National carrier RwandAir has announced the resumption of its route to and from Johannesburg, South Africa effective May 7. Johannesburg is one of the southern African routes that RwandAir suspended its flights alongside Cape Town, Lusaka, and Harare. The suspension happened in February following the detection of a new variant of Covid-19 in South Africa. “We’re excited to announce the resumption of our services to Johannesburg with three weekly flights effective 7 May 2021,” a tweet by the national carrier reads. Other countries where the variant had been detected include Brazil, Britain among others. After months of lockdown last year, RwandAir resumed commercial flights in August 2020 across its global network, including most of its African routes, as well as some long-haul destinations such as London-Heathrow, Brussels, Mumbai in India and Dubai. The London route was later suspended and only the cargo flight maintained, while Mumbai was also put on hold last week, owing to the latest spike in cases of Covid-19 in the Asian country. Despite the resumption of the flights to Johannesburg, flights to Cape Town, remain on hold until further notice. A certificate of a negative Covid-19 test is required for all travelers arriving, transiting, or departing from Rwanda. The only accepted test is a SARS-Cov 2 real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) performed within 72 hours of departure time, according to guidelines in place.
