The defense French lawyer Emmanuel Altit, said his client would appear in court on Tuesday.
Altit is a longtime lawyer in the profession, defending former President Côte d’Ivoire’s Laurent Gbagbo on charges of war crimes.
Richard Gisagara, who lives in France and is currently defending the survivors of the Genocide against the Tutsi, told IGIHE that although Kabuga is appearing in court, it is very likely that a decision will not be made immediately.
The court shall notify him of the charges, and the complaint shall be submitted to the judges who shall hear his transfer within eight days.
They will decide whether Kabuga will be sent to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in Arusha. While Kabuga appeals to their decision, the complaint will be referred to the court of Cessation.
84-year-old Félicien Kabuga is considered a major perpetrator of the genocide, where in November 1993, his company Kabuga imported 25 tons of pangas from China, then in March 1994, he bought another 50,000 pangas. They are the weapons used in killing Tutsis during the Genocide.
In addition to being accused of being one of the founders of RTLM radio, he was instrumental in sowing hatred before and during the Genocide.
The development is part of the cabinet resolutions passed on Monday, May 18 and decided on many topics among which new guidelines for the prevention against the COVID-19 were released.
According to the same statement, apart from the 50 young women convicted of abortion, the cabinet also approved a Ministerial order granting conditional release of 3,596 convicts.
This makes a total of 3,647 convicts who are expected to be released with several obligations as citizens, also having to avoid recidivism.
The minerals were seized on Sunday from the house of one Wellars Nimuragire, 56, the suspected illegal dealer.
According to the Police spokesperson for Eastern region, Chief Inspector of Police (CIP) Hamdun Twizeyimana, the minerals were unlawfully collected from different mining concessions in a neighboring country before smuggling it into Rwanda through a porous border post.
“Police had received information from residents after they saw Nimuragire smuggling sacks of minerals into the country,” CIP Twizeyimana said.
He added: “After receiving information that there are people engaged in illegal mineral trade, police reacted and arrested Nimuragire with 296kgs of cassiterite minerals.”
The minerals were to be sold to other illegal mineral traders, he said.
CIP Twizeyimana noted that the illegal selling and buying of minerals is connected with illegal mining, which is a risky and dangerous to people’s lives.
“All these seized minerals are from illegal miners, who mine and steal them during the night. There is a need to adhere to mining rules and regulations and ensure that minerals are from legal mining cooperatives or licensed people. This will minimize irregularities that expose illegal miners to hazards and cause environmental degradation as well as fraud,” CIP Twizeyimana emphasized.
He added: “Most cases of death in mining concessions that are recorded are linked to illegal mining especially at night and under other risky circumstances. We urge people engage in mining activities only when they are legally authorized, have operational license using the right and protective tools in the right time and place.”
CIP Twizeyimana commended residents, who provided information on the illegal acts and further called for strengthened partnership and information sharing on any suspected unlawful acts.
“We urge people go through right channels to conduct legal mineral trade and mining, contrary to that they will be wasting their money especially in such cases when minerals are impounded and offenders arrested to answer before courts of law.”
Article 54 of the law on mining and quarry operations, states that “any person, who undertakes mineral or quarry exploration, exploitation, processing or trading without a license commits an offence
Upon conviction, the offender is liable to imprisonment for a term of between two and six months and a fine of not less than Rwf1 million and not more than Rwf5 million or only one of these penalties.”
The cabinet maintained the curfew but extended the curfew by one hour, from 8p.m to 9p.m (until 5a.m), allowing couples to have civil weddings with only 15 attendees.
Under the new measures which will run for 15 days until June 1, the government eased some restrictions.
The new developments are contained in a communication of cabinet decisions reached on Monday, signed by Prime Minister Edouard Ngirente. Government also announced that inter-provincial travel (including to and out of City of Kigali) and taxi-moto transport will resume on June 1.
These are some of the latest Covid-19 decisions:
The Government has introduced a curfew from 8 pm to 5 am, when the total lockdown was partially lifted on May 1. Yesterday, the curfew was reduced by one hour and will now be observed between 9 pm to 5 am.
Since late-March, social gatherings, including weddings, have been banned. Under the new guidelines, however, civil weddings with 15 people are allowed; but related ceremonies such as church services and receptions are not permitted.
The cabinet statement said that borders will remain closed, except for goods and cargo, as well as returning Rwandan citizens and legal residents.
All returnees will be subjected to mandatory quarantine in accordance with existing health guidelines at their own cost.
Quarantine services for people returning from abroad were initially free.
The quarantine normally lasts for 14 days.
Moto taxis have been suspended from carrying passengers since the lockdown was ordered on March 21. But they are allowed to carry goods and other essential supplies. This will continue to be the case until June 1.
The cabinet also retained major coronavirus preventive measures.
For instance, schools remain closed until September, while churches and bars are still not allowed to open.
Major preventive measures such as wearing masks, keeping the required 1-metre distance between people and washing hands remain a requirement for everyone.
Gicumbi District Mayor Ndayambaje Felix said they will start building the classrooms from June 1 to September 30, 2020.
He said they will use various means to make the rooms available, including about 351 to be built under the auspices of World Bank.
A classroom should, at least accommodate 40 or 45 students but the Ministry of Education figures for 2018 show that in the Gicumbi district, in primary schools, a classroom had between 69-78 children.
Mayor Ndayambaje said they have reduced the number and now one classroom has 60 to 67 children.
He said new classrooms are needed because they cannot achieve the goal of building the capacity of the community without the development of education.
The substances were seized Saturday from seven distillers and sellers in Ruhashya, Tumba and Rusatira sectors.
About 620 litres of illicit brew were seized from two dealers in Tumba, Cyimana Cell in Ubumwe Village.
In Rusatira Sector, Kiruhura cell, Kiruhura Village two people identified as Danatille Uwimana, 37, and Jean Marie Vianney Habimana, 26, were found with 185 litres.
In Karama and Gatovu cells of Ruhashya Sector, 205 liters were seized from three separate homes.
Chief Inspector of Police (CIP) Sylvestre Twajamahoro, the Police spokesperson for Southern region, said that the targeted and successful operations were informed by credible information from local residents.
“The suspects had illegal distilleries in their homes. They were distributing to local dealers and selling them in bars in their homes,” explained CIP Twajamahoro.
He added: “Besides having illegal distillers, which were unhygienic and producing the poisonous substances, they were doing it and selling them in the period when all bars are closed. At the time, Police and local leaders found them selling the substances to consumers.”
Rwanda Standards Board (RSB) specifies that “only food-grade processing aids recognized as safe for human consumption shall be used during the manufacture.”
All drinks with an alcoholic content exceeding 45 percent as well as all those without the standard mark (S-Mark) issued by Rwanda Standards Board (RSB) are classified as narcotics.
Article 263 of the new penal code partly states that “any person who, unlawfully produces, transforms, transports, stores, gives to another or who sells narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances commits an offence, with a sentence ranging from seven years to life in prison, upon conviction, and a fine of between Rwf20 million and Rwf30 million.
To address such a challenge, StarTimes has launched an interactive e-shopping platform of premium selection named StarTimes GO. A programme of the same name will be on air on 6 channels including TV1, BTN TV, Flash TV, ISANGO STAR TV, ISIBO TV, and Prime TV from 18th May 2020, offering an access to the no-touch “TOP” shopping experience, namely through integrated services available via TV, Online and Phone-call. The newly born e-shopping service will generally cover pan-Africa area.
With the slogan “Better Life, Let’s GO”, the program frequently displays smart equipments such as TV set, solar power system and decoder, and the category will be expanded gradually.
The hosts of the programme will explain the feature, quality, usage of each product and show the differences in one series, and the audience shall know the specific information without risky physical contact with salesperson.
Aside from the safety consideration, a fact that makes your choice even wiser is that most products available are priced lower than market price. And by purchasing decoder and TV set, StarTimes ON (the streaming media APP) membership shall be complementary on three devices, enabling the audience to access content anytime and anywhere.
From picking to ordering to receiving the goods, the client does not need to leave home at all. A call at 0788156600（or WhatsApp at 0784033202）to the StarTimes call centre can have your order made directly; the OTT platform StarTimes ON can also help you pick and order product safely.
The payment can be made in a no-touch way such as mobile payment. And the installation service is also available after payment, together with a swift delivery to home, which will be arranged through the 3 level marketing system built by StarTimes.
“We know that a healthy environment is important for pandemic control,” said Deng Sanming, the CEO of StarTimes in Rwanda, “thus we innovated a safe platform as well as a modern shopping method in order to help people keep safe in the difficult time.
The sad news of his death was confirmed by one of his family members who was attending to him at the time.
Born March 20, 1950, Prof Laurent Nkusi served in different government positions.
Nkusi served as literature and language lecturer at the University of Rwanda for 24 years between the years of 1976 and 2000, before he was appointed Minister of Land and Environment for three years.
Nkusi was later appointed Information Minister before he served as the vice-rector in charge of academics at the Institute of Agriculture, Technology, and Education of Kibungo (INATEK).
Thereafter Nkusi was elected to the senate and completed his term last year.
He leaves a widow and five children.
The development has been announced during the daily update from the Ministry of Health. The two cases were obtained from 2,041 tests- the highest since March 14 when the country confirmed the first case of Coronavirus.
In total, the country has so far conducted 48,239 tests of COVID-19 since the outbreak.
As a result of strict directives in the fight against the COVID-19, Rwanda’s recovery cases have since May 11 surpassed active ones and the country has reported no deaths from the virus so far.
Rwanda recently eased COVID-19 lockdown and allowed some businesses to continue operations for two weeks, and the government is expected to give an update on the partial lockdown on Monday, May 19.
Meanwhile, citizens are still urged to abide by COVID-19 precautionary measures such as regular washing of hands and self-distancing and the wearing of face masks when in public or multi-family compounds.
The awareness activities, according to RYVCP leadership, were initiated to supplement the government efforts and Rwanda National Police (RNP) in particular, to fight and prevent the spread of Coronavirus especially in business centres like markets and trading centres.
On May 15, awareness activities were conducted in different markets in Nyabihu and Burera districts.
Jean Baptiste Bunezero, the District Youth Coordinator for Nyabihu said that the outreach activities on their first day, were conducted in the markets of Kora, Gasiza and Gashusha in Bigogwe, Rambura and Rugera sectors, respectively.
“Our public awareness campaign aims at educating people that go to markets on safer and healthy practices as recommended by our government, to prevent them from either spreading or contracting Coronavirus,” said Bunezero.
He added “Traders and people who came to these markets were educated on how to wear face masks, those who don’t have them asked to acquire them first; how to wash hands and doing it regularly even in their homes and communities; social distancing and urging them to avoid unnecessary movements.”
The outreach activities, Bunezero said, will be expanded to other business centres in Nyabihu.
In Burera, the district youth coordinator, Gervais Ngemba said that they started the campaign in business centres in the sectors of Butaro, Gahunga and Kagogo.
“In partnership with the Police, local leaders and other security organs, we took the awareness campaign on prevention of COVID-19 to Gahunga, Rusumo and Mugo markts and many other places including trading centres,” said Ngemba.
“We want Rwandans to understand the importance of washing hands with soap, planning their shopping carefully to avoid unnecessary movements, social distancing and wearing face mask at any time they leave their homes,” Ngemba explained.
The youth volunteers are also measuring body temperature at entry points of markets and trading centres.
“Thousands of people who came to these business centres washed their hands, exercised social distance and went home with face masks.
We believe that continuous awareness will influence positive actions as recommended by our leadership for everyone to be safe from Coronavirus,” Ngemba said.
“We want to be the voice of our government in our respective communities because the measures are meant for us to stay safe.”
Rwanda National Police spokesperson, CP John Bosco Kabera commended the role of youth volunteers in security, health and development activities.
“Over the years, youth volunteers have been central to community policing; raising awareness on fighting and preventing crimes, supporting disadvantaged Rwandans in varied human security activities and the overall community security and development programmes,” said CP Kabera.
He added: “Raising awareness to influence positive attitudes on COVID-19 is, therefore part of of their usual actions of patriotism and individual responsibility which should define everyone to achieve the intended results.”
The youth group, which started in 2013, currently has over 300, 000 members across the country.
