By David Himbara
The World Economic Forum Used To Believe Kagame’s Lies
The World Economic Forum (WEF) used to love and flatter General Paul Kagame. No wonder the Rwandan dictator loves WEF. He considers himself a member of the Davos elite – he does not miss the annual meetings of WEF.
How Did WEF Flatter Kagame?
WEF has been claiming that Kagame is transforming Rwanda into an economic powerhouse. For example, in 2015, WEF shamelessly claimed that the Kagame government is the 7th most efficiently run in the world. Only Qatar, Singapore, Finland, Hong Kong, United Arab Emirates, and New Zealand, were said to be the only countries more efficiently governed than Rwanda. Imagine!
In 2017, WEF ranked Kagame’s Rwanda as the third most competitive economy after Mauritius and South Africa.
The World Economic Forum Is Singing An Entirely Different Tune
Suddenly, Rwanda is a basket case, according to the new wisdom of WEF. Now, see how WEF ranks Rwanda in its Inclusive Growth and Development Report just published.
As is shown the above WEF Table, Rwanda is mostly in red – indicating the worst performance in the following important areas:
- Per capita growth
- Labor productivity growth
- Poverty rate
- Median income and
- Dependency ratio
According WEF calculations, Tanzania is the most inclusive Sub-Saharan economy, followed by Ghana. Rwanda ranks even worse than Burundi.
So What Changed The Attitude Of WEF?
WEF is no longer single sourcing and relying on Rwanda’s statistics. According to Kagame faked statistics, poverty in Rwanda was “reduced from 44.9% in 2011 to 39.1% in 2014 and extreme poverty from 24.1% to 16.3%.” WEF is not buying Kagame’s bogus statistics. WEF shows the poverty ratio in Rwanda to be 81.5%. This is in the same range as the World Bank’s international poverty line when US$3.10 a day is used to measure poverty.
Bottom line?
Evidently, WEF no longer buys Kagame’s bogus data and associated stories. Welcome to the real world – WEF has effectively dumped Kagame and his fake data.
