Philanthropy
Coutts Helps Bring Healing Power Of Cricket To Rwanda
The UK private bank has joined hands with a foundation building cricket facilities in the African nation.
A cricket club of Coutts hopes to raise more than
£20,000 to build a stadium for the game in Kigali, Rwanda, aiming
to harness the healing power of sport to help rebuild a country
torn apart by civil war and genocide.
Coutts Cricket Club is backing work of the Rwanda Cricket Stadium
Foundation to bring cricket facilities to the African country.
The Rwandan cricket captain, Eric Dusingizimana, recently
performed the feat of batting in a cricket net for a
record-breaking 51 hours to raise funds for the foundation.
Taking inspiration from this, the Coutts team hosted its own 51-
hour sponsored net at the Oval ground in London. Some 20
members of the cricket team will also fly to Rwanda in October to
join the opening ceremony, take part in the opening tournament,
and each carry out five days of volunteering work by supporting
local community projects.
“The stadium and sports centre will be run on a not-for-profit
basis to ensure its continued service to the community and any
surplus funds will be invested back into local sports based
development programmes,” Howard Cornwell, tour organiser of
Coutts Cricket Club said.
Rwanda Cricket Stadium Foundation’s vision is to create a green
and pleasant environment where Rwandans of all ages can develop
their cricket and use these skills into their wider lives.
The project is to be constructed using predominantly local labour
sourced through a Rwandan government-led social protection
programme, the Vision Umurenge Project.