IGIHE

Author: Publisher

  • Kabila Accused of Planning ‘Constitutional Coup’

    Kabila Accused of Planning ‘Constitutional Coup’

    {{The Congolese opposition has denounced the constitutional reform plans being proposed by the ruling party majority.}}

    According to the opposition, this modification, including a change in the voting system ,would allow president Joseph Kabila to run for a third term.

    The Congolese opposition claim President Kabila is planning to implement a ” constitutional coup ”

    On March 28th, the opposition and civil society mobilised protests against the constitutional reform. The protests are aimed at announce to President Kabila to stay away from the next presidential elections.

    According to the current constitution, the head of state is not allowed to seek another term in office and President Kabila has so far served his two terms and this technically means he is not eligible to contest in the next elections unless he abrogates the constitution.

    A fortnight ago, Congolese ruling party (constituting of majority seats in parliament) was said it was considering “seriously” a referendum to amend Article 197 of the Congolese Constitution.

    If this amendment is accepted. The president would be elected through the national assembly and not the entire voters in the country. The amendment would also increase the presidential term from 5 to seven years.

  • UNAMID Conducts Umuganda to Mark 20th Commemoration of Genocide

    UNAMID Conducts Umuganda to Mark 20th Commemoration of Genocide

    {{Rwanda peacekeepers deployed in UN mission in Darfur (UNAMID), were joined by International Staff and Darfur Locals in Global Umuganda to mark 20th commemoration of genocide against Tutsi.}}

    The community work was conducted in a place called Suqal Mawashi, El-Fasher, Sudan. Peacekeepers helped locals to collect plastic bags, cleared stagnant water around El-Fasher suburbs, removed dirty stuffs and cleaned different places.

    In a meeting after Umuganda, Brig Gen Norbert Kalimba, UNAMID Chief of Staff, on behalf of UNAMID leadership, encouraged the locals present to adopt the culture of Umuganda in their country and live in a clean environment.

    Gen Kalimba also urged the locals to cooperate with Security Forces to bring stability in their region. “Your cooperation is key to bring about security in your region”, Gen Kalimba told the locals.

    Col SK Baguma, Rwanda Contingent Commander in UNAMID promised to conduct Umuganda activities monthly, as it is being practiced in Rwanda, as long as they will own it and are committed on it.

    “If you own and commit yourself on these activities we shall do the same every end of the month as we are practicing it back home,” told them Col Baguma.

    Locals thanked Rwandan peacekeepers to help them clean up their neighborhoods. “We had never seen Military apart from their military activities helping us to do cleaning”. One of the locals thanked Rwanda peacekeepers for much assistance they have rendered to them.

    “We appreciate Rwanda peacekeepers activities here in Darfur, there are many peacekeepers from different nationalities in Darfur, but we had never seen any of them initiating such kindly acts apart from you”, said Mustaf Tadjan, the chief of hygiene and Sanitation in El-fasher.

    Meanwhile, Rwanda Peacekeepers deployed in AU peace mission in Central Africa conducted Global Umuganda in their barracks, SOCATEL MPOKO, Bangui where they cleaned neighborhoods and made ground leveling where they will establish tents for soldiers.

    RwaMechBatt1 had launched and conducted Umuganda with Bangui residents on 22 March 2014, where they cleared bush in SOCATI and BENENGWE localities, Bangui, Central African Republic.

    {Peacekeepers holding a meeting with locals after Umuganda}

    {Col Baguma with ACP Mwesige joined by Darfur Locals in Umuganda}

    {Rwanda Peacekeepers conducting Umuganda in SOCATEL MPOKO barracks, Bangui}

    MOD

  • Dutch forensic experts visit RNP

    Dutch forensic experts visit RNP

    {{Five forensic experts from the Netherlands Forensic Institute visited the Rwanda National Police (RNP) on March 31, a move aimed at further assessing and supporting the force in the field of forensic science.}}

    The delegation headed by Doris Eerhart-Waslander, the Senior Scientific Support Cordinator and the International Forensic Advisor at Netherlands Forensic Institute was received at the RNP headquarters in Kacyiru by the Deputy Inspector General of Police (DIGP) in charge of Administration and Personnel, Stanley Nsabimna and other senior officers.

    Their visit to assess the RNP’s training needs, especially in the field of forensic science, followed that of the Netherland’s Minister for Migration and State Secretary for security and Justice, in January, who had pledged to support the force in various fields.

    DIGP Nsabimana briefed them on the force’s achievements in the last 14 years, including professional crime scene management and the establishment of a forensic laboratory to assist the justice sector by providing forensic evidences.

    The delegation also visited Kigali Forensic Laboratory (KFL), Isange One Stop Centre at Kacyiru Police Hospital (KPH), which offers free medical medical, psycho-socio and legal services to GBV victims.

    Chief Supt. Morris Muligo, the Director of Kigali Forensic Laboratory said the centre conducts DNA sampling, document examination and fingerprint analysis among others.
    The Head of the delegation, Doris said the RNP has made tremendous step in assisting the justice sector “basing on the history of the country and the few years of the Rwanda National Police existence.”

    The Dutch government, through its embassy in Kigali, supports Rwanda National Police in various policing areas including the anti-gender violence campaign.

    RNP

  • Can you Die of a Broken Heart?

    Can you Die of a Broken Heart?

    {{In 1986, a 44-year-old woman was admitted to Massachusetts General Hospital. She felt fine all day, but in the afternoon she developed extreme crushing pain in her chest, radiating through her left arm. }}

    It’s a classic sign of a heart attack, but the puzzling thing was that she didn’t suffer from coronary heart disesase. There was no life-threatening clot in the arteries surrounding the heart.

    It looked, from the outside, like a heart attack, but it wasn’t. Describing the unusual case in the New England Journal of Medicine, Thomas Ryan, and John Fallon suggest the apparent damage to the heart muscle was emotional rather than physiological. Earlier that day, she had been informed that her 17-year-old son had committed suicide.

    Could the woman have suffered from a broken heart? The answer, it turned out, was already hiding in plain sight. The Massachusetts case was surprising to doctors – but it wasn’t news to everybody.

    For many years, doctors scorned the idea of a relationship between psychology and physiology. In their book Zoobiquity, Kathryn Bowers and Barbara Natterson-Horowitz described this attitude: “Among many physicians, the idea that emotions could cause actual physical events within the architecture of the heart was viewed with nearly the same sideways glance as an interest in healing crystals or homeopathy.

    Real cardiologists concentrated on real problems you could see: arterial plaque, embolising blood clots, and rupturing aortas. Sensitivity was for psychiatrists.”

    Despite this, the evidence that extreme emotions can impact the heart goes back decades – only not among humans. It was wildlife biologists and veterinarians who first noticed that extreme emotions can wreak havoc on body physiology.

    By the mid-20th Century, they noticed that a curious thing happens when an animal experiences a sudden jolt of life-or-death fear. When it’s caught by an advancing predator, adrenaline fills the bloodstream to such an extent that the blood almost becomes like a poison, damaging the animal’s muscles, including the heart. It’s called “capture myopathy”.

    By 1974, the effect was so well known to veterinarians that a letter in Nature proposing a possible way to avoid it didn’t even bother explaining what it was in the first place.

    By then, researchers had realised that capturing animals for scientific or conservation purposes – such as for captive breeding, for mark-and-release studies, or for relocation – was often, ironically, fatal.

    Indeed, by the time that physicians were puzzling over that strange, apparently emotion-driven heart-attack in Massachusetts, veterinarians had already recognised stress-related cardiomyopathy in a tremendous variety of non-human species: elk, pronghorn sheep, moose, deer, scimitar-horned oryx, antelope, muntjac, wisent, gazelle, dugongs, and wild turkeys.

    Since then, that list has expanded to include duikers, Arabian oryx, dolphins, whales, ducks, little bustards, partridges, river otters, cranes, bats, a variety of shorebirds, and a slow loris. Animals who are most prone to capture myopathy are small mammals, ungulates, birds, and anxious primates.

    From around the mid-1990s, more case studies in humans, too, began to hint at physiological problems due to extreme psychological stress. In 1995, researchers Jeremy Kark, Silvie Goldman, and Leon Epstein found that Israelis were more likely to die as a result of heart-related problems on 18 January 1991 than on any day in the preceding and subsequent two months, as well as for the same period of time the previous year.

    That’s because that’s when the Persian Gulf War began, resulting in 18 missiles directed at Israel from Iraq. To be clear, the increase in mortality measured by this study was not due to injuries directly caused by the missile attacks; they were cardiovascular-related deaths that mostly occurred outside of hospital care.

    “The perception of an imminent, life-threatening situation was widespread,” the researchers wrote in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

    “To prepare for chemical attack, gas masks and automatic syringes containing atropine were distributed to the entire population. Every household prepared a sealed room. Civil defence instructions were issued in the media.”

    The entire country was heavy with anxiety to begin with, and the life-or-death fear associated with missile strikes was too much for some to bear.

    The following year, a different group of researchers took a look at sudden cardiac-related deaths in Los Angeles on 17 January 1994. That day was when a magnitude 6.8 earthquake – “one of the strongest earthquakes ever recorded in a major city in North America,” the researchers noted – struck the region at 4:31am.

    In the New England Journal of Medicine, they reported a massive spike in cardiovascular-related deaths due to the stress of the early-morning jolt. As in the case of the Israeli missile attacks, that doesn’t include traumatic injuries directly caused by the earthquake.

    These deaths are instead attributable to the extreme stress of being shaken awake by a violent earthquake. It should be noted, however, that many of those who died were not entirely healthy to begin with.

    In the 1990s Japanese researchers coined the term “takotsubo cardiomyopathy” to describe a stress-induced apparent heart attack. It was so-named because the ballooning of the left ventricle characteristic of this sort of cardiomyopathy is reminiscent to a type of fishing pot, called takotsubo, which are used to trap octopuses.

    But it wasn’t until 2005 that enough studies had been described in the medical literature that human medicine began to fully take note. That year the concept of stress cardiomyopathy was firmly established within the medical literature, though many physicians still refer to is as takotsubo, or occasionally as “broken heart syndrome.”

    So while it isn’t necessarily sadness or rejection that can hurt us physiologically, there is now little doubt that the mind and our emotions can have a direct, measurable effect on our physical bodies, and when things take a turn for the worse, it can lead to catastrophe.

    After consulting with veterinarians at the Los Angeles Zoo, it was Natterson-Horowitz, a UCLA cardiology professor, who put the heart-related aspects of capture myopathy with takotsubo cardiomyopathy side by side. In Zoobiquity, she and Bowers, a journalist, ask whether the two syndromes are really one and the same, afflicting humans and animals alike.

    It’s just a shame that it took so long for doctors to accept what wildlife biologists and veterinarians had known for decades. If this episode teaches us anything, it’s that the traits we share with animals run far deeper than first appears.

    As this column has explored, the commonalities are myriad, whether it’s the ability to dance, to rule by democracy, or to lure the opposite sex with perfume.

    They’re written into the very fabric of our biology. Our species occupies but one tiny branch on the enormous tree of life; it would be a shame if our hubris prevented us from applying knowledge derived from decades of research on every other species on the planet to our own.

    {BBC}

  • Companies Showcase at First-ever CSR Awards Dinner Gala

    Companies Showcase at First-ever CSR Awards Dinner Gala

    {{The CSR award ceremony, the first of its kind in Rwanda, was aimed at recognizing and appreciating the voluntary works of private companies working in Rwanda that have shown care and support to the poor and vulnerable communities in Rwanda.}}

    Companies were recognized and awarded based on the areas of Health care support to the community, Education support, Poverty Eradication, Innovations, Environmental Protection, Marketplace and Stakeholder relations.

    In his speech to the guests, Honorable Minister of Lands and Natural Resources, Mr. Stanslas Kamanzi hailed the initiative, saying that the CSR Awards signal the culture of Corporate Social Responsibility is building up in Rwanda. He noted that he wishes wish is that the initiative builds up and is positively interpreted and owned by corporate companies and individuals.

    Quoting President Paul Kagame, minister Akamanzi said,” “Remember the president of the republic has been observing that doing good things to improve livelihoods of people should not be seen from the perspective of being nice.

    It should also be seen as your own benefits. In relating the President’s comments, Mr. Kamanzi observed that; “whatever good you do in promoting community empowers members of those communities so that in return they can purchase from you what you offer to sell.”

    Kamanzi said the awarding ceremony was exceptional in the country as they were the first of that kind.

    “I thank the organizers of the event,” he sounded happy. The Guest of honor also revealed he was pleased with the contenders saying the different initiatives to support communities they had showcased at the gala as part of their CRS programmes have impacted positively on the communities.

    “The programmes that have been developed are useful. They have made impact but some of them made bigger impact in communities and that is why they are being awarded,” said the minister.

    The Chairperson of the CSR Awards initiative, Apostle Alice Kabera Mignnone described the process of selecting the best winning company as not easy because all CSR players who do important works to uplift the living conditions of the needy and vulnerable as winners.

    We opened and called for participation of companies in the CSR awarding ceremony sometime in January 2014. We received 15 nominations with reports of the most important initiatives each company had run in the years between 2012 to December 2013, Apostle Mignonne said.

    We had six (6) categories of nominations. These were Healthcare support, Education support, Poverty Eradication, Innovation, Environment and Marketplace and Stakeholder Relations, she said, adding that the evaluation of these activities will consider among others but major ones being; projects which were impactful, projects which were engaging, projects which were Impactful and projects which were done collaboratively.

    Pastor Mignonne revealed that the process of participating in the awards was to be a private business company, must have voluntarily done or run a CSR program in the past, must submit and share reports of past CSR activities done and submit an application form to participate in the Awards.

    The team of the judges included
    Honorable Tito Rutaremara, Dr. James Vuningoma, Honorable Marie Claire Mukasine, Apostle Alice Mignonne and Prof. Anastase Shyaka who was not at the awarding ceremony.

    Eight (8) awards were given out to companies; MTN Rwanda was voted the overall winner of the Rwanda CSR Awards 2013 and best company in educational support, KCB Rwanda the runner up and best company in Healthcare support.

    Other companies that won an award include, Serena Hotels was the best in Environmental protection, Inyange Industries as best in Innovations, Bank of Kigali as Best company in Marketplace and Bralirwa as best company in Poverty eradication.

    The Patron of the CSR Awards, Bishop Rucyahana noted why it matters for businesses to embrace People, Planet and Profit, saying that people do not trust businesses but increasingly see companies as irresponsible, greedy and inhuman.

    He also said that climate change and economic fluctuations have also accelerated new expectations.

    The Patron revealed that CSR Awards vision is To revive, build and preserve the spirit and culture of care, support and giving among Rwandans and businesses.

    “Businesses need to re-engage people, to understand their new priorities; rethink their role and propositions; work in new ways and enable people to do more for themselves.

    He noted that resolving the many paradoxes faced by customers who want the best things from companies but also for these customers to do “the right thing” and business leaders who want to grow but in more responsible ways; is a reason we all need to embrace the People, Planet and Profit.

    “Here in Rwanda, Change is all around us. From a fragile economy and a climate out of control, from poverty across half the communities and scarcity of natural resources, from the extinction of species and explosion in population, from ethical dilemmas on every corner, and low confidence and trust in business. All these symptoms of a changing economy we have felt.

    Doing CSR will help businesses and other stakeholders to connect in solving social, environment and economic challenges in order to achieve a new balance, that is more different from competitors and inspiring your people.

    CSR Awards initiative will make it possible for businesses to be highly motivated to continue behaving ethically. It is an opportunity where companies will pride in their important works to the community and positively accept to showcase and share their best practices. He revealed that the Awards will be taking place annually.

    From the business perspective, CSR help building brands in a way that builds capacity rather than just making sales, and enabling people to do more for themselves and their worlds, instead of just buy your product or service, Bishop Rucyahana said.

    Thank you so much our dear CEO’s and Managing Directors of Businesses in Rwanda who struggle to balance your priorities and ambitions while also seeking to make the world of Rwanda a better place, Bishop Rucyahana closed his keynote address.

    Corporate Social Responsibility is the continuing commitment by businesses to behave ethically and contribute to economic development while improving the quality of life of the workforce and their families as well as the lives of the local community and society at large.

  • Egyptian firm Takes over RVR Management

    Egyptian firm Takes over RVR Management

    {{TransCentury has exited Rift Valley Railways (RVR) after it sold its shareholding in the firm to Citadel Capital of Egypt.}}

    The listed firm sold its 34% stake in RVR to Citadel Capital but it did not indicate the value of the transaction which will result in Citadel’s shareholding increasing to 85% from 51% while Uganda’s Bomi Holdings will hold on to the remaining 15%.

    TransCentury decided to sell its investment which had started to pay off after a seven-year wait that has seen shareholding change hands amongst a number of investors.

    “We have been part of the RVR story for the past seven years and helped steer the company through some very challenging times.

    RVR is vital to the economies of Kenya and Uganda and TransCentury remains fully in support of the Company.

    We wish Citadel Capital and the team at RVR all the best as they continue to see through the turnaround of the railway,” said TransCentury chairman Zephaniah Gitau Mbugua in a statement.

    TransCentury first invested in RVR in December 2006 when it acquired a 20% stake.

    This later increased to 34% in May 2010, the same year that also saw Citadel become a shareholder.

  • ICC Extends Uhuru Kenyatta trial to October

    ICC Extends Uhuru Kenyatta trial to October

    {{International Criminal Court on Monday postponed Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta’s repeatedly-delayed trial over post-election violence to October, saying it was giving Kenya more time to look for documents wanted by prosecutors.}}

    “Today the Trial Chamber adjourned the case against Uhuru Kenyatta until October 7,” the Hague-based ICC said in a statement.

    The east African country is given “a further time-limited opportunity to provide certain records which the prosecution previously requested on the basis that the records are relevant to a central allegation to the case,” the ICC said.

    Kenya’s lawyers last month slapped down accusations that it was not cooperating with the world’s war crimes court, where Kenyatta, 52, faces crimes against humanity charges for his alleged role in masterminding post-poll violence in 2007-08.

    Prosecutors say more than 1,100 people died and hundreds-of-thousands of others were displaced in the country’s Rift Valley and elsewhere in clashes between pro-ruling and opposition party supporters.

    But ICC chief prosecutor Fatou Bensouda late last year asked for a three-month postponement after admitting she no longer had enough evidence to put Kenyatta on trial.

    Prosecutors then told judges in an apparent final push to bring the powerful African leader to trial that they needed Kenyatta’s financial statements.

    The statements, they said, could either prove or disprove Kenyatta’s involvement in funding post-poll violence, the worst since Kenyan independence in 1963.

    Kenyatta’s trial and that of his rival-turned-partner, Kenyan Vice President William Ruto, who faces similar charges, have been dogged by problems and delays.

    These include accusations of witness intimidation and witness withdrawals, false testimony from other witnesses, and Kenya’s international campaign to have the trials put on hold.

    African leaders frequently complain that the ICC discriminates against their continent. Kenyatta has lobbied intensively to muster support against the tribunal.

    Arguments include allegations that the court is targeting Africans and that Kenya’s leaders need to be available to tackle Al-Qaeda-linked militants who have turned neighbouring Somalia into a major global jihadist hub.

    Both Kenyatta and Ruto have maintained their innocence.

    AFP

  • BRD Gets New Board Chairman

    BRD Gets New Board Chairman

    {Francis Mugisha, Appointed new BRD Board Chairman}

    {{Shareholders of the Development Bank of Rwanda (BRD) convened on Monday an Ordinary General Meeting that unanimously approved, upon request, to relieve Mr. NDUNGU Bernard of his responsibilities as the Board Chairman.}}

    At the same meeting, the shareholders have appointed Mr. Francis MUGISHA as the new Board Chairman to consolidate and oversee the next phase of the bank’s mandate of financing private sector investments aimed at poverty reduction.

    Mr. Mugisha brings wealth of knowledge and experience attained during his previous service in various other capacities during past tenures as a BRD board member.

    A Chartered Management Accountant by profession, Mr. Mugisha is the current president of the Institute of Certified Public Accountants of Rwanda (iCPAR).

    He also serves on a number of boards – including BRD where as a former non-executive director, he chaired the Audit Committee of the Bank.

    “We’re very pleased to welcome Francis Mugisha at the helm of our Board of Directors,” said Alex Kanyankole, Chief Executive Officer, BRD. “We’re confident that his extensive knowledge and service to the bank as well as wide-ranging portfolio of responsibility as a seasoned member of the Board at BRD will enable us build upon our successes thus far registered”

    Appointed in July 2013, Mr. Ndungu’s leadership was instrumental in consolidating the bank’s profitability, portfolio growth as well as driving the bank’s strategy in collaboration with an experienced team of Board members with diverse professional knowledge, skills and competencies.

    Mr. Ndungu cut short stint to take up his new duties as the new accountant general of the national treasury of Kenya, and also head of a nine-member Public Sector Accounting Standards Board after recently been appointed by the Kenyan Treasury.

    An international public financial management consultant, MR. Ndungu also previously served as the Technical Advisor to the Accountant General’s Office in the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning (MINECOFIN).

    In a related development, Dr. Daniel UFITIKIREZI has been appointed as a Board Member representing shareholder, the Rwanda Social Security Board (RSSB). Dr. Ufitikirezi is the current Director General at RSSB

    Dr. Ufitikirezi joins other accomplished Rwandan individuals on the BRD board membership – Rutabingwa Athanase, Kanyangeyo Agnes, Rwigamba Eric, Kagabo Vianney, Kayitesi Antonina Rutembesa, De Wandel Erwin and Hategekimana Cyrille – mandated to support BRD achieve its vision as the most profitable Bank at the service of poverty reduction.

    The ordinary general meeting also passed numerous resolutions, in addition to adopting the report of Directors for the financial year 2013 during which the bank registered around Rwf 4 Billion net profit.

    More so, the report also shows that the bank’s loan book increased by more than 39%, and in 2013 a total of Rwf 65 Billion was approved consolidating its position as the main financier of medium and long term investments (with a market share of around 50%) in Rwanda.

    {Out: Ndungu Bernard, outgoing BRD Board Chairman}

  • More Sex to Boost Denmark’s Population

    More Sex to Boost Denmark’s Population

    {{Couples in Denmark are being encouraged to travel to help boost the country’s falling birth rate in a hilarious new advert.}}

    The Do It For Denmark! clip explains how getting away from it all boosts men and woman’s libidos – with a therapist claiming nearly half of couples have more sex when on holiday.

    And the tongue-in-cheek video says 10 per cent of all Danish children are conceived while abroad – with the producers Spies Travel offering a free holiday to anyone who conceives on one of its ‘ovulation discount’ trips

    The voiceover on the Do It For Denmark! campaign asks ‘Can sex save Denmark’s future?’, adding: ‘Denmark faces a problem.

    ‘The birth rate is at a 27-year low, and there are not enough children being born to support the ageing population.

    ‘The Danish government has not found a solution. But there has to be one. Meet Emma, she’s Danish. But even though she was born and raised in Denmark, she was made in Paris, up there, in that hotel room.

    Motivation to travel: The video claims Danes have 46 per cent more sex when on holiday

    ‘Thirty years ago, Emma’s parents took a little getaway. If these walls could talk… But it turns out Emma’s case isn’t so rare. 10 per cent of all Danish children are conceived on holidays.’

    The video goes on to interview therapist Birgit Dagmar Johansen, who claims: ‘To travel and get new experiences affects relationships because couples see each other in a new light. It releases endorphins in the brain and creates desire for sex.

    ‘It’s how we get children. In fact, Danes have 46 per cent more sex on holiday compared to their everyday life.’

    Ovulation discount: Danes who prove they conceived while on one of the company’s holidays will win a prize

    The voiceover adds: ‘So to help the falling Danish birth rate, Spies Travel wants to encourage all Danes to take a romantic city holiday.

    ‘After all, it will also help our future business. But if doing it for Denmark isn’t enough, we made a little competition.

    ‘Book your holiday with our ovulation discount. Get it on. And prove you conceived a child to win a three-year supply of baby stuff and a child-friendly holiday.

    ‘But what if you already did your duty? Or what if your chance of conceiving a children isn’t so high?

    ‘Well look at it this way. It’s not just about winning. All the fun is in the participation. Participate in the competition.

    {dailymail}

  • Kenya Tourism Down on its Knees

    Kenya Tourism Down on its Knees

    {{The frequency of International tourists to kenya dropped by 7% in the last one year due to terror attacks in the east African country.}}

    Tourism Cabinet Secretary Phyllis Kandie said the Westgate Mall terror attack had a negative impact on the number of international tourists visiting the country.

    “Tourism is sensitive to terrorism and incidences in the last one year particularly Westgate affected the number of international tourists,” she said.

    She was giving a brief to the media alongside other Cabinet Secretaries on Tuesday at Harambee House, Nairobi.

    On Monday, Industrialisation Cabinet Secretary Adan Mohamed, Ms Judi Wakhungu (Water), Mr Felix Kosgei (Agriculture) and Principal Secretary Mariam Elmaki addressed the media and outlined their achievements in the last one year.

    Ms Kandie said the ministry had to take urgent measures to assure international visitors of their safety in Kenya.

    She said domestic tourism increased in the past year with bed capacity increasing from 37 per cent to 41 per cent.

    The CS said they were now focusing on enhancing domestic tourism in Kenya and also East Africa.

    “We are also looking to diversify from only marketing the coast and safari and focus on business tourism,” she said.

    Ms Kandie said Kenya hosted 31 international conferences despite the terror attacks, an indication that there is potential in business tourism.

    She said the ministry will construct two conference facilities of international standards in Nairobi and Mombasa.

    She also said the ministry was working to boost agri-tourism, sports tourism and adventure tourism.

    NMG