German founders and Rwanda: why the apostille does not work, and what to do instead

Step 2 in detail: who pre-certifies what

German federalism decides the first certification. Each Land assigns the task by document type, and the same principle applies everywhere: the office that supervises the issuer confirms the issuer's signature. The general pattern is this.

• Notarial deeds and notarial certifications. The president of the Landgericht in whose district the deed was made. Berlin notaries' documents go to the Landgericht Berlin II at Littenstraße 12–17, 10179 Berlin. In Bavaria, the Landgericht presidents state that they also handle translations, and that legalisation needs the Vorbeglaubigung of the Landgericht where the document was created.
• Court documents, including register printouts. As a rule the president of the Landgericht or Amtsgericht in whose district the document was issued. A certified printout from the Handelsregister comes from the Registergericht at an Amtsgericht.
• Administrative documents of Land and local authorities. A Land authority: in Baden-Württemberg the Regierungspräsidien, in Bavaria the Regierungen, in Berlin the Landesamt für Bürger- und Ordnungsangelegenheiten (LABO), sometimes after a specialist authority has certified first.
• Federal documents. The federal level, through the BfAA. The Führungszeugnis (certificate of good conduct) from the Bundesamt für Justiz follows a set federal procedure described below.

Fees are set per document by each Land. The Landgericht Berlin II and the Bavarian Landgerichte publish EUR 25 per document for an apostille or a Vorbeglaubigung; LABO in Berlin publishes EUR 19 for its administrative pre-certification.

Step 3 in detail: the federal final certification

The Foreign Office no longer issues final certifications itself. Since 01/01/2023 the Bundesamt für Auswärtige Angelegenheiten has done so; until 31/12/2022 it was the Bundesverwaltungsamt. Older guidance, and some Land pages, still name the Bundesverwaltungsamt, which is out of date. The BfAA issues an Endbeglaubigung only if the document has already received its Vorbeglaubigung from the competent office.

Whether the Endbeglaubigung is needed is decided by the destination state. IremboGov's description of the Rwandan service expects documents from non-Convention countries to have been legalised by the foreign ministry of the country of residence first. In Germany that federal function sits with the BfAA. We therefore plan for the Endbeglaubigung on every German file for Rwanda, unless the embassy confirms in writing for the document in question that the Land pre-certification is enough.

Step 4 in detail: the Rwandan side in Berlin

The Embassy of the Republic of Rwanda in Germany is at Jägerstraße 67–69, 10117 Berlin. Its consular section takes legalisation requests through IremboGov, Rwanda's government services portal, under the heading Foreign Affairs and Consular Services. The applicant chooses the legalisation of public documents originating from abroad, selects the document type, chooses the embassy office and uploads the documents as PDFs. IremboGov lists notarial acts, including powers of attorney, certified copies, certified translations and commercial registry extracts, among the accepted types.

IremboGov publishes a fee of USD 15, or the equivalent in Rwandan francs, and a processing time of 3 days for this service. The result is an electronic certificate with a QR code in which the legalised document is embedded, sent by email or downloadable from the portal. The embassy and MINAFFET process the application together. Embassy working hours are Monday to Friday, 9:00 to 17:00 with a break from 13:00 to 14:00, and telephone hours 9:00 to 13:00.

Rwanda also has honorary consulates in Frankfurt am Main, Hamburg, Magdeburg and Tutzing. We do not route legalisations through them; the published procedure runs through the Berlin embassy and IremboGov.

The register extract

Since the Handelsregister went fully electronic, anyone can download register data. A download has no certification and cannot enter the legalisation chain. What the chain needs is a certified printout from the Registergericht, or a printout whose conformity a notary has certified. The notarial version is often faster, because a notary near you can produce it on the day and send it straight to the Landgericht of the same district with the other notarial documents.

Resolutions and powers of attorney

The Rwandan Registrar wants the original resolution of a corporate shareholder signed before the notarising authority, and a power of attorney for our licensed partners in Kigali. Under the Beurkundungsgesetz a German notary certifies a signature made or acknowledged in his presence (§ 40 BeurkG) and certifies copies (§ 42 BeurkG). Ask the notary to state the signatory's capacity, for example "managing director, acting for the company", and to record how the notary verified that authority, for example in a register certificate under § 21 BNotO.

The certificate of good conduct

For an investor permit, the immigration service (DGIE) asks for a police clearance not older than six months. In Germany that is the Führungszeugnis from the Bundesamt für Justiz. The federal procedure has a fixed order: apply online to the BfAA first and receive an application number; then request the Führungszeugnis from the Bundesamt für Justiz, naming the destination country and quoting the BfAA number; the Bundesamt für Justiz sends the pre-certified certificate directly to the BfAA, which returns it with its certification. Only then does the Rwandan legalisation follow. The six-month window runs from the date of issue, so the Führungszeugnis is the last document we order.

Translations

Documents not in English need a certified English translation. In Germany, translations by a court-authorised translator carry the translator's certification, which the Landgericht presidents can themselves certify. That gives two workable sequences. Either the translator works from the fully legalised German document and the translation is filed as a certified translation, or the translation enters the German chain alongside the original and is legalised too. IremboGov lists certified translations among the documents the embassy legalises. We confirm with the Registrar, for each file, which sequence it accepts before you order translations.

Under § 5(2) BeurkG a German notary may, on request, draw up a deed in another language if he is sufficiently proficient in it. A bilingual German and English resolution or power of attorney, prepared by us and signed before such a notary, removes most of the translation work.

1. Invest through a holding in an apostille country

Many German founders already hold their foreign interests through a company in Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Austria or Switzerland. None of those states objected to Rwanda's accession, so the Convention applies between them and Rwanda. If that company is the shareholder of the Rwandan company, its register extract, articles and board resolution are documents of that country, and each takes a single apostille from the competent authority listed for it in the HCCH table.

The limit is the people. The Rwandan file still needs the passports of the beneficial owners, and if a German-resident director signs a power of attorney or consent before a German notary, that deed is German and goes through legalisation. The holding route removes the corporate documents from the German chain. It does not remove German individuals' own signed documents unless they sign elsewhere.

Austrian and Swiss documents are often in German and still need a certified English translation. Luxembourg documents are often in French or German. Where the holding is chosen for tax reasons as well, the treaty matters: Rwanda's treaty with Luxembourg sets 10% on dividends, Switzerland is not among Rwanda's treaty partners in PwC's table, and we confirm the position for any other holding country before you rely on it.

2. Sign before a notary in an apostille country

A notarial act is a public document of the country where the notary holds office (Art. 1(c) of the Convention). A German founder who signs a power of attorney or a resolution before a notary in Salzburg, Basel or Luxembourg produces an Austrian, Swiss or Luxembourg document, which takes that country's apostille. For founders near a border, a day trip can replace the Landgericht and BfAA steps. The foreign notary applies its own rules on identification, language and fees, and may decline to certify a signature for a company whose authority it cannot verify from its own register, so we check with the notary in advance.

3. Sign before the Rwandan embassy in Berlin

The embassy's published procedure for powers of attorney is direct: apply through IremboGov, and after verification the embassy gives an appointment at which you sign the power of attorney before an embassy official. Rwanda's published requirements accept notarisation abroad by a Rwandan embassy. A signature given there does not pass through German offices at all. The route works for documents that only need your signature: a power of attorney, a director's consent, a short resolution of a one-person GmbH. It does not work for documents issued by German institutions, such as the register printout or the Führungszeugnis, which still need the German chain.