Lawmakers have said that the construction of an ultramodern hospital should be considered in the next fiscal year, with a view to expanding Kacyiru Hospital and diversifying its medical services to patients.

This was noted on Thursday, May 4, during a session in which the Lower House’s Committee on National Budget and Patrimony started virtual budget hearings for the funding allocations to different public entities in the 2023/2024 fiscal year. The hearings started with the City of Kigali.

The Vice Mayor of the City of Kigali in charge of Urbanisation and Infrastructure, Merard Mpabwanamaguru, told lawmakers that the Kacyiru ultramodern hospital is one of the projects planned for the next fiscal year but the budget was not allocated.

He said the [initial] budget required to set up the hospital is estimated at more than Rwf8 billion.

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So far, Kacyiru Hospital – which is a district-level hospital in Gasabo, Kigali – focuses on maternity, and child healthcare, according to information from the Ministry of Health.

MP Georgette Rutayisire said the project to construct the hospital had started, citing a study that cost the government ‘a lot of money'. She said that the project should have been completed if its implementation had been given enough attention.

"A long time has elapsed since the project study was done. There is a likelihood that another study will be done,” she said, decrying the fact that no budget has been earmarked for the project.

For MP Pierre Claver Rwaka, the project was expected to be a worthwhile venture as explained during its initiation period. But, he said, the delay in implementation might result in extra costs to the Government since some of the concrete and iron bars that were laid a long time ago were attacked by rust.

Mpabwanamaguru said that the hospital is important to the City of Kigali, especially Gasabo District residents, indicating that about eight years have passed since the project was conceived.

"Depending on the growth of the City, and the available [healthcare] need, that project is necessary,” he said, indicating that the population of the City of Kigali increased from an estimated 1,13,000 in 2013 to over 1.7 million, at present.

Meanwhile, the Auditor General’s report for the financial year ended June 10, 2021, indicated that the objective of the ultramodern hospital was to deliver highly skilled services to the population within the country and in the region, to function as an emergency operations center for disasters or wartime care coordination; and to become a teaching and research center in different fields.

It exposed that on January 10, 2016, Kacyiru hospital (located in Gasabo District), signed a contract worth over Rwf8 billion with Fair Construction Ltd for the expansion works. The project execution period was 18 months starting from February that year, and works were to be completed in August 2017.

According to the report, the hospital terminated the contract with the contractor due to shortage of funds to finance the project, just two months after commencing of construction works.

By the time of the audit in October 2021, (five years after the project was stopped), construction works had not yet resumed, the report exposed.

It added that the hospital management incurred ‘fruitless’ expenditure amounting to over Rwf248 million as a cost of terminating the contract, paid to the contractor (compensation and liability claims of the contractor), due to early contract cancellation.