Rwanda shuts the alcohol line of Sina Gerard, the tycoon behind Akabanga chilli oil

Rwandan investigators have shut down the alcoholic beverages section of Sina Gerard Enterprise Urwibutso, the agro-processing company behind Akabanga chilli oil and one of the best-known manufacturing businesses in the country, and arrested the manager who ran that production line.

Thierry Murangira, spokesman for the Rwanda Investigation Bureau, set out the decision on Aug. 8 as investigators paraded 16 suspects before the media in Kigali. "Sina Gerard's factory has two sections, one for producing juices and food products, and another for producing alcoholic beverages," he said. "The section that was shut down is the one producing alcoholic beverages."

Sina Gerard was not among those arrested. Neither the RIB nor the Rwanda Food and Drugs Authority has made any allegation against him personally, and the company's juice and food operations continue to run.

The distinction matters in a sweep that has reached company owners elsewhere. Investigators arrested the owner of Ingufu Gin Ltd along with its quality control officer and production manager, the owner of Bio Hub, the owner of Ebenezer Company, and a shareholder in Lotas Medical Group. Three people were detained at Kerry Taste and Nutrition Rwanda, which supplies flavour products to alcohol factories, and two at Sakaza Fruits.

Eighty people have been arrested in total, public servants among them.

What investigators allege

Murangira said the operation, run jointly by the RIB, the police and other public institutions, found companies that were properly registered but operating in breach of multiple requirements.

The violations he listed include failure to use standard measures of ethanol in industrial production, operating without valid licences or on expired ones, lacking the required S-Mark certification, poor hygiene, failure to follow standard operating procedures and operating from unauthorised premises.

A common pattern ran across the companies, according to investigators. Producers used substandard neutral spirit and substandard flavours, diluted ethanol with water, added other substances and put unqualified personnel on production lines. Murangira described it as lowering product quality through cheaper or unauthorised substances to cut costs and raise profits. Some companies did not disclose to consumers the levels of ethanol or other substances in their drinks.

"Overall, the suspects face allegations including serving someone something that can kill or harm their life, forgery and use of forged documents, embezzlement, and non-compliance with lawful authority," Murangira said.

The suspects are being held at various RIB stations while investigations continue.

The health consequences drove the crackdown. Health Minister Sabin Nsanzimana has put the toll at more than 50 deaths since the start of 2026, with over 100 people left with partial or permanent blindness and more than 500 treated after drinking illicit alcohol.

A sweep that has closed 140 companies

Enforcement escalated through late July and early August.

The Rwanda Food and Drugs Authority revoked every existing licence to import or use neutral spirit on July 31 and stopped issuing new permits, citing the need to safeguard public health. It closed eight domestic alcohol factories on Aug. 3 and revoked their manufacturing licences, naming Ingufu Gin Ltd, NBG Ltd, SKY Drop Industries Ltd, African Buffalo Ltd, NOPA Company Ltd, Roots Investment Group Ltd, Rugali Agro-processing Company and Zhonglu Industrial Liability Company Ltd.

At least 38 locally produced brands were recalled in that round, among them Red Waragi, Rabiant Gin, Ngufu Gin, King's Vodka and Royal Castle Gin. The regulator gave manufacturers three working days to submit recall reports and told distributors and retailers to stop selling and return stock to suppliers.

The authority suspended imports of 14 Tanzanian alcohol brands on Aug. 5 and ordered them recalled.

More than 140 companies have been closed since Aug. 2 and hundreds of brands pulled from shelves.

The Akabanga business

Sina Gerard, born in 1963 in Bushoki sector of Rulindo District, built Urwibutso from a roadside shop into one of Rwanda's most recognisable manufacturers.

He started trading in 1983 with a single employee at Nyirangarama, on the road between Kigali and what is now Musanze, giving away goat skewers and bread to passing drivers so they would taste his products. A bakery followed at the same site in 1985. He registered the business formally in 1993 under the name Urwibutso, which means a memory or something to remember, taken from what customers called his doughnuts. Fighting and the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi halted operations for two years.

The company won ISO certification in 2007 and now runs a portfolio of brand names in Kinyarwanda. Akabanga, meaning small secret, is the chilli oil that made the company internationally known and turns up in Rwandan diaspora kitchens well beyond East Africa. Agashya covers the juices, Akaryoshye the yogurt, Akanozo the cereal flour and Akandi the bottled water.

The alcoholic products carry the brand Akarusho, which means better than the rest. That is the line the RIB has closed.

Urwibutso operates from Nyirangarama in the Northern Province, roughly 45 kilometres from Kigali on the Kigali to Musanze and Rubavu road. The company reports employing more than 400 people directly and working with about 3,000 farming families, to whom it has extended microcredit financing, agronomic training and education programmes. Sina Gerard has collected the Diamond International Quality Crown, the New Era Award for Technology, Quality and Innovation, and the Made in Rwanda Award, and is counted among the wealthiest people in the country. The Nyirangarama name has become his own nickname locally.

Neither Sina Gerard nor the company had commented publicly on the closure at the time of writing.