Rwandan referee Mutuyimana to officiate at U-17 Afcon championship

Rwandan assistant referee Dieudonné Mutuyimana is among 19 match officials selected by the Confederation of African Football (CAF) to officiate the Africa U-17 nations cup that runs from March 13-31 in Morocco. The tournament will be the first continental competition that Mutuyimana is going to officiate in his refereeing career. With the U-17 Africa nations championship in sight, Mutuyimana wants to establish himself as a top assistant referee who can handle big games including the World Cup, a tournament he dreams of officiating at in his career. “It [officiating U-17 CAN] is a milestone for me but of course I still have a long way to go. Every referee dreams of officiating World Cup matches and I am no exception, so there is still a lot to do to reach that level,” he said. “This is an indication that Rwandan referees are performing well at the international level and, hopefully, I am looking forward to improving my career game after game. The future is bright,” he added. Mutuyimana, 31, started his refereeing career in 2012 where he started officiating second division games before he was promoted to referee premier league in 2014. After impressing in officiating crucial games, Rwanda flagged Mutuyimana to participate at the CAF ‘Young Talent Referees Course’ held in Uganda in September 2018, during which he passed all tests including medical, physical, theoretical and technical tests. He was the only Rwandan among 34 African referees that participated in the course. His performance at the course has since impressed the CAF refereeing committee which decided to hand him tasks to officiate the CAF Champions League and CAF Confederations Cup since 2018. Mutuyimana has also been handling crucial games as assistant referee, including matches between rivals APR FC and Rayon Sports among others.