Following the 1994 genocide in Rwanda the country was written off in almost everything.

The surviving population was looking up to the new leaders not only for political leadership but also pulling the country out of the abyss it had fallen.

RPF seems not to have disappointed. It used the balance in its war kit to embark on the long journey of reconstructing the country with the creation of Crystal Venture as its development arm Dispatch’s Magnus Mazimpaka talked to the company’s Chairman NshutiMannaseh.

What is the value of Crystal Ventures at this moment?

The worth of a business is not a constant figure. It is based on cash flows, based on sales volumes and based on good will, but the company is worth around U$ 500 million.

There is conflicting knowledge about Crystal Ventures’ ownership and its investment philosophy. Some people relate it to RPF, some relate it to government, while others relate it to members of RPF. Is this Crystal Ventures’ deliberate strategy?

I think that is lack of information, wrong perceptions and prejudices.

Crystal Ventures is an investment arm of the RPF, where the party invests with other shareholders in different ventures. We get no favours from government.

The party simply happens to be a shareholder. Party members had their money and decided to invest that money in ventures that are profitable.

But one has to look at it from a certain perspective. We had a country that had been shattered by the genocide. At that time people didn’t have hope that the country would bounce back.

There were no numbers to attract an investor; and the environment was crazy.

For instance at that point, everyone needed water, milk, juice and so on, and yet nobody would have invested in a venture like Inyange ltd.

We also invested in construction where nobody could invest or did not want to invest. Most of the Rwandese businessmen at the time were speculative and wanted to make quick money.

Nobody would have put money in a construction company.

I mentioned this when I was still the Minister of Commerce and it was not well received. We realized it was not good business and not good for the economy either.

So, RPF decided to invest in areas where nobody could invest, partly because people didn’t have money to invest, but also we did it to give hope to Rwandans that the country would bounce back.

We had to send a signal that there was something happening to other investors.

Can you explain more about that investment philosophy or approach?

We are in business to make money, but we are also mindful of our customers.

We balance the issues of profitability and social responsibility, by investing in profitable areas that can sustain business, and areas where government would want investors, but they are not there.

We invest in such areas knowing we shall make money in the long run.

Let’s set the record clear. Is crystal Ventures RPF’s company or it belongs to RPF members?

Crystal Ventures is for RPF members, much as we share other investments with other shareholders such as Social Security Fund CSSR, private and foreign investors.

The board-elect looks at the interests of RPF as a party, not individuals. No individual has money in Crystal Ventures.

No individual will come and ask for a cheque. In any case, the money that was invested in Crystal Ventures was money left after the war.

You were Minister of Commerce, Finance, held different strategic government posts, including being advisor to the President. Now that you are Chairman of Crystal Ventures, how do you personally not push government in that regard?

No Government policy favours Crystal Ventures because the company is purely private.

If you bring Politics, then you are not in Crystal Ventures. We had money after the war. So we said what do we do with the money?

Can we use it to transform the economy? And, how best can we invest this money, because the party eventually needs money for elections and so on.

Instead of the party going to private businesses to finance its activities, which company will hold the party hostage; RPF chose to run its businesses to generate funds to fund its activities.

Of course that was motivated by the fact that RPF wanted sustainable development.

You want to run business and make sustainable cash flows, then run it purely business. You want to kill it; run it politically.

Why wouldn’t RPF ministers, directors in government institutions and other politicians in decision making positions, make policies that favour Crystal Ventures?

Policies formulated by Government pass through the cabinet, which is not necessarily an RPF Cabinet.

But the majority of the cabinet is RPF?

Policies are debated openly, and I don’t think they debate with Crystal Ventures in mind.

Government policies are designed for the country irrespective of which players are there.

With the money RPF members had at hand, they chose to run its businesses to generate cash flows to monitor its activities.

Honestly, we have lost many bids, of course won some, but we have no favours at all.

For example, we lost bids in road and building construction. Most buildings are done by Roko. Strabag International has won road construction, and Chinese companies have won many bids as well.

We don’t complain to government because we know that the best bidders wins.

Can’t awarding a few contracts to other companies be used as blindfold to the public and protecting RFP from public scrutiny?

Crystal Ventures knows that favors are not good for business. We know you can’t survive on political favors.

If we had favors from government we would be making super profits.

What about theaccusation that while other investors struggle to get capital to invest, RPF picks money from government coffers and gives it to Crystal Ventures?

I have heard those accusations, and that is misinformation. First all, we don’t get instructions from the RPF secretariat, we run business purely on professional basis.

If that was the case, they would tell our bidders; ‘don’t go for the envelopes’ then order the tenderer [government institution]‘ to give it to Crystal Ventures but we haven’t had that scenario.

Does that mean you can’t take favours if they came your way?

Nobody would refuse favours. I wish I would get those favours, but we don’t get them, unfortunately. Secondly, it is not good business because you can’t survive on favors.

We don’t have favours at all from anybody. This is true. You can verify from the audits. Actually now we are fighting with the costs.

Rwanda, is to some extent a difficult terrain; but very profitable. Crystal Ventures seems to have mastered the Rwandan market more than any other investor. Can you share with us your experiences?

There are advantages and disadvantages. The advantage is that, you can make money [in Rwanda] if the investment is right.

Two, because it’s virgin you can reap money in the first few years before other people come in. But also we have a disadvantage that, the investment may not pick up as faster as you would want it.

RPF went into green investments because nobody was willing to invest in. At the time [after the genocide] we needed a local company as a back-up,for example to do construction.

We invested in high-end machines. We took risks upfront to invest to avoid a scenario of a foreign company failing and then leaving, yet we dint have roads.

Or if Inyange was in the hands of a private person, and he says ‘look, I am not producing milk’, then it is our farmers in Nyagatare or elsewhere that would be in a loss.

I think these are strategic investments that we went into for the benefit of the economy.

Of course we make money, but not a lot. Basically, we go where no one wants to go .

These days we get some money from the banks, in the past we used our own money [savings from the war contributions] to invest, but now sometimes we borrow money from the banks to do the various investments.

Is it because the money from RPF has dried up?

The investments have become quite numbered and the cash flows were not balancing because some are just start-ups, we kept sinking in money down the road.

What is the biggest challenge in the market that fellow investors should know about?

The East African integration has brought in a crazy competition. We have milk from Uganda, which is cheap. Imagine milk all the way from Kampala, but is cheaper than Inyange’s.

There must be something wrong in pricing or they are dumping, or there is corruption; they probably don’t pay taxes at the border. How do we have milk from Uganda that is at the same price or even cheaper than ours?

Water from Kenya is cheaper than ours ,not because Kenya has more water than Rwanda, but what goes on between the company and the market.

The manipulation that goes on is that immense. I can tell you it has nothing to do with the cost, but the manipulation.

You can’t tell me you will transport water from Nairobi and compete with us in Kigali. No.

You can’t if you consider the transport, tax, raw materials, etc.

But assume you put off the tax, and you understate the cost, which most of those companies do, there you can compete.

Are you suggesting Rwandan companies are not benefiting from the EAC integration?

The raw materials in those countries are much cheaper and they have economies of scale.

It is common talk here that Rwandan companies are feeling the heat from the East African integration.

We can’t compete. We would if the field was leveled. In Rwanda we pay taxes for everything, which may not necessarily be the case with the companies in those countries.

That makes the prices of our products slightly higher. But how are you going to compete with someone who has ten containers, pays for one and the rest are duty-free? By the way, there you can even import raw materials duty-free. We can’t do it here. We pay taxes for everything.

There is a public outcry that your products and services are overpriced. The President made similar comments at the launch of the East African Granite Factory.

We sell at the price that can make us earn a profit. However, maybe the president was right given that the average people cannot afford to buy some of the products.

Well, let us go back to RPF. How do RPF members benefit from Crystal Ventures, and who exactly benefits?

If the party wants dividends from our operations, we get it, instead of asking private businesses for funding, like it is done in the western world, in which case company X would ask for benefits in return.

We don’t want anybody to hold the party at ransom. It also gives the party the clout to intervene when nobody can.

Who does Crystal Ventures report to?

It depends on the investment. If it is a co-investment, we report to shareholders. If it is a sole investment, we report to RPF for example, presenting financial reports.

Some members who have fallen out with the RPF, like Karegeya and Kayumbasay the RPF elite class is the only beneficiary of the dividends in Crystal Ventures.

Kayumba knows that we have never used any government money, not even a dollar.

Actually it is the RPF that lent the Central Government money, after the war the Central Bank was broke[bankrupt]. People had looted all the local and foreign currencies.

It is the RPF which lent the Central Government US$9m and government has not paid back that money.

You don’t just take money from the Central Bank, the IMF is there to monitor how government is using the money especially if you have a program funded by them.

Why should the public believe your story and not theirs? You have the power, everything at your disposal, besides they know how RPF works, don’t they?

It is even bizarre to argue that RPF members use government money for their own good.

I can assure you that nobody whether a minister or the president can go to the Central Bank to order for the release of money.

Nothing comes from the Central Bank to Crystal Ventures in terms of money, absolutely nothing.

But Kayumba was on the Board of Directors of Crystal Ventures, so he knows what he is talking about, doesn’t he?

Yes, he was and he knows the truth. Money for Crystal Ventures belongs to members of RPF and the party used part of it to fund its activities.

In the previous elections, Crystal Ventures financed 50% of the RPF budget.

And we are also going to finance the RPF Silver Jubilee celebrations to the tune of Rwf 300 million, which is basically the whole budget.

It should have been the other way round for members to contribute.

How much is the president involved in terms of overseeing both the success of Crystal Ventures and the RPF?

The President being the Chairman of RPF makes him the Chairman of Crystal Ventures but not in the sense of operations.

As the Chairman he would want to know how we are doing, but not on the day-to-day basis.

We may report to him at the end of the year. He is not involved at all in the day-to-day running of the business because he doesn’t have that time.

He trusts that the decisions taken by management are for the good of the businesses.

How do you explain that the president, with vested interests in RPF and Crystal Ventures, going to separate the interests of the two from public interests?

The president doesn’t and can never get involved in the policies that favour RPF and its businesses. If anything he can only get involved in policies that favour the whole business community in Rwanda.

He is the Chairman of RPF, but he is the President of the country as well.

If there was a policy that was not in favour of the whole business community in Rwanda we would approach the Private Sector Federation to engage government for the benefit of all businesses in Rwanda.

Tell me about the offshore investments of RPF?

We have invested in stocks onshore and offshore across the world.

Do you intend to have bigger investments in different countries?

Yes, we have that vision but it depends on the cash flows. Right now we need to consolidate our businesses. Quiet a number of our businesses are start-ups.

And you don’t take on another risk before you do away with the current risks of the start-ups. You take on new risks when you know you have a strong background.

Do ordinary Rwandans benefit from Crystal Ventures?

The benefits are immense. We employ 70,000 people directly and when you add on indirect jobs including contracts, it can go up to 10,000.

Investments in Inyange benefits farmers who supply milk because we pay them. Crystal Ventures has constructed feeder roads in rural areas where other companies were not willing to invest.

Crystal Ventures is among the big taxpayers in the country. I think people should be appreciative that it was a brilliant idea to establish Crystal Ventures.

Crystal Ventures will keep on growing as a big holding company, of course subject to consolidating our investments and going to the regional market.

We need to have another Inyange in Uganda and Burundi. We need also to continue investing in the areas where people don’t want to invest in or don’t have money to invest in.

Tribert Rujugiro Ayabatwa is a controversial name that evokes both success and fraud in equal measure. If the measure of success is how fat one’s wallet is, then Rujugiro certainly features. However if success is the aggregate sum of an individual’s character, then the aging tycoon scores a flat F. One great writer put it well —that success without honor or character is like an unseasoned dish. It will satisfy your hunger but won’t taste good.

Similarly, another great novelist said it better—“be careful of your habits, for your habits become your character–be careful of your character for your character becomes your destiny.”

No better way of describing the 76-year-old Rujugiro than the above statement. Rujugiro’s habits read fraud from A to Z. These unscrupulous habits have shaped the character of man who thinks money can buy him anything.

His story would pass for a typical Mexican drug cartel –only this time operating from Africa. His mafia-like lifestyle has seen him amass wealth through undercover methods. He is the kingpin of tax evasion, money laundering, smuggling and eliminating any opponent who stands his way in his hunt for an extra dollar.

Rujugiro was born in Rwanda around 1941. Like many Rwandans, he spent most of his adult life as a refugee in Burundi. It is from Bujumbura that Rujugiro cut his teeth in the business world of cigarette smuggling. Before venturing in the shady world of cigarette smuggling; Rujugiro contributed to the bankruptcy of an insurance company he worked for as a clerk through an elaborate scheme of fake vehicle accidents.

It didn’t take long until he became a household name as a front man for the business interests of key military and political figures in the Jean Baptiste Bagaza regime in the 1970s and 80s. In turn they would protect his business via monopoly. The impunity that Rujugiro enjoyed as a result of these relationships led him to wide scale smuggling, money laundering and tax evasion, something he has specialized in till today.

Rujugiro excels at smelling prey. It is a business model that has followed the same pattern since his Bujumbura days. It views accountability deficits as an opportunity for investment, identifying a country for investment whose systems of accountability are non-existent or are decaying.

Alternatively, where there are strong systems of accountability, he seeks out powerful (already corrupt or potentially corruptible) individuals within those systems and integrates them into his business by offering them some equity. In exchange, they help him to evade accountability and gain impunity. This is how Rujugiro has managed to hold different governments at ransom everywhere he has been.

And this is the point of departure with Rwanda or the beef with Kigali. Those who know the system in Rwanda know that it cannot accept to be held at ransom by anyone. Moreover, the political and military elite in Rwanda is cohesive and under control, which made it impossible for Rujugiro’s business model to thrive.

When he was arrested in London following an arrest warrant issued by the South African prosecution office over tax evasion, Rujugiro, in his shallow thinking thought Rwanda would immediately sever diplomatic ties with London for “daring” to lock up Mr. money–bags.

The arrogance of thinking that individual crimes must be a state responsibility, largely informed by his past dealings with rogue states is what led Rujugiro to turn against his motherland. It was a case of a childish argument “you didn’t fight my war, let me fight you now” —which largely explains the megalomaniac character of this fellow.

To embark on his ill-advised revenge scheme, he linked up with disgruntled RDF deserters and fugitives like Kayumba Nyamwasa and the late Patrick Karegeya to form the terror group, Rwanda National Congress (RNC).

In an ill-advised classical case of “money can you buy you everything,” Rujugiro has reached out to his wallet to fund the “revenge” scheme. He has paid lobbyists to tarnish Rwandan image, issued free shares in his companies to buy loyalty from well-established individuals in the region and cashed PR agencies to write and find space for derogatory stories on the leadership in Kigali.

For example, in September last year, Rujugiro paid $440,000 to the Washington Based Podesta Inc., a lobbying firm to buy access to U.S. Congress where his main stooge, David Himbara would testify against Kigali with the aim of throwing mud at Kigali.

After the September hearing in the American Congress, the group also tried to secure a similar hearing in the Canadian parliament but failed after Rwandans in that country mobilized against them.

Parallel to this, Rujugiro has been active in the region. In Bujumbura, he showered the leadership with free gifts of shares in his tobacco and cement business in exchange for a safe haven for his anti-Rwanda activities. He bankrolled Burundi’s ruling party during the controversial elections held two years ago with a cash donation to finance the elections and forty(40) brand new pick-ups for use in the campaigns.

In Kampala, most Ugandans learned about the name Tribert Rujugiro for the first time when a local tabloid revealed that Rujugiro had signed a business venture with President Museveni’s young brother Gen. Saleh Akandwanaho worth millions of dollars. In the agreement Gen. Saleh is given shares in Rujugiro’s Tobacco Company (15%) and in exchange, Saleh agrees to protect Rujugiro’s assets in Uganda and in the region.

It is said, when Rujugiro is in Kampala, he is protected more than the Generals of that country. His sons also enjoy similar security protection. This explains the very reason Uganda’s Chieftaincy of Military Intelligence (CMI) has become the focal point for RNC recruitment inside Uganda.

“New Gold”

In South Africa, a recent book by investigative journalist Jacques Pauw titled “The President’s Keepers: Those Keeping Zuma in power and Out of Prison” sheds light to Rujugiro’s exploits.

Pauw names Rujugiro among a ring of “assassins, arms dealers, and gangsters” who have turned South Africa into one of the “top five countries in the world with the highest incidence of trade in illicit cigarettes,” he reveals that the smuggling is “referred to as ‘the new gold,’ something that places emphasis on the lucrative nature of the trade in which, Pauw underscores, “Profit margins approach 1,000 % in an industry that has grown into one of the largest organized criminal enterprises.”

The consequences of the smuggling are vast. According to the book, “Tobacco smuggling doesn’t just deprive the state of taxes and duties, but it often masks other crimes, including money laundering, fraud, drug smuggling and human trafficking,” Pauw writes: “The smuggling of tobacco costs government 3bn rand because of tax evasion, money laundering and corruption.”

In a crackdown against smuggling in ‘black gold’ that was giving a bad reputation to South Africa, Rujugiro found himself detained in the UK on a warrant of arrest by the South African Prosecution Services. In 2007 South African Revenue Services (SARS) halted all operations at Rujugiro’s Mastermind tobacco company, in Wilsonia following a $7.4 million fraud case. He faced 25 counts of fraud relating to non-payment of excise duties, 25 charges of illegally exporting goods from the Customs and Excise warehouse, six charges relating to the non-payment of Value Added Tax, and a charge of irregular dealing in goods

In Nigeria, Rujugiro defaulted on the terms of a concession granted by the local authorities under which his company (Leaf Tobacco Company) was to enjoy a 60 per cent waiver in the importation of cigarettes, tools and inputs against the promise to start production locally in three years. Six years down the line, Rujugiro’s company was yet to start manufacturing cigarettes locally but was still handsomely benefiting from the generous terms of the concession.

That is that character of the man behind anti-Rwanda propaganda today. A man drank on ill-gotten wealth and one who thinks he can use his money to evoke regime change. Good enough, such times have changed for Rwanda and changed

Good enough, such times have changed for Rwanda and changed for good and forever.

Rwanda and South Africa were rated above Nigeria on the African continent. A total of 153 countries were surveyed.

The American business magazine made this known in its Index of Best Countries for Business Report released last Friday.

The report, according to TheCable, said in the period under review, Nigeria experienced positive economic growth driven by its agriculture, telecommunications and services sector.
In the overall ranking, Nigeria was ranked as 115th best country to do business in the world.
The rankings were based on 15 different factors including property rights, innovation, taxes, technology, corruption, freedom (personal, trade and monetary), red tape and investor protection.

Cumulatively, South Africa was ranked 48th while Rwanda scored 79th on the index for best country to do business.
Listing key indices used in its computation, the report said Nigeria’s GDP as of December 2017 was $405 billion while GDP growth was -1.6 percent in the period under review.

Rwanda’s economy is expected to grow by 7.2 per cent in 2018 riding on the services sector, agriculture and a rebound in construction activities

The economy in 2017 grew by 6.1 per cent surpassing earlier projections of 5.2 per cent.

In 2010, Rwanda attracted US$400 million in investments. The figure has grown by four folds. In 2017, the country registered US$1.6billion.

The number of businesses registered per year has also grown exponentially from 2,000 in 2009 to 13,000 in 2017.

These results have come at a price; hard work, mistakes, criticism, stalled projects, but also good fruits.

In 2017, mineral exports grew significantly by over 210 per cent to $248.5 million, compared to $80.1million in the previous

The government of Rwanda and the World Bank Group have signed a $150 million International Development Association credit agreement to expand access to housing finance.

The Rwanda Housing Finance Project is centered around the provision of long-term finance to support the development of the mortgage market. The project consists primarily of a line of credit to financial institutions to support the expansion of mortgage lending which will be implemented by the Development Bank of Rwanda.

Speaking after the signing Minister of Finance and Economic Planning Dr. Uzziel Ndagijimana noted that « This project will expand access to housing finance to households and will support capital market development in Rwanda.

« The Government is keen to ensure the sustained provision of long-term finance to support the development of the mortgage market beyond the lifetime of the project. » He added

World Bank Country Manager Mr. Yasser el Gammal said that « This project is expected to provide six thousand new housing loans to targeted households thus creating incentives for private sector participation in the housing market’. It will also create a socio-economic transformation at a household level which is achieved by spending less of monthly budgets on housing, leading to an income substitution effect toward improving education on and health outcomes for families ».

The Rwanda Housing Finance Project will also strengthen the enabling environment for affordable housing and financing through technical assistance (TA). Working in close coordination with relevant Government departments and agencies, the TA will focus on efforts to address housing supply constraints such as high cost of land and building materials by preparing and enhancing the grounds for private developers to construct more affordable houses than what is currently offered in the market.

The primary beneficiaries of this project are Rwandan households which have limited or no access to mortgages under the current market conditions.