Arsenal, PSG And Bayern Requested To End Visit Rwanda Partnership
The Democratic Republic of Congo requested on Arsenal, Bayern Munich and Paris St-Germain to end their “blood stained” sponsorship deals with Visit Rwanda amid an escalating humanitarian turmoil in the country.
The request comes as M23 rebels captured Goma, the largest city in eastern DR Congo, while the United Nations’ refugee agency estimates more than 400,000 people have been forced from their homes this year.
A group of UN experts preserves the Rwandan army is in “de facto control of M23 operations”.
DR Congo’s Foreign Minister Thérèse Kayikwamba Wagner reached out the owners of Arsenal and PSG and to Bayern president Herbert Hainer to “question the morality” of the deals.
She highlighted how Visit Rwanda’s sponsorship could be aided by the illegal mining of blood minerals in the occupied parts of DR Congo, before being transported across the border and exported from Rwanda.
In her letter to Arsenal, Kayikwamba Wagner stated that Rwanda’s “culpability” for the ongoing conflict “has become incontrovertible” after the UN reported that 4,000 Rwandan troops are active in the DRC.
“It is time Arsenal ended its blood-stained sponsorship deals with this oppressor nation. If not for your own consciences, then the clubs should do it for the victims of Rwandan aggression,” she wrote.
Arsenal, PSG, Bayern Munich and Visit Rwanda have been contacted for comment.
The Visit Rwanda initiative has successfully raised the east African country’s profile but Rwanda’s government has been accused of investing in sport to enhance its global image a strategy labelled by critics as ‘sportswashing’ or reputation cleansing.
A sleeve partnership with Arsenal began in 2018, with the latest sponsorship reported to be worth more than £10m ($12.39 million) per year.
A sponsorship with PSG was agreed the following year, and Bayern Munich signed a five-year football development and tourism promotion partnership with Rwanda in 2023.
Meanwhile, Rwanda President Paul Kagame has announced a bid to stage a Formula 1 race and Kigali is set to be the venue for cycling’s World Road Championships in September 2025.
On Friday the UCI, cycling’s world governing body, said there were no plans to relocate the event away from Rwanda.
The Central Africa director at Human Rights Watch, a campaign group which investigates and reports on cases of abuse around the globe, says these deals and events help hide Rwanda’s violation of human rights.
The Rwandan government has dismissed accusations of sportswashing, with its chief tourism officer Irene Murerwa calling them “a distraction” from the “amazing and outstanding achievements the country has made”.
