The Mayor of City of Kigali, Fidele Ndayisaba, last week talked to The New Times Kenneth Agutamba on a wide range of issues during an exclusive interview at his office, last week. Below are excerpts;-

How would you describe 2014?

Well, 2014 was a year of growth and peace in the city. Of course, as the President said it, every year comes with its own challenges and realities. In 2014, we registered encouraging development in terms of urban planning since we are the capital city; urbanisation is a key aspect in our business.

On our side as the government, our main responsibility is to put in place enablers for development and last year we registered quite good progress.

Main roads in the city were constructed, others rehabilitated, and some dirt roads have been made smoother which improved efficiency in traffic management, mobility and connectivity in the city.

In some neighbourhoods we increased the coverage of street lighting, which also boosts things like security and contribute to the beauty of the city. We get a lot of feedback from people appreciating the transformation.

You have been in office since 2011; at what rate has the city been growing and how has it impacted on the cost of administration?

The growth of the city is at 10.5 per cent and demographically, we are receiving new comers from abroad and other provinces in the country and the population is now estimated to be 1.2 million.

Regarding the cost of administration, we have really made good progress in incorporating technology to reduce the high cost of administration.

The intention is to increase our budget for development and try to keep the recurrent budget low and, through ICT, we have managed to deliver most services online, which enables us to use less manpower and resources yet increasing the efficiency in service delivery.

Actually, 2014 was a good year for consolidating our previous efforts in the use of ICT in Kigali, which is in line with our agenda of Smart City, which should start by our own business and our own administration.

And in terms of revenue collection, how much is the City collecting?

Because of our improved investment environment, we have attracted many investments and the city is benefiting in different ways.

There are direct revenues the City is earning from these businesses, there are those taxes, collected by our districts and all these collections have been increasing every year.

But there are other tax revenues collected by the central government and in our system of fiscal decentralisation, there is a share we receive from the taxes collected at the central government level.

So briefly, the economic development has benefited our revenue growth. There is another important thing we should not forget, when a business is growing, it gives the capacity to our residents to contribute in resolving some other needs they have in the community.

You will see some business operators and the citizenry in general contributing through Umuganda (monthly community service), to various developments in the city and this is good.

Many dwellers find the cost of living in this city very high. As an economist, what are the dynamics at play?

I wouldn’t agree that the City of Kigali is so expensive. I know there are some areas where there is high demand, and this, of course, makes prices somehow high; for instance, in housing; this is the simple rule of economics – when the demand is high and supply is low, definitely it impacts on the price.

Regarding the low supply of affordable housing, this is something we are currently working on; to increase the supply in housing, both commercial and residential but its work in progress.

However, it’s also a huge business opportunity that I want private sector investors to exploit. When you see people who are investing in housing in the city, those buildings you see here, they’re trying to deliver a mix of apartments and commercial structures, but it can’t happen in a short time.

As a city, we try to mobilise investors to respond to that demand which is there and definitely with time, it will be resolved.

Apart from housing as a major constraint, what other economic problems do you see in the City of Kigali?

Still, it’s discussion around prices (urban inflation) and when we say things are expensive or not expensive, this goes together with purchasing power, and this goes with the incomes of people and the income of people goes with the jobs.

We realise that we still have some pocket of informal sector in our economy. And this also is somehow an opportunity, because if we can guide that informal sector to join the formal sector, it can greatly contribute to the growth of our economy through job creation and increased consumption.

There is one important thing we should not forget; the capacity of saving. Nationwide, starting from the capital, we are mobilising people to adopt a savings culture right from individual level.

A strong savings culture would greatly contribute toward tackling the issue of high interest rates; that’s because people live with loans, they borrow to invest; but when the interest rate is high, it impacts on the cost of living, making even other basic needs such as housing, expensive.

Working on savings, and this is a responsibility of everybody, will be able to cut short the cost of borrowing.

Currently, because of low savings, our banks are being forced to look for money outside and when they borrow this money, it is impacted by our exchange rate factors that have to be factored into the final interest rates.

You talked of an improved investment environment but some investors lament about the high cost of doing business; again as an economist, what are the dynamics?

First of all, we have to congratulate our country on good improvement in doing business reforms. It has been doing well being in the top three in Africa for quite a number of years.

There are some areas where we still have challenges such as the need to increase our energy supply capacity to make electricity more affordable and this is what government is currently doing.

If you look at the government spending plan, you will notice that energy and other major infrastructure projects are the priority, and that’s in response to the current challenges we have. Regarding electricity, a major factor of production, the Ministry of infrastructure is working round the clock to have important energy projects completed in time.

That’s because if we can have enough production, enough electricity on the national grid, reducing its cost will be the next and we are on course for sure.

Other constraints such as service delivery are things we should be able to deal with more easily. Combined with the efforts of fighting corruption and consolidating security, we really thank the residents because they have contributed to reduce the number of incidents in terms of security through the community programme.

Kigali has been credited with being the cleanest city in Africa. However, there are areas of discontent; beatification expenditures for business operators and motorists hate fines for knocking down palm trees…

We don’t need to have laws to force us to do good things for ourselves. Something that is good for us, we have to do it because it is good for ourselves. An orderly, clean society is for our own good.

I really thank those who are responsive to our programmes. Of course, those who differ, the society should send them a signal that they are differing from the common good; the common good for our city is to respect the order.

We have some bi-laws to back our programmes and you will never see people happy to be punished, there will always be complaints. Before people complain about fines they should ask themselves why they are being fined in the first place.

You recently hired the former mayor of Seoul, South Korea, as advisor on economic development, what is the story?

That happened because of the good bilateral cooperation we have with South Korea, and we managed to get the former mayor to work with us, and he is with other experts in Korea in architecture, ICT, and transportation. They have done a great job developing from a small economy to a large one and we hope they will help us.

You are ending your first five-year term, will you seek a second term?

I haven’t thought about it yet because I’m busy trying to accomplish the goals that we have set, I want to finish well my first term, first. By law, I know that I am allowed to come back, but I want to first accomplish the goals I and my team have and thereafter I, with my team, will sit and evaluate our performance and decide; you see it’s not about Fidele Ndayisaba alone.

It’s also about the Kigali people, they will decide as well.

Gasabo District, which forms the largest chunk of the city, has been dogged by administrative problems which culminated into the recent resignation of the entire executive, were you taken by surprise?

I think what happened in Gasabo was clearly visible to everybody; it was expected. The outgoing committee made a decision which I think was a courageous one, to give way for fresh leadership; so there is no doubt that it was expected.

With new leaders there, we hope to have positive change in form of more development and we shall support them.

Many city dwellers complain that you are presiding over a noise curfew of sorts making it hard to have fun.

I think people should not exaggerate these things. We should not have pollution, any kind of pollution; air pollution or noise, whichever form, and this doesn’t have anything to do with curbing entertainment.

Those who would like a peaceful environment to work or rest have a right to do so. And those who want to entertain themselves have a right too but they should do so in a decent manner, respecting others.

This is where the line is and fighting against noise pollution is not something new; we have it in our laws.

What’s the cost of your new city hall and when are you moving in?

Well, I would have to do last calculations but it’s about Rwf11 billion. It is almost done, they are doing the final set-up and in less than a month from now, it’ll be in use.

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