Tokyo promises to double aid to Africa

President Paul Kagame continued talking investment programmes and opportunities in Rwanda. Last week, the president’s investment tour took him to Vietnam (another country that has managed to recover for the destruction of war) and Japan, an important member of G8. Kagame along with 40 other African leaders attended the Tokyo International Conference on International Development where the Japanese Prime Minister Yosuo Fokuda promised increased aid to Africa. Rebels surrender Last week Joseph Kabila gave the genocidaire rebels another last chance to lay down their arms and be moved back to Rwanda. After a sustained period of dilly dallying, the government in Congo has finally threatened to take action against the FDLR rebels. The FDLR has caused widespread turmoil in the Great Lakes region, murdering innocent civilians in Eastern Congo and threatening security of the area close to the western boarder of Rwandan. In November 2007, the rebels signed an agreement with the government of Rwanda in Nairobi in which they allowed to be repatriated back to Rwanda but the rebels have continued playing hide and seek. However, some of their senior officers have been surrendering to the Rwanda demobilisation and reintegration commission. Last week it was a senior commander in the rebel force who crossed to the Rwandan side from Congo. The boss of the reintegration committee Sayinzoga last week said his commission is handling the surrendering officials well. Election fever Preparations for the September 2008 parliamentary elections are in advanced gear after the national electoral commission received funding from donors last Thursday. The donors headed by the EU handed assured NEC boss Prof. Chrysologue Karangwa with $4.1million (Frw2.2 billion). This will be the first time that donors will contribute to Rwandan legislative elections. The elections are estimated to cost government Frw6.6 billion, the national budget has taken care of Frw4.8 billion. The funds will be used to secure an electoral kit and finance a mass awareness campaign. The ongoing national identity card registration exercise is part of preparations. Cases closing In Arusha, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda has had a busy week. First the court heard closing submissions for two high profile cases involving renowned Rwandan crooner Simon Bikindi who is accused of compiling music which boosted Interahamwe morale prior and during the Genocide. The trial of a wealthy businessman and close family friend of Juvenal Habyarimana, Protais Zigiranyirazo also came to an end in the same week. The two suspects are waiting sentencing by the court. The ICTR turned down the request to transfer the case of Yusuf Munyakazi, another businessman in Rwanda in 1994, to Rwanda. The refusal is significant because should it have been approved it would have set a precedent for the transfer of other cases to Kigali as the court comes close to the end of its mandate in October 2008. A deadly week The political malaise in South Africa continued throughout the week. In Johannesburg black South Africans turned against fellow Africans from other countries and attacked them with fire and machetes. The South Africans accuse their fellow blacks, especially immigrant workers, of taking away jobs and ensuring many natives stay unemployed. Having suffered decades of segregation by white minority rule, natives in South Africa know a thing or two about discrimination. However, the immigrant Africans that the natives in South Africa attacked came from countries which helped black South Africans in their liberation struggles. Most of the wounded immigrants were from Zimbabwe and Mozambique; two countries that were a pillar to the success of the African National Congress in 1994. ANC stalwart Nelson Mandela’s wife Graca Machel is from Mozambique. The Zimbabweans will curse more the blind hand of fate; many who have moved to South Africa for jobs after the destruction of their economy by Robert Mugabe are stuck between a rock and a hard place as they cannot return home. The Zimbabwe election fiasco remains unsolved months after Morgan Tsvangarai and Mugabe faced off in a highly charged presidential election. The blood bath in South Africa comes only two years before ‘The Rainbow Nation’ hosts the World Cup in 2010. The terror in that country also comes after talks of a more united and effective Africa through the New Partnership for African Development collapsed after President Thabo Mbeki is reported to have experienced with Senegal’s Abdul Wade. And finally Following recent reports in the media that a fake malaria drug was on sale in Rwanda, health experts and authorities in the country have stepped inspection measures across the country to check the quality of drugs on sale in pharmacies and health centres. Rwanda is highly regarded as a success story in the fight against malaria in the sub -Saharan region. Ends