FES: ADVANTAGE TO RWANDA-GERMAN COOPERATION – MINISTER KABONEKA

During the signing ceremony that took place at the Rhineland Palatinate “Jumelage” Office in Kigali, Minister Kaboneka said that; the introduction of Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung Foundation (FES) in Rwanda is an added advantage to the existing Rwanda-German cooperation that has been existing for over 30 years now.

He said: “For the more than 30 years of partnership, over 1700 projects worth over 50 billion of Frw have been successfully implemented in the areas of education, health, water sanitation, handicraft, sports and support to socio-economic projects for vulnerable and disabled people. ”

“On broader cooperation, the Government of Rwanda and Federal Republic of German have enjoyed strong relationship and cooperation for years where Germany supports us in implementing some of our developmental programs mainly in education, decentralization, sectoral development and empowering public financial management through GIZ and KFW.” Minister Kaboneka added.

The objective of this three-year MoU is to provide partnership in the different activities such as promoting and strengthening social justice with a focus to areas of social protection, good governance, decentralization and democracy; to provide capacity-strengthening to relevant organizations and promote citizen education and participation by bringing together representatives from different sectors of society and policy makers with the objective to strengthen the development and comprehensive coverage of social policy initiatives and therewith support Rwanda to achieve its commitments as set out in the Second Economic Development and Poverty Reduction Strategy (EDPRS 2).

FES will also support to address together existing challenges affecting the above mentioned topics and citizen participation in decision-making and to increase awareness across Rwanda and internationally of the benefits of national social protection programs and lessons learned of increasing citizen participation, with a focus on inclusion of the informal sector in decision making and voice and accountability.