S.Africa based luxury jets owned by RPF- Nshuti May 28, 2010
Posted by Business Daily in Uncategorized.
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Luxurious Bombardier jet
By Marcel Museminari
Rwandan President Paul Kagame’s political party RPF and not the government of Rwanda owns mystery South Africa based luxury jets reported in the South African newspaper Sunday Times of Feb 14, 2010, Business Daily can now reveal.
At the time the South African newspaper had reported that ‘Nyirubutama ( first secretary Rwandan Embassy South Africa) said he was appointed as one of the directors of Repli Investments to allow the government to have a say in the operations of the aircraft “for security reasons”.
He said his government had decided to base the jets in South Africa because his country did not have the “skills, expertise or knowledge” to maintain them. Both were available for charter when not needed by the Rwandan government.’
One of the directors named in the plane saga, presidential advisor Manasseh Nshuti recently told Business Daily that the planes belonged to RPF’s trading arm Tri-Star recently renamed Crystal Ventures.
Challenged if the money to buy the planes could actually have been pilfered from the Central bank BNR, Manasseh Nshuti replied, “there is no way any money to buy those planes – (price tag USD50million each) – could leave the treasury without the World Bank officials embedded in the Central Bank BNR raising alarm,” he told this reporter.
The money came ‘from clean sources.’ he said, including the sale of shares owned by Tri-Star in MTN Uganda and Rwanda and ‘which were substantial by the way,’ Manasseh Nshuti added. Tri-Star or Crystal Ventures have since divested in MTN Rwanda and Uganda and the mystery luxury planes explain where the millions of shares from MTN had been re-invested.
Manasseh Nshuti also debunked the idea that the vast wealth of Tri-Star would be the source of conflict among top RPF members including the top army officers who have since fled, such as Gen. Kayumba Nyamwasa and Karegeya.
He said the original RPF fund was a war chest that helped the ‘liberation war’ and was only managed efficiently. Most ventures are strategic ‘to sustain the national rebuilding effort at whatever cost’ implying that ‘some ventures are not profitable.’
But Kayumba Nyamwasa without pointing a finger at who exactly owns the planes, in the May 29, BBC Imvo n’Imvano talk show preferred to say ‘they are owned by the one who rides in them,’ an indirect reference to President Paul Kagame. Kayumba Nyamwasa accuses Kagame of lack of accountability to the party member claiming that even the RPF party secretary does not know about much about party finances.
It is unlikely that that Kagame or any of the named directors would have declared to the Ombudsman; that they own the two planes worth USD100 million or more this after Kayumba Nyamwasa furnishes new information (believable) that the plane are now fitted with anti-missile technology.
Instead, the luxury planes explain the sophistication of the RPF strategy. President Kagame needs efficient and secure air travel in a country with a history of shooting down a president’s plane with missiles. The national budget and embedded World Bank officials in the Central Bank cannot allow it. So RPF goes to its war chest, buys a world class jet fitted with anti-missile technology
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