Burundi prepares for local polls

2005-06-02 19:10

Bujumbura - Huddled in small groups along the streets of Burundi's capital, war-weary residents of Bujumbura chat intensely about the conflict-ravaged country's key local elections this week.

Eager to shake off the ethnically driven tragedy that engulfed their tiny Central African nation, home at one point to seven rebel armies, Burundians are nonetheless anxious about the impending end of an extended transition period.

"Peace will emerge as the winner of the elections," says 35-year-old flour seller Monique.

Yet Gaspard, a teacher, is less sanguine, recalling Burundi's long history of conflict between majority Hutus and minority Tutsis.

Difficult times ahead

"The most difficult time will begin after the elections because the winner can't just lead the country for his own ethnicity," he said. "For there to be lasting peace, the winner must take account of all Burundians."

The first in a complex series of polls designed to finally end more than a decade of the latest Hutu-Tutsi conflict, Friday's vote will be Burundi's first for elective office since war broke out in 1993.

With a power-sharing constitution overwhelmingly approved in a February referendum, Tutsis, Burundi's traditional powerbrokers, are widely expected to lose the political dominance they have held since independence from Belgium in 1962 despite being only 14% of the population.

Most analysts and observers are convinced Tutsi parties will be largely marginalised in the races for local leadership that will be key to who eventually controls the national government.

Here in this predominantly Hutu neighbourhood in Bujumbura's northern Kinama district, the arguments and conversations centre around which Hutu party will emerge strongest for legislative polls in July.

Stiff competition

Here — despite the presence of candidates from 31 political parties, including six former Hutu rebel groups, and 19 independents — Friday's vote is a contest between transitional President Domitien Ndayizeye's Front for Democracy in Burundi (Frodebu) and its chief rival, the ex-rebel Forces for the Defense of Democracy (FDD).

As Burundi prepares to elect 3 225 municipal councillors, the two parties are locked in an intense battle for political supremacy that began when the FDD signed a peace deal last year and joined the government with its political wing, the CNDD-FDD.

Just two days before the campaign began on May 18, Ndayizeye sought to cement his reputation as a peacemaker by inking a truce with the country's lone remaining rebel group, the National Liberation Forces (FNL).

Yet three weeks later, FNL attacks have continued, something the FDD has seized on as it promises voters it is the true party of peace and reconciliation, pointing to its key role in establishing new security forces.

"The main objective of our fight was to form an army and police that would reassure Burundians, that is done now," FDD leader Pierre Nkurunziza told a recent rally.

"But during that time, the others were fighting only to fill their stomachs with meat and beer."

- AFP