RwandAir has introduced five week day operations out of Kigali to Johannesburg, South Africa. The flights to Johannesburg are on Monday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. The increase in the frequency of flights from four flights a week to five flights come with a change in operating time from night flights to daytime flights which means passengers travelling to Johannesburg from Kigali will now depart at midday Kigali time which is two hours behind GMT.   The Johannesburg bound flights from Kigali are set to give better intercontinental passengers connections departing from O.R Tambo International Airport as arrival time will be 1645hrs South African time.
The return flights to Kigali depart from Johannesburg at 1830hrs on the same days. The introduction of a fifth flight on the Johannesburg route comes ahead of the anticipated Johannesburg Shopping Festival 09, set to take place in September this year. RwandAir is one of the lead partners supporting the organisers of the shopping festival. The increase in the flight frequency follows RwandAir’s addition of a second Bombardier CRJ jets to its fleet which will now be flying to Entebbe and Kilimanjaro. The airline recently introduced a 0700hrs flight to Nairobi to cater for the midmorning travellers who want to be in Nairobi by 0900hrs.
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Kenya lions may become extinct
Kenya’s lion population could disappear in the next 20 years because of climate change, habitat destruction, disease and conflict with humans, the country’s wildlife authority said last week.
Lions are one of the so-called Big Five along with elephants, buffaloes, leopards and rhinos that are the major tourist attraction in Kenya’s game parks.
Kenya, heavily reliant on tourist dollars, lost an average 100 lions in each of the last seven years; from 2,749 lions in 2002, to about 2,000 of the big cats now, the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) said.
It said it has tracking devices fitted on five lions to monitor their movement and better understand the human-lion conflict in the southern Amboseli ecosystem.
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Kagame lauds police
Rwandan President Paul Kagame lauded the police for their work during his countrywide tour of institutions. He urged the police to target achieving their objectives and cautioned them not to allow anyone tarnish the name of the police force. He said he was happy with what the force had achieved, but added that more needed to be done.
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Rwanda’s corruption casualty toll raises
Just over two weeks ago, a former Rwandan minister, Bikoro Munyanganizi, was sentenced to two years for corruption. Last week another former police boss Edward Higiro was sentenced to 10 years in jail for diverting Rwanda National Police funds to his personal bank account. He thought he could use the police funds for personal gain.
How wrong he must have thought time will never run out for him. The ghost names he created on the police payroll must have hounded him so hard that he had to return to the country to face trial.
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Kigali don reinstated
Director of the Centre for Instructional Technology (CIT) at the National University of Rwanda, Gerald Rwagasana, must be a happy man. He had been suspended from his job about two weeks ago for alleged abuse of university property. When a local reporter called him to verify whether he had received his suspension letter, he simply said, “Well that is decision of whoever did it, but as far as I am concerned I still have my position.â€
A letter from the Board Chairman Dr Theogene Rutagwenda to the University Rector, Silas Lwakabamba, says the suspension was repealed pending further discussions to decide whether to terminate his services at the university.
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Chama Cha Mapinduzi treads NRM line
Just as we thought that warning members of a particular political party against deviating from the official party line on controversial issues was only common in some countries, something similar was happening next door. The ruling party in Tanzania, Chama Cha Mapinduzi, was castigated by the opposition for attempting to recall the Speaker of Parliament, Samuel Sitta (read rebel), for alleged sloppy work.
It’s alleged that members of the ruling party were not happy when he allowed debate on corruption allegations against some top and influential party officials in the House. The CCM top dogs believed, wrongly or rightly, that Sitta had weakened the party. He acted quickly and resigned to deny them the opportunity to recall him.
It appears every ruling party fears washing of their dirty linen in public. That’s right. But why do they allow their linen to get dirty in the first place if they fear “public washing?â€
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Beer giants stuck in sour venture
Plans by the East African Breweries Limited’s to end its partnership with rival SABMiller group and join another brewer the Serengeti Breweries of Tanzania have been halted after a London High Court stopped the termination of an agreement EABL and the SABMiller group signed 7 years ago . The partnership is said to have ended 18 months ago but EABL was reluctant to renew it citing poor positioning of its brands in Tanzania. In a ruling passed last week at a London High court, Diageo the majority shareholder in EABL with a 50 % stake and the SABMiller group were ordered to go into an arbitration process expected to start soon to search for a middle ground of ending the seven year partnership. EABL joined Tanzania Breweries Limited (TBL), where SAB Miller has a 52 % stake, under an agreement signed in 2002. SABMiller agreed to sell 20 % of TBL to EABL in exchange of a similar stake in EABL`s Kenya subsidiary.
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