Having been hustled off his hard earned money by Kagali’s moto riders courtesy of his limited knowledge of the city street names, American journalist Josh Kron developed a business idea.

He decided to invest his money in a localised databank and multi service providing agency and named it Umva, a Kinyarwanda expression for;”Hey Listen”.

Kron who has been a resident of Kigali for over two years now says he has been here long enough to know this is one of the most beautiful places he has been to and unfortunately he says that most features of the country’s beauty are not recorded and furthermore, where it is recorded, the information is not readily available for those that give it and the ones that need it or are supposed to use it.

"After working in several newsrooms in Kigali, at certain times I was embarrassed by the kind of questions that journalists asked after being assigned stories. I realised for the start I could start a service company where any information about Rwanda could be updated by members of the public by uploading their own data and images about issues and events of importance to the vision of the country,” Kron said.

Kron says that currently there is so much going on in Rwanda but there’s a general lack of information on what is happening; "Umva House will address many sectors in the country and this is shown in its multi lingua franca, we have our information collected from official sources and will be translated in Kinyarwanda, Swahili, English and French to be able to appeal to a cross section of Rwandans.” 

The American says his idea is not similar to the popular language schools in the country that claim to help Rwandans to achieve Vision 2020.

He rather says that Umva will soon be one of the examples of private-public partnerships where followers will be able to get updated on what is happening in the country and that this information will be provided by government, multinational companies and organisations to individuals-who through a given procedure will also be able to contribute to the information flow by updating umva.co.rw with their own perceptions and experiences.

He adds that his vision for Kigali is a well cleaned, socially connected and with competent delivery services, "and Umva hopes to be one of the first ventures that beyond event management will guide everyone interested in Rwanda to get contacts, book buses to different areas in the East African region, food delivery in Kigali and have every sector of the population represented in its coverage.”

He says that UMVA will also list public and private weekly events and will bridge the gap that exists between Rwanda’s tourists, locals, students, policy makers and politicians.

Kron reviews his website-which is listed by the registrar of companies as a private limited liability company-as being geared towards the rebirth of Rwanda culture, national identity and prestige, both domestically and abroad while keeping the identity of the country’s leaders at par with their subjects.

Coming soon, the lighting city of Bugesera

With an industrial park, airport, free trade zone, a new road linking up to Burundi, perhaps the most equipped boarding school in the country and a soon to be introduced irrigation scheme-the first in the country-it is of utmost importance that residents are worried about the soon to be importance of Bugesera.

Part of the larger Eastern Province Bugesera is emerging from was otherwise Rwanda’s poorest regions where malaria thanks to the area’s relative comfort for mosquitoes, the Eastern town will soon rival our good old Kigali in terms of attracting settlers and investors.

There are many projects underway to prove this not least the new modern road and a better planned water distribution framework. The cost of land has also shot to the skies and if you are from Kigali, price discrimination is one concept you might love to revise if you are interested in looking up.

Three years ago, a plot of land here cost in the region of Rwf 300,000 to 500,000 today this figure has gone up tenfold and the district authorities know the importance of beauty, their housing plans that have to be strictly adhered to and like in Kigali, the construction boom is taking its root here too.

Bugesera will in the near future be the true symbol of where Rwanda has come from and where it is headed.

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