President Paul Kagame has appreciated India for playing a major role in supporting Africa’s Covid-19 vaccination efforts. A high number of the vaccine doses that have been used on the African continent so far were of the AstraZeneca type produced by the Serum Institute of India, provided through the Covax Initiative. This has assisted Africa to get its vaccination campaigns going, despite the challenges of scarcity brought about by the fact that several other manufacturing countries were holding onto the doses, as a way of prioritizing their own populations. Speaking virtually at the 6th edition of the Raisina Dialogue, India’s flagship conference on geopolitics, President Kagame praised the Asian nation for its solidarity with Africa during the challenges encountered in its vaccination endeavours. “India, despite its own challenges, has produced most of the vaccine doses sent to Africa under Covax and related programs. Without India’s production capacity and spirit of solidarity it is possible that Africa would not yet have received much vaccine at all,” he said. Noting that access to vaccines is highly unequal in a situation of scarcity, power and wealth will always set the tempo, he said that Covid-19 not only a public health crisis but also a crisis of international cooperation. He hinted on the need for more ambitious private sector investments between India and Africa, in pharmaceutical manufacturing. He zeroed in on the relationship between India and Rwanda, saying it is continuing to flourish and the goal is to further deepen the ties. “Rwanda and India continue to collaborate on important infrastructure and development initiatives. The key objective is to increase the educational and employment opportunities available to young people both in Rwanda and India,” he said. “Knowledge, innovation and the green economy will still be the key drivers of growth after the pandemic. The observer Research Foundation’s annual Kigali Global dialogue is another good example,” he added. The four-day event, according to organisers, will have a total of 50 sessions with the participation of 150 speakers from 50 countries and multilateral organisations. Narendra Modi, the Prime Minister of India, Mette Frederiksen, Prime Minister of Australia, Scott Morrison among others are some of the speakers at the conference.
