Secretary-General Appoints Valentine Rugwabiza of Rwanda Special Representative for Central African Republic

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres announced today the appointment of Valentine Rugwabiza of Rwanda as his new Special Representative and Head of the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in the Central African Republic (MINUSCA).

Ms. Rugwabiza succeeds Mankeur Ndiaye of Senegal, who has led the Mission since 2019.  The Secretary-General is grateful for Mr. Ndiaye’s service to the people of the Central African Republic during a turbulent and critical period in its history.  His leadership was instrumental in MINUSCA’s comprehensive support to the general elections held in 2020-2021.

With more than 30 years of experience in Africa development and security issues in both the public and corporate sectors, Ms. Rugwabiza has been a Cabinet member, a senior diplomat accredited to several countries and organizations, and a senior leader in national, regional and multilateral entities.

Since 2016, Ms. Rugwabiza has been her country’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations and non-resident Ambassador to Colombia and Jamaica.  Between 2014 and 2016, she served as Minister for East African Community Affairs and Member of the East African Legislative Assembly.  From 2013 to 2014, she was Chief Executive Officer of the Rwanda Development Board and a Member of Cabinet.

From 2005 until 2013, Ms. Rugwabiza served as the Deputy Director-General of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in Geneva.  Before that, she was Rwanda’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations Office at Geneva and United Nations specialized agencies, as well as Ambassador to Switzerland, from 2002 to 2005.

Ms. Rugwabiza speaks English, French, Kiswahili and Kinyarwanda.

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* This supersedes Press Release BIO/4900 of 11 November 2016.