By David Himbara
On August 8, 2018, the Rwandan cabinet chaired by President Paul Kagame appointed Guy Baron the Chief investment officer of Rwanda Development Board (RDB). Prior to joining RDB, Baron was a strategic advisor to Tony Blair Africa Governance Initiative (AGI).
A chief investment officer (CIO) is an executive responsible for managing a company’s investment portfolios. The CIO is responsible for managing and monitoring investment activity. The CIO works with external analysts and maintains good investor relations and develops investment policies.
Baron has extensive investment and capital markets experience acquired in New York City. He may help refocus RDB so that it delivers the services for which it was created, namely, investment and export promotion. Baron joins an Israeli businessman, Itzhak Fisher, who is the chairman of RDB.
Hopefully, RDB will also stop telling lies that Rwanda attracts billions of dollars annually in foreign investments. For example, RDB lied that it attracted US$1.6 billion in foreign investment in 2017. In reality, foreign investment in Rwanda in 2017 was US$366 million. The entire stock of foreign investment in Rwanda made during the past decades is US$1.7 billion.
