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Burundi: the Issues at Stake

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Burundi: the Issues at Stake BURUNDI: THE ISSUES AT STAKE. POLITICAL PARTIES, FREEDOM OF THE PRESS AND POLITICAL PRISONERS 12 July 2000 ICG Africa Report N° 23 Nairobi/Brussels (Original Version in French) Table of Contents EXECUTIVE SUMMARY..........................................................................................i INTRODUCTION...................................................................................................1 I. POLITICAL PARTIES: PURGES, SPLITS AND CRACKDOWNS.........................1 A. Beneficiaries of democratisation turned participants in the civil war (1992-1996)3 1. Opposition groups with unclear identities ................................................. 4 2. Resorting to violence to gain or regain power........................................... 7 B. Since the putsch: dangerous games of the government................................... 9 1. Purge of opponents to the peace process (1996-1998)............................ 10 2. Harassment of militant activities ............................................................ 14 C. Institutionalisation of political opportunism................................................... 17 1. Partisan putsches and alliances of convenience....................................... 18 2. Absence of fresh political attitudes......................................................... 20 D. Conclusion ................................................................................................. 23 II WHICH FREEDOM FOR WHAT MEDIA ?...................................................... 25 A. Media culpability in the crisis ....................................................................... 26 1. Poor journalism and self-censorship. (1993) .......................................... 26 2. Press offences and calls for bloodshed (1993-1996) ................................ 28 B. The general obsession with political control .................................................. 31 1. Broadcast media since 1996: censorship by default................................. 31 2. The militant written press ..................................................................... 32 3. More freedom for the spoken press ....................................................... 34 C. Deficient public information and communication policies................................ 34 1. An unsuitable legal framework............................................................... 34 2. A restricted forum for public debate....................................................... 36 D. Conclusion ................................................................................................. 39 III. THE ISSUE OF POLITICAL PRISONERS ...................................................... 40 A. Situation of the Prison Population ................................................................ 42 1. The origin of the prisoners .................................................................... 43 2. What are the prisoners accused of? ....................................................... 46 3. What is a “political crime” for the Burundian courts? ............................... 49 B. The political stakes of the debate ................................................................ 50 1. The burden of “genocide” ..................................................................... 50 2. The respective positions of the parties ................................................... 51 C. Conclusion ................................................................................................. 57 RECOMMENDATIONS........................................................................................ 58 ANNEXES ABOUT ICG LIST OF SELECTED REPORTS ICG BOARD MEMBERS BURUNDI: THE ISSUES AT STAKE. POLITICAL PARTIES, FREEDOM OF THE PRESS AND POLITICAL PRISONERS EXECUTIVE SUMMARY After two years of negotiations, the Burundian peace process has reached a critical stage. In his capacity as Mediator, Nelson Mandela, during his latest visit to Bujumbura from 12 to 14 June renewed his support for rebel demands that President Pierre Buyoya's government should free all political prisoners regardless of their crimes and restore the rights of political parties. In March of this year Mandela also demanded that freedom of the press be restored and that all regroupment camps be dismantled. A compromise has finally been reached on this single issue: the Burundian government has promised to close all camps by 31 July 2000. On the subject of political prisoners, the government defended itself by suggesting that the situation was more complex than it seemed and denounced propaganda from the Tanzanian facilitation team and certain Hutu parties. Buyoya considers - in common with the majority of Tutsi opinion - that these prisoners are either members of armed groups or terrorists who participated in the massacres that followed the assassination of President Melchior Ndadaye in October 1993. At a moment when the peace process is entering into its final phase, the demands that Nelson Mandela has made to the Burundian government are justified for several reasons. Firstly, Buyoya, who regained power after the July 1996 putsch, must show willingness to co-operate in order to merit a role in the transition period that will follow the peace agreement. Secondly, all the rebel groups must be brought to the negotiating table and their requests must be heard. There can be no credible negotiations as long as rebel sympathisers remain in prison accused of nothing more than representing a threat to state security. Thirdly, there can be no constructive dialogue with political parties whose activities are proscribed by the authorities. Finally, freedom of the press is fundamental to ensuring the success of the peace process. As long as the population has not been fully informed about the progress of the Arusha negotiations, the chances of signing a peace agreement remain slight. Mandela's demands regarding prisoners, political parties and the press should probably be dealt with through negotiations rather than be a condition for their continuation. However, it is essential that the government make a significant gesture of compromise as a demonstration of its goodwill to the Burundian population: it should initiate a debate on expected changes during the transition period. These demands have been formulated to strengthen the peace process through participation of the rebels and of the people. In this debate the reluctance of the government to accept compromises is not without good reason. In particular, it warns that Mandela, by choosing to adopt the demands of the Hutu political parties and the rebels, may provoke a violent Tutsi reaction. It also believes that it is unfair to apply pressure to only one of the parties Burundi: The Issues at Stake. Political Parties, Freedom of the Press and Political Prisoners ICG Africa Report N°23, 12 July 2000 p: ii involved in the conflict. These complaints, however justified, do not diminish the government's responsibility to show good faith at this critical stage of the peace process. Political parties: purges, splits and crackdowns FRODEBU (Front pour la Democratie du Burundi), the party that won the 1993 elections, accuses the government of authoritarianism and harassment of the opposition. Conversely, the government accuses the FRODEBU of civil disobedience and mobilising the Hutu population against it. Although this polarisation reflects the hard-line positions of the two parties, at this critical moment of the peace process two paradoxes must be kept in mind. Firstly, although the parties opposed to the current regime were able to emerge during the period of democratisation granted by Buyoya himself in the early nineties, as of 1994, they also promoted and benefited from the civil war. Most of them used violence to obtain positions of power in 1994, when the Convention of Government was signed. None of them can a priori be considered as defenders of democracy or human rights. Moreover, none of the parties are showing signs of a new attitude, which could contribute to building a peaceful future in the country. Instead, the president and the parties have engaged in politicking and manipulation. Their radical positions are aimed at pandering to their natural electorate, or to ensure a role in the institutions of transition. These manoeuvres have led Pierre Buyoya to purge the UPRONA (Union de Progres National) and its anti-Arusha faction, to crack down on his Tutsi radical opponents from PARENA (Parti pour le Redressement National), and to guarantee impunity to the police, armed forces and administration in their harassment of the FRODEBU militants. These constant re-alignments have given rise to internal divisions within the parties, alliances and counter-alliances whose political objective has sometimes been solely limited to carrying out personal attacks on Buyoya. Which freedom for what media? Control of the media is an obsession that is deeply entrenched and shared by all Burundian politicians. The government, its allies and the opposition are all responsible for the current state of the media, which is typically militant and sometimes defamatory. Due to heavy state control of the media and the reluctance of the government to publicise its role in the Arusha negotiations, the media has failed to fulfil its duty to inform the people. In 1996, a suspension of the freedom of press followed a three-year period during which the media of various parties had encouraged violence by spreading messages of ethnic hatred. At present
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