Donald Kaberuka

Kaberuka was born in Byumba, Rwanda. He studied at the University of Dar es Salaam as an undergraduate and obtained his MPhil in Development Studies from the University of East Anglia in 1979. He received his PhD in economics from the University of Glasgow.

Kaberuka worked in banking and international trade for over a decade. In October 1997 he was appointed minister of finance and economic planning in Rwanda. Kaberuka served in that position for eight years, and is credited with helping to stabilize the Rwandan economy from the effects of the 1994 genocide.

African Development Bank, 2005–2015

In July 2005, Kaberuka was elected president of the African Development Bank. He took office in September 2005.

Kaberuka led an institution whose financial standing has been restored from the near collapse of 1995, but whose operational credibility remains a work-in-progress. In addition to his role at the bank, Kaberuka was also a member of the Commission on Effective Development Cooperation with Africa which was set up by the prime minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen of Denmark and held meetings between April and October 2008.

A working group convened by the Center for Global Development, an independent Washington think tank, released a report in September 2006 that offered six recommendations for Kaberuka and the bank's board of directors on broad principles to guide the bank's renewal. The report contains six recommendations for management and shareholders as they address the urgent task of reforming Africa's development bank. Prominent among the recommendations is a strong focus on infrastructure.