Access to certain public places is now conditional on the presentation of a vaccination document against covid-19 in the Rwandan capital. This concerns places that could be sources of contamination.
A woman passing through Nyabugogo market on Monday 20 December to do her shopping was refused entry. She was asked for written proof of her vaccination against covid-19. She does not have it. She left her mobile phone at home. She saved a digital copy on it.
“They should have told us,” she complains. She has to return home to Nyamirambo empty-handed.
Another similar scene is seen in Gisozi, not far from the Ecole Belge de Kigali. A bus driver demands a certificate of vaccination against covid-19 on the Gisozi-Nyabugogo line. His bus is almost empty. Most people are surprised. They do not have this document.
This way of proceeding would be to require people to be vaccinated without rushing them too much.
The Minister of Local Government, Jean Marie Vianney Gatabazi, had issued a thinly veiled threat against people refusing to be vaccinated. “It is your right not to be vaccinated, but you must not contaminate others,” he said on Wednesday 15 December at a virtual press conference.
Vaccination pass’ becomes mandatory in Kigali and secondary towns
The Prime Minister (PM), Dr Edouard Ngirente, signed a revised communiqué on Sunday 19 December 2021 on preventive measures against covid-19. A “vaccination pass” is required in most public places.
In restaurants, “customers in Kigali and secondary towns must have already received two doses of vaccine,” said the Rwandan government’s PM, Dr Edouard Ngirente. The same requirement is imposed on people frequenting cabarets, places of worship and those taking buses from Kigali to the provinces and vice versa.
“The patients hospitalized today are those who have not yet been vaccinated,” explains Health Minister Dr Daniel Ngamije. “By refusal,” said Minister Jean Marie Vianney Gatabazi.
In Kigali, everything has been done to ensure equitable access to the vaccine. First, people were invited to go to the vaccination centers at state expense. Then the medical staff went to the homes of the disabled. For the time being, bus stations are also being used as places for the injection of the Vaccine-19.
Statistics show a rapid increase in the number of patients in the City of Kigali. Since 15 December, more than 100 new cases have been recorded every day in the capital, according to the Ministry of Health. This is due to the new variant, Omicron.
Gérard Rugambwa
