BasiGo promotes Doreen Orishaba to head its Rwandan Unit

BasiGo has promoted Ms. Doreen Orishaba to Managing Director, BasiGo Rwanda.

Ms. Orishaba joined BasiGo in January 2022 and has served in various leadership roles within the company. Prior to this promotion, Ms. Orishaba successfully led the company’s expansion and pilot launch in Rwanda in November 2023.

BasiGo’s business in Rwanda is the company’s first expansion outside Kenya. BasiGo currently has 4 Electric Buses in pilot operation in Kigali with three leading Bus Operators – Kigali Bus Service, Volcano and Royal Express.

“There are few professionals in East Africa as experienced in the electrification of public transport as Doreen Orishaba. With her experience from Kiira Motors and BasiGo, Ms. Orishaba is the ideal leader to help Rwanda achieve its ambitious goals for sustainable public transport.

Thanks to the strong support for the e-mobility industry from the Rwandan government, we believe Rwanda can set the example in Africa for profitable and sustainable electric buses, and no one is better equipped to lead that business than Ms. Orishaba.” says Jit Bhattacharya, BasiGo CEO/Co-founder.

As Managing Director, Ms. Orishaba is charged with actualizing BasiGo’s ambition of delivering 200 electric buses to Kigali by 2025. These buses will help directly address the shortage of public transport buses in Kigali while also offering relief to bus operators from the high fuel prices.

Rwanda has set a climate action agenda that features a 38% reduction of Greenhouse Gas emissions by 2030, and is providing the right environment to achieve the goal.Because of this, Rwanda is the regional leader in the volumes of electric vehicles in the 2-wheeler and passenger vehicle segments. However, the question of electrifying the bus, the biggest movers of people around Kigali City and the Country at large, was still unanswered until BasiGo came in.

Ms. Orishaba has over ten years’ experience working in the automotive industry in East Africa. Prior to joining BasiGo, she worked at Kiira Motors Corporation in Uganda, where she led the product design and strategy development of the first locally manufactured electric buses in all of East Africa. Ms. Orishaba also worked as an engineer at Ford Motor Company in Michigan.

She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering from Makerere University, Uganda and a Master of Science in Engineering Management from Kettering University in the United States.