Minister Nyatanyi to be accorded state funeral

The body of the Minister of State in charge of Social Affairs, Christine Nyatanyi will, today, lay in state at the Parliament buildings. Nyatanyi passed away last week in Saint-Luc University Hospital, Brussels in Belgium where she had, for long, been undergoing treatment. Her body arrived on Saturday aboard an SN Brussels flight. In interview with The New Times, the Minister of Local Government James Musoni said that Nyatanyi would be accorded a state funeral as she died while still in service. “It will be an official function. At the time she passed away she was still in service. “The body will lay in parliament in the morning for government officials to pay their last respects and from there, a requiem mass will be held before the body is laid to rest at Rusororo Cemetery,” Musoni said. Upon arrival, the body was taken to King Faisal Hospital mortuary. The body will, this morning, be taken to her home in Kiyovu for her family to pay their last respects before it is taken to Parliament at 10:30 a.m. The requiem mass will be held at the Regina Pacis church in Remera there after. Marie Christine Nyatanyi graduated in 1991 from the Institute of National Economy of Odessa, Ukraine (Former Soviet Union) with a Masters in Industrial planning. She also held a bachelors degree in economics from Kharkiv State Economics University. Nyatanyi occupied a number of positions before she was appointed Minister of State in charge of Social Affairs and Community Development in October 2003. After the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, she worked at the Tracing Department of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Goma and Nairobi, respectively,. In 1997, she was assigned the role of Project Officer in the Flemish Council for Refugees in Brussels. In 2008, she received a UN award for public service and accountability for the ‘Ubudehe’ programme. Ends