 We're here today with Mr. Andrew Rugege, who is the ITU Regional Director for Africa. Mr. Rugege, thank you for being here. Thank you for inviting me. Mr. Rugege, we gathered here in Kigali for two important ITU meetings. The first one is the Regional Development Forum, that took place on Monday, the 5th of December. Can you tell us about these meetings, what was the outcome? Thank you Monika, thank you for being here, thank you for inviting me. I hope you enjoyed being in Kigali and our meetings. The Regional Development Forum has two, for me it has two objectives. One, it is my platform as Regional Director to report back to the membership, and I do that every year on the activities of the ITU. But secondly, it's a platform, it's a multi-stakeholder platform that on which ITU and other stakeholders meet to discuss issues that are important to Africa. That means that it is ITU membership, and those that are not members, they can come and give ideas, and this is exactly what happened. So the way it was organized, the reporting was done, they appreciated my report, which I'm grateful for, but also we had three other very important sessions. We had a session that discussed the role of ICTs in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. Most importantly, this session included sister organizations, the ITU, the UN organizations, it included private sector, it included other organizations like the banking sector, because we wanted to talk about the role of the ICT in Sustainable Development, but we also wanted to say how do we actually achieve this, how do we fund this, how do we operationalize it, so that was the discussion, and the outcome was very good. The third session talked about emerging technologies and the opportunities and challenges, and they turned out to be many, but I think we had more opportunities than challenges. But this addressed, for example, the trending issues of OTTs and telecom economics, which is a trending issue in Africa right now, and it also included issues of IOTs and big data, for example, it included connectivity and smart cities. So for Africa these are very important issues, there are things like big data, there is a lack of understanding of what it is, there is the scare of it, so we were able to clarify it, players were able to talk about it, appreciate it, and also to say you know what, this is where we want to go. The most exciting session was the last session, the fourth session, which was on young entrepreneurs. It was most exciting because whenever you have young people in the room, not only young people, it is young, innovative people, it is most exciting. You could see the attention was undivided. This session was meant to give a platform to these young entrepreneurs to tell us what their projects are, what their success stories are, what their challenges are. But I also wanted us to learn what challenges they have and what we can do about it, both as ITU but also as member states who are in the room, because often not all of us appreciate entrepreneurship, and especially when you have young people, when you have young women, we still have a stigma as one of the young ladies was saying. So this session, it was very carefully selected, the adults that were on it, the moderator is a young person but who is seasoned as a mentor for young people. He's also a member of the Young President's Club, that's why he was selected. It's called Sunil Chandaria. We had a keynote speaker who was the regional director of UNIDO, and UNIDO has in its mandate the development of industrialization but also innovation and encouraging young people. So I wanted them to hear from these two people but also them to share their experiences. It was amazing because we had three young ladies, three young entrepreneurs and two young men, and they all seemed to share one thing, passion for innovation. And this is what really resonates with me because I do want other young people to know you can be young, you can be an entrepreneur, whether you're a young man or whether you're a young woman, you can still be an entrepreneur. And this also was meant to encourage those that will be determining the priority areas for Africa where ITU should focus. So when they see this, when they see the success of these few young people with the little they had, what would happen if as countries we really supported these young people, we supported young women, we encouraged everybody to know that they can succeed and then put our weight behind them. I think that's going to be a trick to Africa's taking off like that. That's great. Thank you. And you spoke about innovation but you spoke about the sustainable development goals which were adopted by the international community in 2015. How can the work of ITU contribute to the achievement of the sustainable development goals known as SDGs? Okay. I should have mentioned that the theme for the Regional Development Forum was ICT for SDGs. And the theme for the RPM, which I'll talk about in a minute, is the same as it is the same for the World Telecommunication Development Conference that is going to happen next year for which we are preparing. How does the work of the ITU, particularly BDT, contribute to sustainable development goals? I think the ultimate goal of the sustainable development goals is to better or improve the quality of life of everybody. And BDT, the work of the BDT, really the bottom line is the same. It is not about technology. It is not about building networks. It is about doing something that will improve the quality of life of people and people wherever they are, not you and me with multiple degrees, not so and so with millions in their account. We want everybody from the bottom of the pyramid to feel that they are included and to see the difference that ICT can make in their lives. And there are many, many things. Young people talk about them. We talk about them. But when you start using ICTs for productivity in agriculture, when you start using ICTs to reach those that are not able to reach a hospital immediately, you remember the minister of ICT in his opening remarks, he talked about the first online hospital that uses ICTs to... you can even get a prescription. So using ICTs in services that improve or save the lives of the people. That's what we're about. That's what SDIT is about. That is what BDT is doing. And that is how BDT will use ICTs in accelerating the attainment or the sustainable development goals. And as you said, this is the theme of the major ITU conference taking place next year in 2017 in Buenos Aires, Argentina from the 9th to the 20th of October. And that's the World Telecommunication Development Conference. And the RPM, the Regional Preparatory Meeting, is in fact a meeting organised to prepare for that conference. Can you tell us about this meeting which is taking place right now as we speak? Indeed, we started on yesterday, Tuesday, and the purpose of getting Africans together and some other stakeholders is to prepare themselves for the World Conference. It is to identify their priorities. It is to, in this case, to gauge their progress, the progress of ICT telecommunications and what it is achieving for them. And therefore, prepare, go with an African Common Proposal to the World Conference in order to be able to have a higher voice among all the other voices that are there. All the regions will be there. All the regions have different priorities. So if you go with a common voice, you are more likely to be heard than if you go with 100 voices. During this RPM, the way it was organised, we had certain significant documents like the BDT draft contribution to the draft strategic plan of the Union, the BDT contribution to the operational plan, the BDT contribution to the declaration. There are other documents like rules of procedure and many others. But also importantly, we solicited from the members contributions not only to those documents, but also to what resolutions would they like to be taken in the interest of Africa. And so the two days that we have spent have looked at those contributions have discussed them, digested them and come up with common positions. We had the regional organisation, the telecommunications regional organisation, here in the room. And it is the one that eventually will take all these proposals and make them into a common proposal and bring it to WTDC. And many things have come out. Many things have been appreciated. But I think it's going to be a very, very interesting WTDC as far as Africa is concerned, because Africa this time, they have their act together. They have it right. So we look forward to it. Absolutely. And I want to thank you, Mr. Rugeger, for your time. Thank you very much. Thank you for inviting me and I'm very excited. I look forward to this conference because we are prepared for it.