The Austrian Red Cross has recently much-admired the Rwandan Red Cross for its remarkable achievements and outstanding contributions to humanitarian efforts. The acknowledgment underscores the admiration and appreciation of the Austrian Red Cross for the impactful work carried out by its Rwandan counterpart.
This recognition not only highlights the excellence of the Rwandan Red Cross but also aims to foster collaboration and the exchange of best practices between the two organizations. By praising the accomplishments of the Rwandan Red Cross, the Austrian Red Cross seeks to strengthen the spirit of solidarity within the broader Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement.
Mr Gerry Foitik, Deputy Secretary General of Austrian Red Cross
Mr Gerry Foitik, Deputy Secretary General of Austrian Red Cross, said that Austrian Red Cross is very proud of supporting the Rwanda Red Cross Society, especially in one field of their core competencies; that is the emergency medical service.
“We are running the emergency medical service in the whole of Austria and as we know that Rwanda Red Cross Society also wants to serve the people in Rwanda with ambulance and emergency medical service, we support them. We support them with ideas, with concepts, but we also support them financially that they are able to improve the situation for people in Rwanda for the transfer between health posts, health centers and district hospitals or referral hospitals and they are doing a very good job in the emergency medical service” Mr Gerry Foitik said.
He added that they have also been very successful in Rwanda at the Rwanda Red Cross Society in training, as they really took a very big step forward in training of the EMTs and ECAs and what they saw these days, Rwanda Red Cross Society are doing it in a very professional, very good way and many of these ECAs and the EMTs, they are really highly professionally trained and they are of course motivated to do this to support their communities and their people.
Mr Gerry Foitik also said that they are planning to continue their support for Rwanda Red Cross, even though it’s not about the ambulances.
Mr Walter Hajek , Head of Operations and International Cooperation of Austrian Red Cross
Mr Walter Hajek , Head of Operations and International Cooperation of Austrian Red Cross, in expressing his gratitude said that the Austrian Red Cross has enjoyed a very fruitful and very strong cooperation with the Rwanda Red Cross Society for many years and they are planning to continue that cooperation in the weeks, months and years to come and also to expand that cooperation.
“Almost 10 years we have been cooperating very well with the Rwanda Red Cross Society and we appreciate very much this cooperation. Now we support the Rwanda Red Cross together, we cooperate together primarily in two sectors. One is the emergency medical services and the other sector is the model village operation. And in both sectors and in both programs we would like to expand and solidify further the cooperation with the Rwanda Red Cross Society. Now what we do is we are planning together with the Rwanda Red Cross where can we support and then we are talking with our partners in Austria, our back donors in order to scale the programs in these two sectors. And when I go back to Austria this is exactly what I’m going to do. I’m going to talk with my ministries and my development agencies” Mr Walter Hajek said.
Uwicyeza Jeannette
Uwicyeza Jeannette, coordinator of Umurunga cooperative, thanks Rwanda Red Cross for supporting them in their development way as the beneficiaries of its projects.
“First of all, we would like to thank the Rwanda Red Cross in particular, which brought us together in order to get our hands out of our pockets, they asked us to be partners, we don’t just expect them to give us gifts, but we come and join hands, we thank you in almost everything, we have decided to be vegetable and fruit farmers and mixed plants and crops, …. we thank the Rwanda Red Cross because it is the one that encouraged us to wake up and work” Uwicyeza Jeannette said.
Mrs. Francoise Mukandekezi, President of the Rwanda Red Cross
Mrs. Francoise Mukandekezi, President of the Rwanda Red Cross, said that they have had guests from Austria for a week, as they also had visited them in October this year.
They have visited the activities related to health, with activities to help the people in having a good life in model villages, in Nyamasheke District in Kirimbi Sector, so we had time for activities at the headquarters where we visited the Medical Training Center, where they support us in providing advanced training to medical assistants and helping us with the ambulance service at the hospital, now we have two hospitals that we work with, Nyamata hospital and Kibirizi hospital, so they were able to see the training center at the headquarter and saw how we work, as well they also went to the Kibirizi hospital, talked to the hospital staff, the trained ambulance workers, then they looked at what we are doing and the challenges we have, in fact they gave different advice, we continued to take them to visit the best of Rwanda” Said Mrs. Francoise Mukandekezi.
She also said that they visited Nyungwe Park then after they went to Nyamasheke, where they visited the activities of model villages with different cooperatives that Rwanda Red Cross supported. The support of Rwanda Red Cross in partnership with Austria Red Cross in the model villages projects is worth more than 203 million used to buy livestock, to build a girl’s room, to planting trees and building water pipes.
In addition to achievements from Austrian Red Cross , Rwanda Red Cross also achieved some activities such as the construction of Kivu Breeze Hotel located in Karongi district, Bwishyura Sector through Belgian and International federation of Red Cross supports.
By Carine Kayitesi
