Will Umoja Wetu revive them?

When you visit the Bukavu and Kamembe towns, the first thing you will do, is to feel sorry for the two depleted towns. Kamembe and Bukavu towns are by virtue of their location supposed to be booming economically, but alas, they are as good as dead.

When you enter the town of Kamembe, you will be welcomed by the sight of a long line of banks that operate in Rwanda- Commercial Bank of Rwanda (BCR), ECOBANK, Banque de Kigali, National Bank, etc.

You actually do not need to carry money in your pockets when travelling to Kamembe- it is the centre of all Rwandan banks, just travel with your documents and you will get your money from there. Banks had rightly positioned themselves in Kamembe to tap the business potentials in the area.

The presence of these financial institutions notwithstanding their importance, gives a big contrast of what the reality of the town is. Why is the city dead?

One of the most significant factors is long time wars in the DR Congo. Kamembe is very strategically positioned. Bordering the diamond-rich Congo, would have made it, a rather rich town, if it were not for the uncertainty of the security in its neighbouring Bukavu.

Bukavu too, is a rather old and economically dead city due to similar reasons. From far in Kamembe you can view an exhausted Bukavu town. Nonetheless, the two peoples of Kamembe and Bukavu take advantage of any peaceful lull to do business together.

At the border, one witnesses a non-stop human traffic jam of businesspersons, plying to and from Bukavu and beyond. Men and women of all walks are involved in different activities all the day.

However, their operations or business transactions are done in silence. You will not hear any one shout or complain, when another accidentally steps on him or her.

This sharply contradicts the nature of busy places in Africa generally and in Rwanda in particular, where there is normally commotion - people shouting and even sometimes having bitter verbal exchanges, as they do their businesses.

This behaviour tells millions of stories! The two peoples are never convinced that they are operating in safe environment. It is therefore understandable that efforts to end war and conflicts within the town’s circumference must be geared by the two countries. In addition, most Hotels have closed due to a lack of clients.

"We used to have so many clients, but when the war in the DR Congo intensified, we lost them. Nevertheless, with the new changes in the peace process, a few men and women come to our hotels. We hope things will get better,” said a receptionist at Mucyo Hotel in Kamembe, Rusizi district.

Kamembe and Bukavu towns are lucky to be neighbouring Nyungwe impenetrable forest. Many tourists would have loved to kill two birds with one stone, by visiting Nyungwe forest and Bukavu at the same time. They have not been able to take the simultaneous advantage due to obvious reasons.

All the above constraints, work against the development of the two towns, which is why Bukavu and Kamembe for instance, look so old and unattractive. There are no more new buildings and the old ones are not properly renovated. Of course, you can see some construction activities going on, but all is done hesitantly.

Surprisingly though, in the centre of Kamembe, there is a booming market that sells all nutritious foods including the most popular fish, Mackerel commonly called Insambaza by the locals. The customer care is astonishingly superb contrary to the rest of Rwanda where even higher authorities have started preaching about the need for customer care.

"Here as you can see, people know how to attract customers. They will never give you room until you get out of the market. You are baptised the name ‘client’, until you get out of the market, a thing that contradicts what others do in Rwanda,” observes James Mugisha, a businessman who hails from Nyagatare district, in the eastern region of Rwanda.

The only disturbance the businesspersons complain about in Kamembe market is the failure of the authorities to curb some unnecessary irregularities that affect their businesses.

"I do not why our leaders do not care about things that affect us in the market. We have some hawkers who come to sell their products inside the market. We end up competing with them, yet they do not pay taxes as we do,” complained a very angry business lady who was too bitter to reveal her names.

"The products most hawkers actually sell come from some of the goods local defence confiscate from us due to various reasons. They in the end sell them cheaply here in the markets because they do not care about the existing prices. Whatever they earn is profit for they (those who confiscate goods) never invest anything. We need help from higher authorities to help us move forward,” she added.

There is a kind of general neglect that can be viewed not only in the claims of the women doing business but also in the general environment. One can see hawkers running up and down in the market, selling foodstuffs, etc. The hawkers are so mobile and fast that they were given a special name-Marathon. The poor market environment is exacerbated by a general lack of access to sanitation.

"We do not have toilets at all. We have complained and authorities remain adamant for no known reason. How do you expect a big population like this in the market to survive without access to toilets? I just do not understand,” Jackline Kangabe, a woman selling tomatoes in the market complained bitterly.

The issue of sanitation goes hand in hand with the general development. The overall implication is that one cannot separate social politics from development. For the two to be realised there is need for an environment free of conflicts and wars.

Two, though Rwanda has been peaceful for quite some time now, some of its people neighbouring the troubled DR Congo, have not managed to match the rest of the country in development.

Peace therefore, in the region, is what would make the two towns rejuvenate from decadence to prominence. They have all the potentials down to earth, and if today’s trend (Umoja wetu operation) is not reversed, we shall no longer call Bukavu and Kamembe, dead towns.

Hopefully, they will resurrect and rise to the potential the bankers were eyeing when they set shop there in the first place.

Contact: mugitoni@yahoo.com