Lemigo Hotel, Kigali – Today on 14th February 2019, the Ministry of Local Government (MINALOC) conjointly with the Local Administrative Entities Development Agency (LODA) has launched a consultative dialogue on Ubudehe categorization review. The dialogue gathers representatives of Government agencies, the Civil Society (CSOs), Faith Based Organizations (FBOs), NGOs, researchers, media and the general public. The dialogue is meant to discuss criteria and utilization of Ubudehe categories.

The utmost objective of the dialogue is to gather multi-stakeholders’ perspectives on how best Ubudehe categorization criteria and practices can be improved. Prof. SHYAKA Anastase, Minister of Local Government, said that “the purpose of the dialogue is to gather a variety of views from different stakeholders of how to better classify citizens according to their livelihood standing or Ubudehe categories. Resolutions from this dialogue shall be exposed to the general public (during community assemblies/ Inteko z’Abaturage) in order to get their feedback on which shall be based the forthcoming Ubudehe classification”.

Historically, the concept of Ubudehe is “a traditional practice of community mutual aid between neighbors to support the vulnerable towards the improvement of their socio-economic life standing”. In the aftermath of the 1994 Genocide against Tutsi in Rwanda, from 2001 the Government of Rwanda revived Ubudehe practice in a bid to contribute to inclusive socio-economic development, economic planning, social cohesion, as well as Unity and Reconciliation of all Rwandans. Although much has been done in that regard, there have been growing public concerns on the fairness and effectiveness of existing Ubudehe categorization process and practices, leading to criticism and complaints associated to categorization criteria, issues of fairness and transparency in the process of Ubudehe categorization and validation usage of the Ubudehe categories in targeting of beneficiaries, etc.

The review of Ubudehe categories is done every three years and it was last done in 2015. According to GATSINZI Justine, Division Manager of Social Protection at LODA, “The 2019 review shall basically be enlightened by and improved from lessons learnt from previous reviews. The involvement of CSOs, NGOs, FBOs and media shall help us to get closer to citizens and explain to them the Ubudehe classification and its role in the socio-economic transformation process, but most importantly consider their views on how to better conduct it as well”.

From the launched consultative campaign, MINALOC and LODA expect to collect free, diversified and constructive views from stakeholders and most importantly from the general public on how to realistically classify citizens according to their livelihood standing in a bid to scrutinize national planning towards socio-economic transformation. The planned campaign will lead to the feedback on relevance of and identified gaps in the existing proposal of Ubudehe categorization criteria and inputs for further improvements are gathered and used as a basis to review that proposal, and to a consensus on how Ubudehe categorization criteria and practices can be best improved to satisfy citizens’ needs.