Kigali, 10 August 2020: Employees of Ministry of Infrastructure and affiliated agencies have donated 1,159 made in Rwanda smartphones towards the Connect Rwanda Challenge that was launched in December 2019.  A cheque worth Rwf 86.9 million was handed over by the Minister of Infrastructure, Hon. Claver Gatete to Hon. Paula Ingabire Musoni, Minister of ICT and Innovation.

Connect Rwanda challenge was launched by MTN in partnership with the Ministry of ICT and Innovation with the objective of providing smartphones to unconnected households countrywide to leverage the digital economy.  The Ministry of Infrastructure and its affiliated agencies honored a pledge of 730 smartphones to support the national campaign meant to boost the penetration of smartphones down to the grassroots.

Minister Gatete noted that, the smartphones would be matched with existing solar systems provided by the Ministry to unpowered homes early this year. The honored pledge is in line with the Ministry’s mission to propagate essential infrastructure. “Minister added”.

According to the Minister of Infrastructure, electricity access has so far reached many parts countrywide and the government is committed to achieve 100 percent power coverage by 2024.

Speaking at the event, Minister Ingabire hailed the voluntary contribution and expressed enthusiasm to roll out further infrastructure services as enablers to the country’s digital transformation. “Services such as electricity are necessarily widespread to the public.As we distribute these phones among households, we should also be thinking of how those services are more decentralized to the beneficiaries,” Ingabire said.

The challenge will facilitate digital payment system to both rural and urban families in acquiring numerous services including; paying electricity or water bills. At the Connect Rwanda campaign launch, President of the Republic of Rwanda, H.E. Paul Kagame, who also supported the cause with 1,500 devices, likened smartphones to an “everyday tool” which should not be a “luxury item”.