Bayigamba pledges to focus on grass root dev’t

Rwanda National Olympic Committee president Robert Bayigamba has pledged to work closely with the districts to scout and nurture the next generation of local talent. Bayigamba is targeting to work with district authorities in a bid to help federations to have play grounds in every centre where young players can be trained. “We will work closely with the districts to help the federation administrators to learn how they can manage the federation affairs and have good results in the coming years,” Bayigamba said recently. The former Minister for Sports, Youth and Culture also says he wants the federations not to rely on government support and instead focus on becoming self-reliant which would in turn take Rwandan sports to a higher level. The former national team volleyball setter plans to help the federations to go down to the grassroots level to scout as many young players as possible which will be done from Sectors to Districts levels. Bayigamba noted that teaching the federation leaders how to be self-reliant is a very important concern during his first four-year term of office. “We need to have good projects to help to get the money for supporting sports. We need to go back to the drawing board and start over again because this is the only way we are going to develop our sports and the players,” he urged. Bayigamba was elected to lead the National Olympic Committee two months ago to replace Brig. Gen. Charles Rudakubana, who served only one term.