Rwanda funding to Arsenal, Paris Saint-Germain (PSG), and FC Bayern Munich is not a donation, but rather a win-win partnership in which the country benefits such as through promoting its tourism attractions, President Paul Kagame has said. He made the observation on April 1, 2024, during an interview with Radio 10 and Royal FM. ALSO READ: Rwanda becomes Arsenal’s first tourism partner Kagame was responding to an issue of foreign critics including the media which question Rwanda's partnership – under the Visit Rwanda brand – with football clubs including Arsenal, Bayern Munich, and Bayern Munich, and the profitability of such a partnership. “It [the partnership] is much profitable,” Kagame replied. “Personally, there are many people I meet, or who come here [in Rwanda] for tourism and they say that they knew Rwanda and its beauty and what it offers through what they saw in our partnership with Arsenal, or PSG, or Bayern Munich,” he observed. For instance, he said that the partnership with Bayern Munich, which is the most recent – it was agreed in August 2023 – has spread information about Rwanda to Germans in an unprecedented way. ALSO READ: Kagame hints at new deal with major football club Kagame wondered why some people were shouting about the partnership, and where it hurts them. On the issue cited by some of the critics that Rwanda is poor and therefore should not sponsor football clubs such as Arsenal, the President said that these critics are ignorant about the situation. “We do not sponsor anyone. We partner, it’s a partnership where everyone plays a role,” he said, pointing out that it would not make sense to provide funding to the football clubs without a profit. “We do not have money to throw here and there,” he remarked. Rwanda’s tourism generated $445 million in revenues in 2022, representing a 171.3 per cent increase compared to $164 million in 2021 (a year in which the country’s tourism earnings dipped due to the Covid-19 impact on the hospitality industry), according a 2022 annual report by the Rwanda Development Board (RDB).
