After the 2-week SfK MBA Boot Camp Training in Arusha, I traveled to Kigali, Rwanda, primarily to spend time with the Nanuri Community people.
Nanuri Limited is the holding company that owns the properties built on a land in Kanombe. Under this umbrella, Nanuri owns and operates Nanuri Medical Center and Nanuri Guest House.
Nanuri Medical Center has been operational since March 2019 by Dr. Park, Junbum, a physician and Dr. Baek, Jieyeon, a pediatrician. The center was still empty with only a few patients, but I think that it will soon be busy with a lot of patients based on their long experiences and high quality medical equipment and clean facility. I took a medical exam including endoscopy.
I stayed at the Nanuri Guest House that has a total of 18 units. But, a significant number of rooms were occupied by Sang Hoon Lee's family, Hee Joo Lee, and one of a short term missionaries. The short term hospitality customers were few at best. Some program clients were also staying at the guest house, such as four high school students from New Jersey and Singapore.
The foods served at the guest house were excellent. I thoroughly enjoyed them.
Nanuri Limited is also managing and operating 2 & 5 Christian Academy for the Friends Denomination in Rwanda. Currently, the number of students was at 204. It was encouraging to see the school being run profitably. I helped them pay professional management fee to Nanuri Limited on a regular basis since January 2019. I also helped out Heejoo to prepare the school's financial statements correctly. But, the school has to manage the license matter since the Ministry of Education has issued a final notice not to issue the license for the school. I explored the possibility of collaborating with Alpha, but was unsuccessful. We will see how the Lord leads them.
Great joy of traveling to a foreign country is meeting up with friends. Rwanda was a place where we lived for 7 and half years so I could meet up with a lot of people. But, in light of the short stay, I saw Christian Baingana, Kevin Rudahinduka, Emmanuel Mugandura, Dan Mutiganda, Faustin Zihiga, Hyun Jung Rhu, Mr and Mrs. Noh.
Daniel continues working for Chalmers Group as Africa Regional Director. Grace may be resigning at the year-end.
Dan Mutiganda is working for One Acre Fund as the head of H.R. His wife is heading the diaspora banking unit for Equity Bank. It was a news that Equity Bank purchased the East Africa businesses, including BPR, from Atlas Mara. He seems to be doing well. He asked me about investment overseas.
Jinhee is the second daughter of Sanghoon and Songyi Lee. She is now sophomore at Yale-NUS in Singapore.
Jaejoon, a member of SBS Rwanda, and his wife Eunbyul have returned to Rwanda. Jaejoon is now one of the administrative staff for KOICA Rwanda. It was my first time to meet Eunbyul who is a nurse and has passed the U.S. RN exam. Good for her! She is planning to volunteer at Nanuri Medical Center for now.
Kevin Rudahinduka is now Director of Digital Transformation at Bank of Kigali that has surpassed the $1 billion landmark in total assets. This 2-year project may prepare BK for the next level performance in banking services.
Mr. and Mrs. Noh have moved to a new location in Gacuriro. It was a new house and they seem to be doing well. Mr. Noh's face looked a bit too dark, but he is taking the B12 shot everyday based on his doctor's recommendation.
Emmanuel Mugandura is now working for Coge Bank as CFO. His adopted children David, John, Sarah and Chantia are doing well. David has graduated from the university and is now looking for a job. John is hanging around. Sarah is soon finishing up her college study. Chantia is a student at UR and is doing well. I invited him to consider using Nanuri Medical Center for its self insurance program. He said he would do.
Faustin used to be Chief Relationship Officer responsible for all business units. His business card still shows the same title, but is now responsible for Spiritual Integration and H.R. Probably it is a better job function for him. I invited him also to use Nanuri Medical Center for Urwego Bank's self insurance program. He liked the doctors and the facility a lot.
I briefly met up with Christine Baingana, CEO of Urwego Bank. She has reshuffled the organization chart and has a bit uncomfortable relationship with her Deputy CEO Jesse. But she seems to have done the right thing for the bank. Two RWF500M loans she has made to ADEPER sounded like a concern, but I pray that things will go well.
I had a meeting with Bishop Louis and his wife Pastor Winnie. Bishop is relocating to Anglican University as the Chaplain and also a professor. He did not look too enthusiastic. Well. Winnie has taken over the management of Alpha Community School again. Its students now number 140 although she complained about 40 students who are not paying on time or at all. I hoped to be able to connect 2 & 5 Christian Academy to Alpha, but it appears to be of no use for now. Alpha still owes to Access Bank Rwf93 million and its Rwf 8 - 12 million payment per term seems like a lot of burden. But she seems to manage it alright.
We held the board meeting for Nanuri Limited. Heejoo was brought in as a new member. I volunteered the resignation of Kristin and I decided to stay for now. I meant to resign also mainly because I do not bring much value to Nanuri since Nanuri is not really interested in pursuing the missional business path. We agreed to hold the board meeting on a quarterly basis through a conference call. We will see how it goes.
I took the Nanuri members out to dinner at BWok, a restaurant owned and operated by Mr. Junghoon Lee and Saesaem Jung. They used to run Rz Manna established and operated by Handong Global University as part of KOICA's ODA program. Now it is defunct. It is sad to see a viable business go under due to poor management and conflict of interest. BWok has recently recruited back Mr. Choi, Jonghee who used to work at Rz Manna as the baker. BWok seems to be doing well and I was happy to see that happen. We enjoyed the food and Hoddeok Icecream.
At the former Rz Manna location, Hyunjin Ryu, a graduate of SfK MBA BCT Chiang Mai in 2017 and a former KOICA volunteer as chef, established an African cafe, called Kijamii Table. It was set up as a social enterprise. Kijamii means "social" in Kiswahili. It is losing money with the revenues covering only 50% of the operating expenses. The losses are covered with donation from supporters and international development organizations. His and his partner's good intent may bear fruit.
Rwanda was one of our long-term dwelling places and remains dear to my heart. More than anything else, its weather is just perfect. Besides, the way it continues to reform itself is amazing. I learned that HE Paul Kagame as Chairman of AU has pulled off the approval from 53 countries in Africa for its Africa free trade agreement, namely Africa Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA). Subsequently, Rwanda will host Inter-Africa Trade Fair (IATF) in 2020. It is expected to draw easily 10,000 delegates. Wow...! - Jeffrey
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