New members of the cabinet will be sworn in Thursday afternoon during a session at Parliament Buildings in Kimihurura.

President Paul Kagame on Tuesday reshuffled the cabinet, naming five new faces in the 30-member lineup.

New faces in the cabinet include the new Minister for Gender and Family Promotion, Espérance Nyirasafari, new state minister Fulgence Nsengiyumva (Agriculture), Evode Uwizeyimana (constitutional and legal affairs), Vincent Munyeshaka (socio-economic development), and Isaac Munyakazi, the new state minister for primary and secondary education.

Among the remarkable changes introduced in the latest cabinet reshuffle include the creation of two new state minister portfolios; state minister for constitutional and legal affairs and state minister for socio-economic development, while the ministry for internal affairs was scrapped as well as the docket of the state minister for mines.

The ministry for EAC affairs was also merged with that of trade and industry, which was left under François Kanimba as minister.

Amb. Valentine Rugwabiza, who was until Tuesday the Minister for East African Community affairs, was moved to New York as Rwanda’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations.

The Ministry of Health, which had remained without a minister since Dr Agnès Binagwaho was relieved of her ministerial duties in July, has been entrusted with Dr Diane Gashumba.

Gashumba was until Tuesday the Minister for Gender and Family Promotion, a portfolio that was entrusted with Nyirasafari, who was until Tuesday a Member of the lower chamber of Parliament.

There was also a change in provincial governors, with Alphonse Munyantwali, the Governor of the Southern Province, transferred to Western Province as Governor while MP Marie-Rose Mureshyankwano was appointed Governor of the Southern Province.

Jean-Claude Musabyimana, who was until Tuesday the Mayor of Musanze District, was named the Governor of Northern Province, replacing Aimé Bosenibamwe, while Judith Kazayire, who has been City of Kigali’s vice mayor in charge of social affairs since February, has been named the Governor of Eastern Province.

She replaced Odette Uwamariya, who was appointed the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Local Government.

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