Building futures in Rwanda

The Agahozo-Shalom Youth Village (ASYV) is a residential learning and healing community for orphans and other vulnerable Rwandan youth. Combining education, family-style care and service, ASYV empowers its young people to build lives of dignity and contribute to a better world.

Freshfields Partner Ian Bushner has acted as outside general counsel to ASYV for over a decade, bringing the same transactional expertise used for leading corporates to projects that transform communities. Ian and our teams have advised on: 

• Rwanda’s largest solar facility – at one point supplying almost 10% of the nation’s electricity, while funding healthcare for the village; 
• See Far Housing – a social enterprise creating sustainable middle-class housing in Kigali; 
• governance, contracts and dispute resolution; and 
• annual training for staff on workplace and HR issues. 

These are sophisticated, high-value matters that would not be possible without an outside counsel with truly global capabilities. By structuring complex transactions, resolving disputes and advising on governance, Freshfields has helped ASYV create lasting impact in Rwanda – turning legal expertise into opportunities for some of the most vulnerable young people in Rwanda. 

For Ian, the work shows how pro bono can apply corporate skills where they are needed most. For Counsel Michal Netanyahu, it also has personal meaning: after clerking at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda as a student, her work with ASYV helps build futures directly in Rwanda.