Kagame speaks on 700 closed churches in Kigali

Kagame was speaking yesterday in Gabiro while closing the 15th National Leaders Retreat.

While referring to the recent closure of over 714 churches in Kigali, Kagame said that such number is bigger than infrastructures that would benefit the population.

The Head of State said that having a number of churches bigger than that of water boreholes and industries which have good impact to population is disorder.

“What is the other productive thing that we have amounting 700 in Kigali? Is it industries? But, churches which you also decided to close down, this implies that it is disorder,” he said.

“Anyway, what do these 700 churches do? Do they offer water to population, are they shops, are they industries? what’s their role?” Kagame questioned.
He said that such disorder is brought by something missing in the culture, lifestyle and settings.

“This disorder in Africa is brought by people who wish the continent to remain in unfruitful practices and cause bad effects unable to control, when you try to avoid such effects; they call it people’s rights violation,” he said.

President Kagame said that the essential thing towards attaining positive changes is culture. He said that developed countries attained the development from being humble and hard work.

The monitoring of churches is being conducted by District leadership in the City of Kigali in partnership with Rwanda Governance Board (RGB) which regulates them.

The exercise of closing down shanty churches was effected after observing that they lack safety measures to worshipers, hygiene and operational documents.

In three-week exercise, a total of 714 churches were closed in the three city districts.