KIGALI, Oct. 31 (Xinhua) -- Rwandan local and central government leaders are to target economic recovery from the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic through their performance contracts for the fiscal year 2020/2021, Rwandan Prime Minister Edouard Ngirente said Friday.

The annual performance contracts, known locally as Imihigo, are a Rwandan home-grown initiative aimed at facilitating development through enhancing accountability of public officials in various capacities. They are normally signed with President Paul Kagame and aligned with government institutions' annual plans and budgets in terms of policy priorities and outcomes.

"This year's performance contracts will mainly focus on economic recovery process from the COVID-19 pandemic, including in areas of agriculture, strengthening local industries production to reduce imports and improving citizen's welfare," Ngirente said at a signing ceremony presided over by Kagame in Nyagatare district in eastern Rwanda.

According to Ngirente, the new contracts range broadly from economic and social transformation to transformational governance.

Kagame reminded the officials that the signing of performance contracts should "come with results and impact" and cautioned against poor service delivery.

"The first thing a leader should be doing is to find a way of getting things done faster, and not finding excuses why things should not be done," the president said.

Rwanda on Friday reported three new COVID-19 cases and 27 recoveries, bringing the total cases and recoveries to 5,134 and 4,878 respectively, with 35 deaths.

Official figures released by the National Institute of Statistics of Rwanda in June showed that the country registered a 3.6 percent GDP growth in the first quarter of 2020, a slowdown due to COVID-19 compared to 9.4 percent growth in 2019.

The country's GDP decreased by 12.4 percent in the second quarter of 2020, compared with the same period of 2019, the statistics institute said. Enditem

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