The Board of Directors of RSwitch Ltd, Rwanda’s national payment switch, has appointed Konde Bugingo as the firm’s new Chief Executive Officer. Bugingo succeeds Otakar Zich, who has been serving in acting capacity since February 2012. The latter will resume his duties as the Head of Projects and Service Delivery. Bugingo has previously worked in the field of financial analysis with various companies in the United Kingdom. Since February 2010, he served as the Chief Operating Officer of Banque Populaire du Rwanda (BPR) with a strong emphasis on electronic banking.“The Board thanks Mr. Zich for his excellent management of the company during the interim period. The progress made in recent months, both in terms of stabilisation of the payment system and the product and service offerings to our clients, is a result of the successful cooperation between our expatriate managers and a strong local team,” RSwitch Chairman, Dirk Harbecke, said in a statement.“Since African Development Corporation (ADC) invested in the company in 2008, RSwitch has been managed by combining international expertise and best practice with the successive handover of responsibility to Rwandan team members.”The statement said that the appointment of a local CEO is a sign of the Board’s commitment to keep RSwitch a Rwandan company.Under the leadership of Bugingo, RSwitch plans to finalise the stabilisation of its core infrastructure that has successfully taken place during the last 12 months and will look into expanding its current offering to banks and Rwandan market in general, such as expansion of the card base in the market, providing value added services such as bill payments on ATMs and roll out of local POS terminals enabling card payments for day-to-day purchases at supermarkets among others.
