Kigali (Rwanda), Oct 13 (IANS) Formula 1 will return to Africa for the first time in the coming years since 1993, after it was confirmed Tuesday that Rwanda will host races from the early 2030s under a 10-year agreement.

Rwandan President Paul Kagame announced the deal for the Formula 1 African Grand Prix at an event in Kigali, Rwanda's capital, attended by senior F1 officials.

"Today belongs to Africa. For more than three decades, the world's premier motorsport championship has raced without this continent, and that changes with this agreement," Kagame said.

He added that Rwanda is proud to host the African Grand Prix, and to share the "moment with more than 100 million fans across Africa, many of them young people who deserve to see the sport at home and to see themselves in it: as engineers, technicians, entrepreneurs and, one day, drivers."

The long-term agreement will see the first race in the country take place once a new purpose-built circuit in eastern Rwanda's Bugesera District has been completed, reports Xinhua.

The circuit is expected to be completed early in the next decade.

Kagame said the partnership is also an investment in Rwanda's future as the circuit in Bugesera will bring jobs, skills, tourism and new business to the country and region for decades.

In a statement, Formula 1 said the agreement marks a defining moment in F1's history.

"Today is a landmark moment for Formula 1," Stefano Domenicali, Chief Executive Officer of F1, said. "With Rwanda joining the calendar from the next decade, our sport will race in every inhabited continent, bringing the World Championship closer than ever to fans around the globe," he added.

Africa first hosted an F1 World Championship race in 1958, when Morocco staged the season finale at the Ain-Diab circuit in Casablanca.

South Africa subsequently became the continent's main F1 venue, hosting its first World Championship race in 1962 at East London. The event remained there until 1965 before moving to Kyalami, near Johannesburg, in 1967.

The South African Grand Prix continued at Kyalami during the apartheid era, although the race was dropped from the calendar after 1985 amid growing international opposition to the country's system of racial segregation.

F1 returned to Kyalami for two races in 1992 and 1993 as South Africa transitioned away from apartheid, but the championship has not raced anywhere on the continent since.

In recent years, South Africa has sought to bring F1 back, with proposals involving both Kyalami and a potential street circuit in Cape Town, though a deal is yet to materialise.

--IANS

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