{{In order to emphasize the culture of saving among Rwandans, the Government has launched Umurenge Savings and Credit Cooperatives, commonly known as Umurenge SACCO.}}
Residents of Bumbogo Sector in Gasabo District say that since the establishment of Zamuka Bumbo SACCO, their lives have improved socially and economically due to access to banking services and use of modern technology in the banking sector.
However, there are some residents that have not embraced the idea of joining the SACCO.
According to Bumbogo Executive Secretary Jean Marie Vianey Ntaganzwa, the sector has the total population of 26, 215 and 90% of them shows the commitment to actively participate in government programs.
Recent statistics showed that about 4040 residents have joined Savings and Credit Cooperative named “Zamuka Bumbo SACCO” and the number of women asking credit is still low.
Speaking to IGIHE, Ingabire Claudine, a Credit Agent of Zamuka Bumbo SACCO says among 230 people that requested for credit services only 67 of them were women.
“The reason why women are not participating is due to their economic capacity, women are found in traditional farming activities only they don’t like to ask for credit for fear that they can fail to pay back the money borrowed” explained Ingabire.
It was noted that by end of 2012, Zamuka Bumbo SACCO credited about Rwf 208,111,400 and most of the projects that were funded are commercial projects.
The Minister of Internal Security, Sheikh Musa Fazil Harelimana said the government is committed to supporting female police officers to further execute their duties effectively.
The Minister was speaking at the third Female Police Officers Convention held at Petit Stadium, yesterday.
Minister Harelimana observed that for the government to effectively accomplish its development programmes, gender equality is a must.
“Rwanda cannot develop if one side – female – is left behind. Women were left behind because of bad politics by the previous governments,” he stated.
He applauded Rwanda National Police (RNP) for supporting female police officers, in all ways possible, to accomplish their duties.
“This fulfills the government programme of gender equality and involving women in decision making,” said the Minister.
He urged the female officers to work with integrity, professionalism and uphold discipline.
The convention is an annual event that seeks to help female officers lay strategies to help in effective execution of their duties professionally and encourage more women to join the force.
The female officers now have a network and focal points at all District Police Units (DPUs) in the country, which helps them to identify problems that might affect their work and ensure that they participate in all activities.
Plans are also underway to increase the proportion of women in the national police force to 30 per cent as the constitution stipulates, up from 19 percent of the over 10,000 force.
The RNP, which was set up in 2000 with about 3,500 officers, had no female officer.
The Inspector General of Police, Emmanuel K. Gasana disclosed that more females were recruited and are currently undergoing training.
He noted that the force is committed to implement government and international community policies, including gender equality in the force and supporting female officers in various ways.
The UN Security Council Resolution 1325/2000 requires governments and institutions to protect women and girls during and after armed conflicts, and to fully involve females in conflict prevention, management and resolution, peace building and reconciliation.
Rwanda now maintains over 150 female police officers on various missions, the highest worldwide. Plans are also underway to deploy the first female Formed Police Unit (FPU).
In the spirit of implementing government policies on gender, the Rwanda National Police also established an ant-Gender Based Violence desk, a directorate in charge of gender promotion in the force and deploys married police officers to their respective home areas.
Chief Inspector of Police, Cecile Umuhire, who heads the Directorate of Gender Promotion in the force, thanked RNP for valuing their input and offering them “more opportunities” especially in peacekeeping missions, education and allowing married officers to work in the vicinity of their families.
{{Islamist extremists damaged or stole only a limited number of manuscripts in Timbuktu in Mali before they fled the fabled desert city, a South African university said Wednesday.}}
People in the north Malian city who have knowledge of the documents reported that there was no malicious destruction of any library or collection, said the University of Cape Town, which helped fund a state-of-the-art library to house manuscripts.
“The custodians of the libraries worked quietly throughout the rebel occupation of Timbuktu to ensure the safety of their materials,” said the university. Islamist rebels have been in control of Timbuktu for nearly 10 months.
The university said that a report from Britain’s Sky News that 25,000 manuscripts had been burned was false.
Other news reports quoted the city mayor, who wasn’t in the city, saying manuscripts had been destroyed, the university said.
With its Islamic treasures and centuries-old mud-walled buildings including an iconic mosque, Timbuktu is a U.N.-designated World Heritage Site.
Most of the manuscripts, which are as many as 900 years old, were gathered between the 1980s and 2000 from all over Mali for the Ahmad Baba Institute for Higher Learning and Islamic Research, which moved into its new home in 2009.
Media reports said that the Ahmad Baba Institute had been ransacked by the militants.
But the university said a senior researcher at the institute, Mohamed Diagayete, said the majority of the manuscripts were stored in an older building elsewhere in the city.
The manuscripts cover subjects from science, astrology and medicine to history, theology, grammar and geography.
They date back to the late 12th century, the start of a 300-year golden age for Timbuktu as a spiritual and intellectual capital for the propagation of Islam.
{{For the fourth time this year, a murky haze has descended over north China, leaving residents of Beijing choking on toxic smog.}}
China’s air hasn’t been this bad since 1954, according to the state-run People’s Daily newspaper.
In a remarkable record of dirty air, 24 out of January’s first 29 days this year had air classified as hazardous. And the skies have still not cleared.
The Air Quality Index from the U.S. embassy, designed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, shows that the concentration of fine particulate matter, known as PM 2.5, has been hovering at the top of the scale since last Friday.
It’s in a range described as “hazardous” and calls for protective measures to be taken.
Visibility is reduced to 100 yards in downtown Beijing. Travel has been disrupted with more than 100 flights cancelled, at a time when millions start the journey home for Chinese New Year.
The air is so bad that wealthy Chinese entrepreneur, Chen Guangbiao, is selling fresh air in soft drinks cans, similar to bottled drinking water. Each can is sold for 5RMB or about 80 cents.
Chen is well known for his charitable donations and publicity stunts. He says he wants to stimulate awareness of environmental protection among government officials and citizens by selling the canned fresh air.
Barack Obama, the US president, says he is looking for immigration reform to be completed within six months, adding “now is the time” for action, Aljazeera reports.
“I can guarantee that I will put everything I have behind it,” Obama said in an interview with Telemundo, one of two he conducted on Wednesday with Spanish-language television networks.
Obama said a deal should be attainable this year, but he wants one even sooner. He said that politics, not technical issues, are standing in the way.
A group of Senators, both Democrats and Republicans, has agreed on a framework for comprehensive immigration reform, including a path to citizenship for an estimated 11 million illegal immigrants already in the country.
In the Republican-controlled House, another group of lawmakers is working on its own proposal.
Obama is promoting his own set of principles similar to those included in the Senate plan, but he has not been directly involved in the Senate’s negotiations – perhaps a sign he recognises that too much involvement by the Democratic president could make it harder for Republican lawmakers to sign on.
If Congress delays, he said, “I’ve got a bill drafted, we’ve got language” ready to offer Capitol Hill.
Obama offered his own principles on immigration at an appearance in Las Vegas on Tuesday.
He pushed for a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants that is faster than the one the Senate group proposed.
{{The main rebel grouping in Central African Republic on Wednesday accused the president of not keeping his end of the peace deal that brought an end to their military offensive earlier this month.}}
The Seleka coalition, which had looked poised to advance on the capital Bangui before a power-sharing deal was struck under regional pressure on January 11, charged President Francois Bozize was clinging to the defence portfolio.
“President Bozize has scrapped the defence minister job and opted for an assistant defence minister. In other words, he remains head of state and de facto defence minister,” Seleka spokesman Florian Ndjadder said.
The Libreville negotiations that yielded a deal between the regime and the rebels provided for a member of the opposition to be appointed prime minister and a Seleka member to be handed the defence portfolio.
{{In Ghana, Residents of Kweikuma in the Sekondi-Takoradi Metropolis are in a state of shock after a 13-year-old boy, Isaac Ocran, committed suicide with a nylon rope on Tuesday.}}
The corpse of the deceased was found hanging in an uncompleted building adjacent to the family house at around 1630 hours.
Chief Inspector Anobaah Odoi, the Station Officer at Adiembra Police Station, confirmed the tragic incident on Wednesday.
He said the corpse had been deposited at the Effia-Nkwanta Hospital pending an autopsy.
Chief Inspector Odoi said police investigations revealed that the deceased was punished by his mother the previous day for misconduct and threatened to kill himself.
The deceased, who is a pupil of Sekondi Presby Basic School, is said to have had a quiet demeanour and was well-liked by his colleagues.
The head teacher of the school, Mr. Joseph Antwi Boateng, expressed shock and sadness over the death of his pupil, saying the deceased never exhibited any suicidal mannerism.
Wednesday morning, the whole school was in a state of mourning as some pupils sang dirges to bid the boy farewell.
{{French forces say they have entered Kidal in the north of Mali, the last major town they have yet to secure in their drive against Islamist militants.}}
French forces now control Kidal airport after a number of aircraft, including helicopters, landed there overnight.
Islamist militants were reported to have already left the town and it was unclear who was in charge.
French and Malian forces have been sweeping north, earlier taking Gao and Timbuktu with almost no resistance.
France – the former colonial power in Mali – launched a military operation this month after Islamist militants appeared to be threatening the south.
French army spokesman Col Thierry Burkhard confirmed that “French elements were deployed overnight in Kidal”.
“The French arrived at 9:30pm [Tuesday] aboard four planes. Afterwards they took the airport and then entered the town and there was no combat.
“The French are patrolling the town and two helicopters are patrolling overhead,”said Haminy Maiga, the interim president of the Kidal regional assembly.
{{Iran’s Bank Mellat plans to sue European Union governments for damages after a European court ruled to annul sanctions against the company, lawyers said on Wednesday.}}
Europe’s General Court said on Tuesday the EU had failed to provide enough evidence that Bank Mellat was linked to Iran’s disputed nuclear progamme when the bloc targeted it with sanctions in July 2010, and ordered the measures annulled.
EU governments may appeal the decision, and diplomats said broader European sanctions against Iranian banks could still limit Bank Mellat’s ability to function in Europe.
But lawyers for the bank, the biggest private sector lender in Iran, said the ruling meant it could resume trading in Europe.
Bank Mellat “will now be able to commence trading internationally and try and draw back the losses incurred over the last three years since the sanctions were imposed,” law firm Zaiwalla & Co said in a statement.
“Furthermore, the bank will now look to claim damages from the EU Council.”
Sarosh Zaiwalla, who represented Bank Mellat, said being put on the sanctions list resulted in a freeze on all the bank’s assets in the EU and its international trade was effectively suspended for three years.
The EU argued in 2010, when it decided to impose the sanctions, that the bank facilitated Tehran’s disputed nuclear programme and provided financial services to companies or institutions targeted by international sanctions.
Tehran says its nuclear work has only peaceful purposes but the United Nations Security Council has ordered it to suspend uranium enrichment, concerned that its ultimate goal is to provide Iran with an atomic bomb.
The case is one of a handful involving Iranian companies that the EU has lost in the court in the last year and will add to concerns among many European diplomats that legal rulings could undermine the bloc’s sanctions policy against Iran.
Iranian companies and individuals have nearly 50 cases outstanding in the court.
In preparing sanctions listings, EU diplomats face a challenge of providing sufficient justification while not compromising intelligence sources.
Beside failing to prove that the bank knowingly committed wrongdoing, the court said that the Council of the European Union failed to show the bank reasons for its listing, hampering its defence, and had erroneously claimed it was a state-owned bank in its original sanction decision.
The General Court also ordered the Council to pay Bank Mellat’s legal costs.
The EU side has two months to appeal Tuesday’s ruling.
EU authorities declined to detail the impact of the decision on the bank’s business in Europe.
“We take note of the judgment and we will study it in great detail,” said a spokeswoman for EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton.
Bank Mellat was formed through the merger of 10 banks in 1980 and boasts 1,800 branches in Iran as well as branches in Turkey, South Korea, London and Dubai. It has also appealed to the UK Supreme Court to overturn a ban on its operations.
{{in Canada, Ontario’s new premier, the first openly gay head of a Canadian province, said on Sunday it would be “wonderful” if her victory can help society be more accepting of young gay people.}}
Ontario’s Liberals chose Kathleen Wynne, 59, on Saturday to become the head of the minority government ruling Canada’s most-populous province, which is grappling with a huge deficit and tenuous growth.
Wynne told a post-victory news conference on Sunday that her priorities would be to heal wounds in the provincial legislature so the parties can work together to tackle spending and improve the education system.
“The rancor and the viciousness of the legislature can’t continue,” she said. “We absolutely have to continue to work out our disagreements.”
Responding to a question on what it meant to be the first openly gay premier in Ontario, Wynne said that while she was not an activist, she hoped she could be a role model for young gay people uncertain of their place in society.
“If I can help people to be less frightened, then that is a wonderful, wonderful thing,” she said.
In her acceptance speech at the weekend leadership convention, Wynne, 59, a former Ontario education minister, thanked her partner, Jane, for her support during a three-month campaign. Ontario was one of the first Canadian provinces to allow same-sex marriage.
