{"id":40158,"date":"2019-10-12T06:10:04","date_gmt":"2019-10-12T06:10:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/kagame-receives-arsenal-star-david-luiz-at\/"},"modified":"2019-10-15T11:14:31","modified_gmt":"2019-10-15T11:14:31","slug":"kagame-receives-arsenal-star-david-luiz-at","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/kagame-receives-arsenal-star-david-luiz-at\/","title":{"rendered":"Kagame receives Arsenal Star David Luiz at Village Urugwiro"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kagame is a fan of Arsenal FC and sometimes makes comments on the performances of the team. <\/p>\n

David Luiz is the first Arsenal first-team player to visit Rwanda since the partnership\u2019s launch last season.<\/p>\n

He arrived in Rwanda at 8 pm Thursday along with his fianc\u00e9 and mother in a two-day visit to Rwanda. <\/p>\n

David Luiz’s visit follows in the footsteps of Arsenal legends Alex Scott, Tony Adams and Lauren who have previously participated in the Kwita Izina Gorilla naming ceremony \u2013 a prestigious celebration of Rwandan conservation and culture. <\/p>\n

He was welcomed by Rwanda Development Board (RDB) before heading to Marriot Hotel where he is accommodated. <\/p>\n

Davis Luiz also visited Kigali Genocide Memorial this Friday and paid tribute to over 250,000 victims of the 1994 Genocide against Tutsi laid there. <\/p>\n

Before his arrival to Rwanda, Luiz expressed to represent Arsenal in Rwanda as one of the luxurious tourism destinations. <\/p>\n

\u201cI have heard wonderful things about the breath-taking beauty of Rwanda and its people, and I can\u2019t wait to experience the country and all it has to offer. I am very proud to represent Arsenal to help tell a global audience of Rwanda\u2019s modernization into a luxury tourism destination, its amazing culture and its enthusiasm for football development,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Born in Diadema, S\u00e3o Paulo, Arsenal\u2019s number 23 started his career with Brazilian side Vit\u00f3ria before moving to Europe to sign for Portuguese giants Benfica.<\/p>\n

He went on to play for Chelsea and Paris St Germain before joining Arsenal in the summer of 2019. In total, he has played 475 club games scoring 33 goals, the most recent being the winner in Sunday\u2019s 1-0 win against Bournemouth in the Premier League. He also has 57 caps for the Brazil National Team.<\/p>\n

With a combined following of more than 52 million on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, David Luiz is the third most followed player in the Premier League.<\/p>\n

The visit comes after a highly successful first year of Visit Rwanda\u2019s partnership with Arsenal as the club\u2019s inaugural Sleeve Sponsor and Official Tourism Partner.<\/p>\n

In just twelve months, the partnership has made Rwanda a must-see holiday destination for football fans and tourists around the world.<\/p>\n

An independent survey conducted by Hall and Partners of 20,000 Arsenal fans across 30 markets found that as a result of the partnership, 51% of respondents are more likely to consider Rwanda as a tourist destination, demonstrating a shift in perception and understanding of the country.<\/p>\n

In 2018, 1.7 million people visited Rwanda \u2013 an 8% increase from 2017.<\/p>\n

This success has led the partnership to be nominated for a Leaders Sports Award in the sponsorship category, which recognizes the best work and most talented individuals in sports business.<\/p>\n

Visit Rwanda and the partnership with Arsenal also won the top award for destination excellence in luxury and experiential travel at the 2019 Luxperience Awards and an Honorary Award for Partnership for \u2018a unique and transformational partnership by an African brand\u2019 at the 2019 Best of Africa Awards.<\/p>\n

\"Kagame<\/figure>\n
\"David<\/figure>\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

President Paul Kagame on Friday received Arsenal Star David Luiz who is in the country as part of Visit Rwanda\u2019s ground-breaking partnership with Arsenal Football Club.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[75],"byline":[170],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-40158","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-homenews","byline-igihe"],"bylines":[{"id":170,"name":"IGIHE","slug":"igihe","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":8}],"contributors":[{"id":170,"name":"IGIHE","slug":"igihe","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":8}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40158","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40158"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40158\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40158"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40158"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40158"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=40158"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=40158"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}