deliver quality work. Each class, each project, each report—every assignment—should be used as an opportunity for students to develop their intellectual skills; students need to be challenged to think further and learn something new—to think “outside the box.” By expecting more from our youth, we encourage them to tap into the potential that many of them have—and did not even imagine that they had. It’s important for our youth—and it’s important for our country!

Photo by Sean Scanlin

64 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

THE WOUNDS OF A VOICE FROM THE POST GENOCIDE GENERATION Jean Michel Habineza WHEN WE TALK ABOUT GENOCIDE, the main narrative is the dichotomy between the perpetrators and the victims. When one talks about reconciliation, it’s about the healing of the relationship between the perpetrators (Hutu) and the victims (Tutsi). Though this narrative has some truth behind it, it does not account for the majority of people who are in the middle ground.

It is no secret that our post-genocide generation suffers from the physical and emotional consequences of the genocide. The issues of reconciliation in our fathers’ generation are different from ours: we do not have to answer the same questions. We must answer such questions as “What does it mean to be Rwandan?” Though we have been taught by our government and our families that all we have to be is Rwandan, I don’t believe that this kind of superficial brushing off of the real questions can actually solve people’s problems; it’s not the best way to deal with the dilemma.

In order to have a changed generation we need to change our mindsets--mindsets do not change by policing or imposing laws that restrict people from talking about them, but rather through debate and discussion. We must address the ugly realities and the messiness of our lives in a direct and honest way. Not doing so can have dire consequences.

That said, in the midst of this messiness what is happening in Rwanda is still a beautiful and an amazing statement of the beauty of the human spirit. Nowhere in the world have such acts of evilness happened; no place has experienced so much pain and betrayal; BUT at the same time, no country has accomplished so effectively what many Christians call restoration and revival.

“ This generation is growing up with an attitude that says that despite our differences we can work together to bring change to our society.”

Twenty-five percent of the Rwandan population is under the age of 24, which means that many are growing up in a country where they don’t have to run for their lives. They are growing up in a generation where they feel equally important as any person from anywhere else in the world. This generation is growing up with an attitude that says that despite our differences we can work together to bring change to our society. This generation has been dubbed the “AGACIRO* GENERATION.” This generation will take Rwanda to another level, * Agaciro means diginity

PART FIVE: Young People Speak—Dream—and Choose • 65

making it a nation that illustrates that differences can be destructive, but they can also be a powerful tool to heal a generation.

We struggle between fear and hope: fear of each other and fear of history recurring; but underneath that fear dwells a spirit of hope.

President Obama said: “Hope is that thing inside us that insists despite all the evidence to the contrary that something better is awaiting us if we have the courage to reach for it, to fight for it and to work for it. Hope is the belief that our destiny will not be written for us—but by us—by all those men and women who are not content to settle for the world as it is; who have the courage to re-make the world as it should be.”

Young Rwandans have hope—and with that hope, the skills and the will to create a new Rwanda—a nation that can proudly take its place in the 21st century world.

Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

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DISCUSSION QUESTIONS FOR PART FIVE • I f “high expectations” are a necessary component in education reform, how can they be integrated into education at all levels in Rwanda?

•W hy are young people so important to Rwanda’s future?

•H ow can they be best prepared to lead their nation into a new chapter in its history?

PART FIVE: Young People Speak—Dream—and Choose • 67

68 • THE NEW RWANDA II: Successes and Challenges on the Ground

PART ONE: Traditions and Mindset: Where the Past Meets the Present • 69 Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS

WILLIAM BERTRAND, PH.D. is the Wissner Professor of Public Health at the Payson Center for International Development at Tulane University and a leading expert on international development.

MICHEL BEZY, PH.D. is the Associate Director and Distinguished Service Professor of Engineering and Public Policy at Carnegie Mellon in Rwanda. His focus is on making emerging technologies easily accessible and affordable to African businesses and building critical skills in technology, strategy and innovation necessary to promote technological development in Africa with the hope of making Rwanda East Africa’s technology epicenter.

JOHN CARY is an architect and the founding editor of PublicInterestDesign.org, a blog dedicated to the intersection of design and service. He is an author and speaker for social change, with an emphasis on design for the public good.

NEAL EMERY is a freelance writer focusing on public health. He has a degree in biology and public health from Northwestern University. He currently works as Community Outreach Coordinator at Baylor International Pediatric AIDS Initiative.

MARGEE ENSIGN, PH.D. is the president of the American University of Nigeria. She is a widely published scholar whose works focus primarily on the challenges of international development.

CHIKA EZEANYA, PH.D. is a native of Nigeria and a senior research fellow with the African Center for Education Research and Transformation and a senior lecturer at the University of Rwanda. She is the Director of Research at The School of Finance and Banking in Kigali.

MICHAEL FAIRBANKS is a published researcher on business strategy in emerging markets. He has been a senior advisor to Rwandan President Paul Kagame since 2001 regarding private sector development and export competitiveness. He has published numerous books on culture and poverty.

ERIC GATERA is the CEO and Founder of El Puente Ltd., a company that bridges the language gap in Rwanda by providing translation and interpretation services. He was an infrastructure officer for the Rwandan Army for the NYANZA District to build and reconstruct houses for the survivors of the genocide.

LASZLO GYULAI, M.D. is Emeritus Associate Professor at the University of Pennsylvania Medical Center Department of Psychiatry and an attending psychiatrist at the Philadelphia Veterans Administration Medical Center.

JEAN-MICHEL HABINEZA is the driving force behind IDebate, an organization that promotes the culture of debate in schools and in Rwandans in general, and founder of the Peace and Love Proclaimers, a youth NGO teaching underprivileged children about forgiveness and reconciliation.

ARCHIBALD HENRY, a recent graduate of the Johns Hopkins University, (Baltimore, MD, USA) is an intern at Rwanda’s National Commission for the Fight Against Genocide. He is interested in international relations, genocide prevention and issues related to development in Rwanda.

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JUDY HOCHMAN, ED.D. is the former Dean of Continuing Education at Marywood University in Scranton, PA, USA. In retirement she is a tutor and a writer.

DOMINIQUE INGABE KALISA, a mathematician, is a Master’s degree student in the technomathematics program at the Lappeenranta University of Technology, Finland.

EDWARD KALISA, M.A. is the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Sports and Culture of Rwanda which develops and supports the implementation of policies to promote a winning culture in an array of sports disciplines and to promote culture as the foundation of development in Rwanda.

ODETH KANTENGWA is the coordinator for the Rwanda Women’s Network, dedicated to improving the socioeconomic welfare of Rwandan women and serves on the National Commission for the Fight Against Genocide.

JENNIFER LEE is the chief operating officer of Rwanda Works. She has done extensive research on sexual gender-based violence in South Africa and worked with the New York City Department of Education to develop domestic and international programs in Ghana.

ERIC MAHORO is the Program Director for Never Again Rwanda, a human rights and peace-building organization that was founded in response to the 1994 Genocide.

COURTNEY MARTIN is the author of “Do It Anyway: The New Generation of Activists” and a co- author of the New York Times article “Dignifying Design.” In addition, she is the leader of the Op-Ed Project’s Public Voices Fellowship Program at Yale University–coaching minority academics to become thought leaders.

LISA MARTILOTTA is the Akilah Institute’s first Executive Director and is charged with institutionalizing the core policies and values of this higher learning institute which trains young women for positions in the commercial sector.

JOLLY MAZIMHAKA, PH.D. is the Acting Vice-Rector for Academics and Director for Academic Quality Assurance at the Kigali Institute for Science and Technology. She served as president of Rotary-Kigali when it undertook the building of Rwanda Library Services.

FAUSTIN MBUNDU is the Chairman of MFK Holdings, which has investments in coffee, car rentals, real estate as well as in animal feed, education, and financial services, etc. He currently serves as the Chairman of Kigali International Arbitration Centre (KIAC), a private-public partnership initiative for Arbitration and Dispute Resolution in business matters.

NATHALIE MUNYAMPENDA is the coordinator of the Office of the Government Spokesperson, Public Relations and Communications for Rwanda. She is an advocate for the progress and future of Rwanda, focusing on the importance of youth skill development and networking, innovation and self-sustainability.

WILLIAM NTIDENDEREZA is the Former Mayor of Kicukiro District of Rwanda and Vice Chairperson of Itorero—a major civic education project focused on Rwandan culture, morals and community crime prevention.

NADEGE NZEYIMANA is the Public Relations and Communication Officer for the Office of the Ombudsman of Rwanda.

List of Contributors • 71

SHIRLEY RANDELL, PH.D. was Founder and Director of the Centre for Gender, Culture and Development at Kigali Institute of Education in Rwanda, 2009-2012.

BISHOP JOHN RUCYAHANA is the president of Rwanda’s National Unity and Reconciliation Commission.

He has been instrumental in rebuilding the infrastructure of Rwanda. He has built churches, renovated schools and built new ones, repaired the hospital, and has taken care of children and youth in remote areas of the country.

SAM RUGEGE, PH.D., J.D. is the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the Republic of Rwanda. He was overseer of the progress made by the Gacaca Courts. Prof. Rugege was educated at Makerere University in Uganda, Yale Law School in the U.S. and Oxford University in England.

JOSH RUXIN, PH.D. is an Assistant Clinical Professor of Public Health at the Mailman School at Columbia University where he heads the University initiative, “Health Builders.” He is the founder and director of Rwanda Works, a non-profit operation dedicated to building sustainable public health facilities.

JULES SHELL is the Co-Founder and Executive Director of Foundation Rwanda, providing education to children born of victims of rape during the genocide as well as training programs and counseling for their mothers.

ANJULI SOLANKI has lived and worked in Rwanda and has done extensive research on public spaces in Kigali. She is currently working on community engagement projects in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

m h m

“ Yes, there are many challenges in Rwanda—poverty being a major one. But Rwandans treat challenges as works in progress. They work to fix them. And while they are wisely committed to homegrown solutions, they are open to helpful advice and resources by outsiders—be they individuals, nations, corporations or NGOs, when they are offered in the spirit of partnership. They realize that none of us does anything alone. We need each other. In this globalized 21st century world we take pride at once in our independence and our interdependence.” – Sondra Myers

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ABOUT THE EDITOR

SONDRA MYERS is the Senior Fellow for International, Civic and Cultural Projects and Director of The Schemel Forum at The University of Scranton. She has conceived and edited a number of publications, including The New Rwanda: Prosperity and the Public Good. Her two Democracy is a Discussion handbooks (1996 and 1998) have been translated into more than 20 languages and are used throughout the world. Other publications include The Democracy Reader, The Pluralist Paradigm and The Interdependence Handbook. Myers writes and speaks frequently on culture and civil society, locally, nationally and internationally.

About the Editor • 73 Photo by Gabriel Dusabe

In my view, the most precious right that an individual can have is the right to be responsible for the public good. – Sondra Myers

Rwandans are reminded that we have no power to change the past but we have a mandate to shape a bright future for ourselves and for the generations that come after us. – Bishop John Rucyahana Today Rwanda’s socio-political history and geographical setting necessitate a value system that guarantees the existence of a nation governed by its own people. – William Ntidendereza The dream has turned into reality. Rwanda Library Services stands as a symbol to all who strive to create a better world. In the words of Andrew Carnegie, it will become a “never-ceasing foundation of good” to all Rwandans.

– Jolly R. Mazimhaka (Ph.D.) This generation is growing up with an attitude that says that despite our differences we can work together to bring change to our society.

– Jean Michel Habineza

Photo by Gabriel Dusabe