This new (2021-2022) academic year opened only on 05 January 2022 at the Université Catholique de Bukavu (UCB), with a delay relative to the initially planned starting date. If we look back at the last year, we can say that this is a much earlier start because the opening of the 2020-2021 academic year had to wait till 22 February 2021. These delays are due to the persisting COVID-19 pandemic, appeared in 2020. We were lucky for this new year that no additional lock-down period was imposed after the last one of December 2020 to January 2021. However new waves of the pandemic have continued to come and go, unfortunately with their deleterious effects, including the restriction on international mobility of lecturers and researchers, the negative effects on university finances, the suspension of new constructions, etc. We managed to have a few visiting lecturers, for example in the Faculty of Architecture & Urbanism, the Faculty of Law and the Faculty of Medicine, but they came in much small numbers compared to previous, normal years.  READ MORE