Full Speech: President Kagame joins Masai Ujiri for the groundbreaking of Zaria Court

Watch Full Speech: President Kagame joins Masai Ujiri for the groundbreaking of Zaria Court - IGIHE on Dailymotion

Transcript

00:00 [Music]

00:29 Masai, Andrew, our friend Amadou and the many guests here including Masai's family

00:43 and other families around. First of all I want to welcome you here and to let you

00:52 know you are our family as well, the family of Rwanda so you are most welcome anytime.

01:06 You know Masai and the words he has just spoken, above all he is a doer, he does things and

01:19 the testament to that is what we are experiencing here. Between him and I there is only one

01:34 regret that goes around and that is that his expense. He has failed to convert me to support

01:43 the team he leads, Toronto Raptors. But it is not because he didn't try, it is just

02:01 because the time he brought the conversation up I was already absorbed in supporting another

02:09 team somewhere. But I said okay if it is to have two I will add Toronto Raptors but first

02:24 it will always be my Golden State Warriors. So sorry to bring that up but that is the

02:44 way it is. But otherwise we are really grateful that we have been able to work together and

02:58 many things have happened including now this one that is coming up, Zaria Court and the

03:08 whole ecosystem built around it as you said. And it doesn't stop here, it spreads across

03:19 Rwanda, the region and our continent. Masai has told many stories about meeting we had

03:37 in Toronto and he invited me to go and watch the All-Star game and how that resulted into

03:49 building the arena. And you know from that time Masai when the arena here was opened

03:58 many African leaders, some men of whom have visited here and actually visited the arena

04:09 itself and they have left saying they are going to build even bigger arenas than our

04:22 own. And I encouraged them to do that. I told them after all you have more reasons to do

04:32 that, please go ahead and do it. So it starts with one thing and then it keeps spreading.

04:43 Well of course they promised and I am still following them and nudging them and saying

04:48 what happened. You promised you are going to build a big arena in your country and so

05:00 we want to see it coming up. But I am just talking about the beginning of the story,

05:06 a very good story and how in a way it might have been slow in different places and different

05:14 aspects but I think it has been growing and to grow and I think there is a lot more to

05:21 come than we have already seen. So we just promise as a country we will do our best.

05:32 Our best may not be good enough but we will keep trying. But having you as friends and

05:40 as partners I think to grow and we will be at the point where we want to be in terms

05:52 of growing. First identifying, there is a lot to do in terms of identifying talent around

06:02 and growing that and the potential is enormous. It is actually limitless. There is a lot that

06:13 can be nurtured and grown here in our continent and that connects with many other things,

06:22 other sectors and you know it is not a secret how in Africa sports is a big thing. The poor,

06:39 the rich, everyone is just connecting with that every day, every moment and that helps

06:53 the spirit to grow even in other areas of development. Therefore to grow the infrastructure,

07:01 to grow the economies, it contributes to tourism, does many things. So this is not just as we

07:12 see it. It is much, much bigger than what is seen by the eyes and I wanted to thank

07:22 you, Masai, Andrew and everyone who has been supporting you as part of your teams. So again

07:35 I wanted to emphasize that here you should all feel at home. You are most welcome. Thank

07:43 you very much.

07:44 [MUSIC PLAYING]