Rwanda’s Minister of Education, Valentine Uwamariya, has announced closure of nursery, primary and secondary schools in the capital, Kigali.
The closure, which becomes effective from Monday, 18 January 2021, follows a surge in numbers of coronavirus cases, the Rwandan Ministry of Education on Sunday said in a communique.
The measure, which will be reviewed in two weeks upon health assessment, applies to all nursery, primary and secondary schools, both public and private.
The statement added that boarding students will remain in their schools.
Uwamariya said schools in other provinces will also close if more cases are confirmed there.
Schools were reopened in November after eight months closure due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Coronavirus cases are on the rise in the country with more than 1,000 new cases and 22 fatalities reported in the last seven days.
Rwanda recorded 182 new cases of Covid-19 on Sunday, January 17, taking the total number of confirmed cases in the country to 11,032.
On the same day, two Covid-19 related deaths were registered. The deceased, according to the Ministry of Health were two men of 60 and 61 years of age from Kigali.
This takes the total number of deaths related to the virus to 142.
The government has ordered public hospitals to treat Covid-19 patients with their widely used community-based health insurance.
