What is the catalyst for Rwanda's superb standing?

Just over a week ago, the United Nations’ Human Development Report marked its 25th anniversary in a ceremony that was held in Ethiopia. Despite Rwanda’s horrific event of 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, it emerged as one of the most progressive countries in the world. According to the report, the leading countries include Singapore, Iran, China, Rwanda and Mozambique, to name but a few. It has been noted that Africa, the Sub-Saharan region in particular, “registered an annual Human Development Index growth of 1.08% on average for the period 1990-2014, positioning the region as the third best performer after South and East Asia and the Pacific.” The Human Development Report has changed the perspective, from the things that a nation produces to the people who actually produce them. Clearly, this affirms that people are the real treasure of a nation. Human development is premised on creating an environment that widens people’s choices to live and lead better lives. It is noteworthy that the above rating is not the only, or the first, in which Rwanda has scored superbly. Most recently, Rwanda was ranked in Doing Business Report (DBR) by the World Bank as 62nd in the world, the second in Africa and the best in East Africa, ahead of the region’s major economies of Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. The prime focus of the index is to show a conducive environment for which the private sector can easily thrive Besides, the Gallup Global Law and Order 2015 Report released recently named Rwanda among the few countries in the world where people feel safe walking home alone at night. In particular, the report focuses on the following exclusive measures: ‘the countries where people feel least, most secure’, ‘global confidence in police’, and ‘the countries where people feel least safe walking alone at night’. The report revealed that Singapore and Hong Kong at 91%, Norway is at 86 per cent, followed by Spain, Rwanda and Indonesia, all tied at 85 per cent. Amazingly enough, Rwanda given its history tainted by 1994 genocide, is ahead of most developed countries, including the UK ranked 27th on the Law and Order Index scores for 2014. And, as a matter of fact, security is the fulcrum of both human development and doing business. The realization of both human development and the ease of doing business is fundamentally contingent upon security. From the legal point of view, every person has an inherent right to inviolability and this can only be guaranteed by an effective and efficient law enforcement. That said, law enforcers have contributed enormously to achieving human development as well as the ease of doing business. On the issue of corruption, which is one of the most serious endemics of the world economy, Rwanda’s rate of corruption has dropped slightly but the country is still among Africa’s five least corrupt nations, according to Transparency International’s 2014 Corruption Perception Index (CPI). Rwanda is among Africa’s least corrupt countries, along with Lesotho, Namibia, Botswana, Cape Verde, Seychelles and Mauritius. How can corruption be ratcheted down? There is no magic formula for overcoming it―just strengthening the law enforcement and inculcating the moral values. Above all, there is a non-nonsense and visionary leadership. And Rwanda sets a capital example of that. For Rwanda, to remain a forward-looking and dynamic country, more robust and stringent measures must be taken to keep corruption at bay. The Global Open Data Index 2015, as well, recently showed that Rwanda has the most available government open data in Africa, after the country moved 30 places up the rankings, from 74th in 2014 to 44th in 2015. Should governments set open data as one of their priorities? Precisely. The reason being, to enable people, as an advocacy mechanism to encourage governments to improve their performance in releasing key data, to access the information that matters to the lives of people. There are so many groups of people and organizations that can benefit from the availability open data, including government itself. The public-oriented goals of the open government movement principally embrace increased transparency and accountability of governments, enhanced citizen engagement and participation, improved services delivery, economic development and the stimulation of innovation. These goals are to be achieved by making more and more government information public in reusable formats and under open licences. From an investment point of view, for example, open data is imperative because it helps prospective investors to access the regulation prior to starting up a business. The data cover the number of procedures, official time, official cost that a start-up must bear before it can operate. Rwanda’s investment climate is also one of the factors branding its posture to both local and foreign investors. The current investment policy and new investment code answer some of the fundamental questions, such as who can invest in the country, in which areas, and under what conditions. In order to maintain this progressive development, as portrayed in various international rankings, Rwanda needs to make sure that each component works well and that, together, they form a coherent system that will attract investment, domestic and foreign, while preserving legitimate national interests. The writer is an international law expert and lecturer

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What is the catalyst for Rwanda's superb standing?