Rwanda:The management of King Faisal Hospital is back in the Government’s hands

Kagame said Rwandans and East Africans should stop spending millions of dollars in India’s medical tourism sector. Kigali King Faisal Hospital would serve East African health needs. Then Kagame destroyed the hospital.

By David Himbara

General Paul Kagame’s New Times is right this time. In its editorial of May 4, 2019, the paper summed up the near collapse of Rwanda’s premier hospital — Kigali King Faisal Hospital (KFH). Here are words of The New Times:

”The management of King Faisal Hospital is back in the Government’s hands once more after it cancelled a management contract it had with an Angolan company, Oshen.

Had the hospital been a person, it would have fallen into severe depression. As the premier reference hospital in the country, it has had a string of mixed fortunes. There was a time when the hospital was only kept afloat by the presence of military doctors who manned crucial departments because of lack of enough qualified professionals.

King Faisal’s woes can be traced back more than a decade ago when a South African firm, Netcare, took over management.”

Look no further than the man who calls himself Rwanda’s CEO, Kagame, to locate the source of failure. At various times, Kagame said Rwandans and East Africans should stop spending millions of dollars in India’s medical tourism sector. Kigali King Faisal Hospital would serve East African health needs. Then Kagame destroyed the hospital. Kagame changes KFH’s management as he changes his clothes. Take a look at the turnover of the hospital’s CEO between 1994 and 2019:

  1. Edgar Kalimba, 2019
  2. Joaquin Bielsa, 2017
  3. Emile Rwamasirabo, 2013
  4. Alex Butera, 2013
  5. Juliet Mbabazi, 2009
  6. Innocent Nyaruhirira, 2008
  7. John Stevens, 2004
  8. Alavi Mohamed, 2003
  9. Jean Kagubari, 1998
  10. Jean B. Habyarimana, 1997
  11. Fernando Olinto, 1994

India’s medical tourism sector is projected to reach US$9 billion by 2020.Thanks in part to hundreds of Africans including Rwandans who spend millions of dollars in India’s health tourism sector. With African rulers such as Kagame, don’t expect a fundamental change in this or other sectors.