Kigali 28 July, 2015: Rwanda Government held talks with American celebrity and businessman Akon to discuss a partnership with Akon Lighting Africa (ALA) to boost Rwanda’s solar energy programme.

In the meeting held at Rwanda Development Board headquarters, CEO Francis Gatare, Minister of Infrastructure Honourable James Musoni and Minister of State in Charge of Energy and Water Honourable Germaine Kamayirese gave a presentation on Rwanda’s current energy status and projections for the year 2018, highlighting gaps and opportunities to bridge them by joining hands with the ALA initiative.

Speaking in the meeting with Akon and stakeholders, Hon. James Musoni said “Africa has sunshine in abundance. It's time to harness it optimally for our progress”. Honourable Gatare further added “Rwanda’s partnership with Akon Lighting Africa will help drive the country’s energy target to have 22% off- grid coverage by 2018. Such partnership will benefit Rwanda in harnessing solar power’s potential to advance our energy goals”.

The Akon Lighting Africa initiative, started in 2014, aims to bring solar power to nearly half, or 600 million, of the Africans who currently live without power. An Africa-wide road show, which started in Kenya on July 24th, 2015, was organized to evaluate the progress of existing projects and identify news areas for electrification. Rwanda is listed on the road show itinerary, among ten countries and as a new area of interest. The Akon Lighting Africa project currently operates in 14 countries with Rwanda recently added on their list for expansion in 2016.

While in a media briefing, Akon said “We met with the necessary parties. This is going to be a pretty massive project obviously. The project will benefit Rwandans not only in terms of access to solar energy, but also to jobs and critical expertise”.

Under EDPRS II, Rwanda has set a target to establish 70% overall electricity coverage and in the same period connect 500,000 households to power. Recent energy advancements include the grid-connected project of Gigawatt Global producing 8.5Mw since mid- 2014. Off-grid connected projects include Mobisol, with 28,500 households connected and an expansion plan to reach 49,000 households and 1000 schools by end 2015 and Ignite Power with 1,000 households connected in pilot phase and seeking a new agreement to give access to 250,000 individuals by 2018.

Akon Lighting Africa has also partnered with the Give1Project, a leadership-development nonprofit, and ADS Global Corporation SA to promote the initiative.