RWANDA: BY CORRUPTION, INSURERS DON’T WANT TO GIVE UP AGAINST LOSSES
According to the National Bank of Rwanda (BNR) report of 2018, the insurance sector had a loss of 53 million for five years (2013-2017). Faced with this problem, the BNR recommended going digital, but the officials of ASSAR (Association of Insurers in Rwanda) do not want it. It is only by corruption, as revealed by the investigation of M28 Investigates.
In its article of last week, video in support, M28 Investigates makes us live the scenes of the dirty game of corruption on the part of the authorities of ASSAR.
The gigantic losses are due to fraudulent acts, between insurance inspectors and mechanics.
Since the publication of the BNR report in 2018 and the recommendation to use digital, initiatives have been born to try to solve this problem. Four young students from KIC (Kigali Integrated College) have created a program that could help policyholders file complaints online. However, these young people were defrauded by the leaders of ASSAR who posed the redheads to them in the plow; in this case Gaudens Kanamugire, director of ASSAR and its executive secretary Jean Pierre Majoro.
At first, these students wanted to create a program that could solve the problem of losses in insurance business and named it Electronic Claim Managing System (ECMS).
Innocent Karambizi, director of KIC went to introduce this program to Gaudens Kanamugire, director of ASSAR so that it would be accepted and applied. The program was approved by Kanamugire and they started developing it.
Things started to get weird when Kanamugire threatened Karambizi. These are his words on video, “there is nowhere you can apply your program without the authorization of ASSAR”. He wanted to be given shares in this program giving permission to be able to apply the program. Karambizi had no choice but to accept what was said, as it was the only way to implement the program.
MAAD Ltd must have the shares
Towards the end of the deal, on August 8, 2019, Kanamugire sent a WHATSAPP message to Karambizi imposing that “there must be 24% of shares for me and for the general secretary, 25% for ASSAR and 51% for you who made the program. A condition without which the program would never be applied.
On September 25, 2019, a shadow company MAAD Limited was opened at RDB, whose shareholders are: Gaudences Kanamugire and his executive secretary JP Majoro. This company should have 24%, against 25% for ASSAR and 51% for the developers of the program, E-Baza”.
According to Majoro, MAAD Ltd is a marketing company, created by his boss. “I couldn’t refuse, I gave him my details, he opened the company”.
But for Kanamugire, in front of the messages and the MAAD certificate, he changes his gaze, he changes his tone, he moves the wheelchair and adjusts his glasses to load himself.
He begins to retort the reporter with questions, “Are you under criminal investigation? …………(a silence, staring at each other).
Do you know how much time wasted on that? These messages are mine, but we haven’t decided. It was an intention, I think we can stop here. If it is a criminal investigation, let the authorized bodies do it”.
Corruption, discouragement of young people
Marie Immaculée Ingabire, of Transparency International in Rwanda, sees all this as corruption. “As long as you deprive people of their rights, in your favor, you are already on the way to corruption. How come a director and his secretary get involved in marketing? For whom, there would be a conflict of interest. Who could intervene in case of fraud? »
Karambizi was shocked by what he saw. Here is what he told us “there are some people who use corruption as their way of life and these two are one of them. However, I had no choice but to accept what he was saying. The program was finally accepted by Kanamugire but it has been two years since the program was introduced to ASSAR but it has not been implemented and since that time Kanamugire has cut off all possible contact between him and Karambizi.
These two have committed actions that discourage innovation among young people. This was endorsed by Honorine Uwase, one of the four students who created the program. She says, “It’s sad that someone can develop an idea and another person comes and defrauds that idea for personal gain. »
And according to the law against corruption, stealing another person’s idea for personal gain is also punishable by law. When the evidence was shown to these two, Kanamugire said that they found better proposals than those offered by KIC students and said he was innocent. Yet all the evidence was against them and in the end said he had nothing more to say. Majoro told him “I accept that I made mistakes and tried to correct them when I was informed. »
These two are clearly criminals who have played a dirty game of bribery to make a profit of RWF 5 million and because of them the idea of the four KIC students will never be implemented. The reporter na M28 investigates has enough evidence to charge them and these two should be punished for what they did.
For the time being, the project will be executed by Beyondtech, an American company experienced in this field, according to JP Majoro.
