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Burundi, Rwanda

Why Kagame’s reelection in Rwanda will be different than Nkurunziza’s

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Two small African neighboring countries. Both are densely populated with between 10 and 12 million people. Both have emerged from Tutsi-Hutu civil wars in the past two decades. burundirwanda

Burundi’s president Pierre Nkurunziza seems headed for a difficult and bloody reelection against the will of a large segment of the Burundian people and arguably in violation of the constitution’s prohibition on serving more than two consecutive terms. Though Nkurunziza unconvincingly argues he is running for his second term under the current constitution, the Arusha Accords that ended Burundi’s civil war made it clear that Nkurunziza should get up to a decade in power — not 15 years (or, potentially, more).

Nkurunziza’s push for a third term resulted in a brutal crackdown over the past 18 months amid growing political violence, twice necessitating the delay of an election originally scheduled for June. When election results, the first of which are scheduled to be announced later Friday, show that Nkurunziza easily won reelection, many Burundians will refuse to recognize the victory, and there’s a chance that Burundi could collapse into greater violence — or even civil war.

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RELATED: Rwandan election highlights tension between ethnic, economic stability and authoritarianism

RELATED: Nkurunziza’s reelection effort brings violence in Burundi

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Next door in Rwanda, however, president Paul Kagame seems preparing for reelection in 2017, notwithstanding constitutional term limits. Unlike Nkurunziza, if Kagame (pictured above) does find a way to seek another term, he will largely do so to the widespread acclaim and genuine approval of the Rwandan people — and with the assent of Rwanda’s Chamber of Deputies, which passed a law earlier this week that will allow Kagame to run for a third term in his own right, in response to a petition signed by 3.7 million Rwandans.

While Nkurunziza has suffered international condemnation for pushing forward with reelection, Kagame will almost certainly receive far less scrutiny if, as expected, he runs for another term in 2017.

Kagame isn’t immune to political repression — the ruling Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) controls an effectively one-party country where opposition leaders or journalists are harassed or imprisoned, sometimes to the point of exile.

So what’s with the double standard? Continue reading Why Kagame’s reelection in Rwanda will be different than Nkurunziza’s →

Burundi

Nkurunziza’s reelection effort brings violence in Burundi

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bujumburaPhoto credit to AFP.

It was all so very predictable and very preventable. burundi

The decision by Burundian president Pierre Nkurunziza to seek a third term in the country’s upcoming May 26 elections is spawning a violent and deadly response in a country where Nkurunziza’s agreement to presidential term limits was a key element of the Arusha peace accords that ended the landlocked east African country’s civil war over a decade ago.

Amid growing repression in the last two years, and reports of intensified attacks at the hands of the Imbonerakure, a militia and youth wing of the country’s governing party, Nkurunziza’s push to win a third consecutive term in office now threatens to engulf the country once again in political violence that could morph into deeper ethnic conflict. Nkurunziza and his advisers are taking the position that because he was appointed to the presidency in 2005 and elected in 2010, he is technically entitled to run for a ‘second’ term in 2015. Nevertheless, political opposition figures and international observers alike disagree strongly with that rationale.

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RELATED: As world remembers Rwanda genocide,
Burundi tilts into political crisis

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With protesters defying government efforts to disperse crowds in the capital city of Bujumbura, a handful of people have already been killed, and aid workers report that hundreds of thousands are fleeing their homes. In addition, reports indicate that Burundi’s borders were being closed today to foreigners trying to enter the country, and the government is shutting down independent radio outlets.

I wrote last summer for The National Interest just how toxic a Nkurunziza reelection bid could become. Above all, the political instability exacerbates the lack of foreign investment in Burundi, which is one of sub-Saharan Africa’s poorest countries. Descent into further political chaos, and resulting internal displacements, would only emphasize the widespread poverty and lack of development throughout the country.

The best-case scenario for Burundi would be for Nkurunziza to rethink his reelection plans. It’s difficult to fathom that the governing Conseil National Pour la Défense de la Démocratie–Forces pour la Défense de la Démocratie (CNDD-FDD, National Council for the Defense of Democracy–Forces for the Defense of Democracy) would lose power, even without Nkurunziza leading it as a formal matter. Conceivably, Nkurunziza might even continue to exercise discretion over top government functions, even if he is no longer Burundi’s head of state.

If Nkurunziza goes forward for a third term, the opposition will almost certainly boycott the vote, as they did in 2010 when the process was deemed unfair and unfree. That’s not a great outcome, and it would invalidate the election, as a matter of international opinion. That, however, would still be much better than a slide into civil war. Avoiding further bloodshed as the 2015 vote approaches is more important than achieving a milestone for democracy in a country where democracy has never been a priority — and will not be a priority in the midst of a violent clash. The risk is that political confrontation will eventually mutate into the kind of ethnic hatred between the Hutu majority and the Tutsi minority that devastated neighboring Rwanda and culminated in the 1994 genocide. No one today believes that Burundi is necessarily destined for ethnic conflict, but a new civil war, based on either political or ethnic differences, should be a major concern for regional leaders.

Rwandan president, Paul Kagame, met with Nkurunziza earlier this month, ostensibly to discuss the rising number of Burundian refugees fleeing to Rwanda. But the term-limited Kagame has pledged to step down as Rwanda’s president in 2017, and there are already rumors he may seek to extend his own mandate. Tanzanian president Jakaya Kikwete in March warned Nkurunziza not to seek a third term, imploring him to respect the terms of the Arusha accords signed in Kikwete’s country a decade ago.

Burundi

Burundi sets presidential election for June 26, 2015

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The troubled east African country of Burundi has set its parliamentary and presidential election dates, establishing the timeline by which Burundi’s fragile government could fall into political (or even ethnic) conflict.burundi

Burundi will hold parliamentary elections on May 26, 2015 with its presidential election to take place exactly one month later on June 26.

Isolated as the poorest and the only French-speaking country within the mostly English-speaking East African Community (EAC), Burundi has increasingly assumed an atmosphere of fear and repression as the 2015 elections approach. It’s widely believed that Burundian president Pierre Nkurunziza is planning to seek a third term in office, despite constitution restrictions to the contrary.

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RELATED: As world remembers Rwanda genocide,
Burundi tilts into political crisis

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That’s left the Burundian opposition increasingly soured on participating the upcoming vote, and it could well boycott the 2015 elections, much as it did the 2010 elections.

Even if Nkurunziza declines to run, pulling back from the brink of a political crisis, his governing Conseil National Pour la Défense de la Démocratie–Forces pour la Défense de la Démocratie (CNDD-FDD, National Council for the Defense of Democracy–Forces for the Defense of Democracy) will almost certainly try to keep a tight grip on power. With the increasing stranglehold that Nkurunziza has taken over the country in the past decade, however, that shouldn’t prove difficult.  Continue reading Burundi sets presidential election for June 26, 2015 →

Burundi

As world remembers Rwanda genocide, Burundi tilts into political crisis

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I write for The National Interest on Thursday that as the world continues remembering the 20th anniversary of the Rwandan genocide, which resulted in the deaths of 800,000 mostly Tutsi Rwandans in three harrowing months in 1994, the world is largely ignoring Rwanda’s southern neighbor, Burundi, as it slips further into a political crisis that could drag Burundi back into ethnic violence that marked its own civil war in the 1990s:burundi

As the 2015 election approaches, however, [president Pierre] Nkurunziza (pictured above) has steamrolled the post-Arusha constitutional consensus by pushing through an election law that could allow him to run for reelection, despite growing opposition. Last year, Nkurunziza introduced a tough new law restricting press freedom amid a wider crackdown on journalists. This year has brought even more restrictions on political assembly and casual gatherings, and the imprisonment of regime opponents after a clash between protesters and the police in the capital, Bujumbura. The leading opposition figure, Alexis Sinduhije, a Tutsi and former journalist who heads the cross-ethnic Movement for Solidarity and Development coalition, was arrested earlier this spring in Belgium after fleeing Burundi, though Belgian officials subsequently released him. The government has also persecuted members of the National Forces of Liberation (FNL), the last major Hutu rebel group to sign the Arusha accords (in 2008). Numerous reports that the CNDD-FDD is arming its youth militia, the Imbonerakure, were sufficient to cause significant concern within Burundi’s UN peacekeeping force earlier this year. That’s especially chilling in light of the role that similar Hutu youth militias, known as the Interahamwe, played in the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

I add that the international community could play a role in boosting Burundi’s fortunes through greater investment:

That doesn’t mean there aren’t promising areas of development. Incredibly, Burundians have known since the 1970s that their tiny country holds at least 6 percent of the world’s nickel reserves. So far, however, those mineral deposits have gone unexploited. Investment to develop Burundi’s industrial capacity and its ability to process nickel ore would be a game-changer. So would investment to improve Burundi’s road and rail infrastructure, allowing nickel (as well as coffee, bananas and other agricultural products) to more easily reach a major port, like Dar es Salaam in Tanzania. Moreover, for a country that’s still 90 percent rural, more efficient agricultural technologies could liberate a significant part of the population for more rigorous education and, ultimately, a more broad-based, services-heavy economy. With a median age of seventeen, Burundi is one of the ten ‘youngest’ countries in the world. Therefore, improvements in education could greatly benefit its youthful population and the country’s developmental future.

But none of this can happen under the penumbra of increasing political violence or the threat of further civil war, whether it’s Hutu-against-Tutsi or Hutu-against-Hutu. Though a surge of development might ameliorate some of the worst of Burundi’s political tensions, greater political stability is a prerequisite for attracting the investment that Burundi needs to fuel that growth. As in many of Africa’s struggling states, Burundi is trapped in a tragic “catch-22.”

Rwanda

RPF win in last week’s elections doesn’t pull Rwanda any closer to a stable democracy

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Rwandan president Paul Kagame’s Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) overwhelmingly won last week’s elections with a staggering 76% of the vote.rwanda

That’s not surprising, given that Kagame’s been so intent on keeping any real opposition from gaining any real power.

One opposition party, the Green Party, won official recognition as a political party only earlier this summer, and its deputy in Rwanda’s parliament was murdered before prior 2010 elections — it’s hard not to conclude that it was intimidated from running this time around.  Another opposition party, the FDU-Inkingi, was not permitted to run in the elections, and its leader Victoire Ingabire sits in prison on politically motivated charges.

Even in a world where sub-Saharan African democracy is growing stronger, Rwanda’s result is disappointing.  The most you could take away from Rwanda’s elections are that they are somehow building the norm of regularized elections.  In most sub-Saharan African countries, we’d call Kagame what he is — an anti-democratic strongman.  His party, which springs out of the rebel military force that spent much of the early 1990s fighting against Rwanda’s central government and that took power in 1994, will control the lion’s share of the 80 seats in the unicameral Chamber of Deputies.

All signs point to his genuine popularity, however, and it’s hard to argue with an average GDP growth rate of over 8% since he formally became Rwanda’s president in 2000.  In economic terms, Kagame’s delivered the best results of perhaps any African leader in the past decade — and he’s done it without oil or other mineral wealth.

But as I wrote before Rwanda’s elections, for all of the success Kagame has made in pacifying Rwanda (after all, we are only 19 years removed from the devastating genocide that took 800,000 lives in three months) and for building its economic infrastructure, there’s a nagging sense that all of Kagame’s progress could unwind if he leaves office without having built a political infrastructure as well:

But Kagame’s third task is perhaps the most important of all — crafting a political system that will guarantee and institutionalize the gains that Rwanda has made in the past two decades under Kagame.  Kagame himself is term-limited to just two seven-terms in office as president, which means that, barring constitutional amendments, he will step down in 2017 — that’s just four years away.  So we’re now entering a crucial time for Rwanda and for Kagame.  And next month’s elections are the sole opportunity for electoral participation between now and 2017.

It’s easy enough to understand why Kagame fears the role of a truly free media or political parties, because both supposedly benign institutions played a major role in amplifying the Hutu interahamwe militias in the early 1990s that carried out most of the 1994 genocide.  All too often, Western good-government types don’t understand how the liberalization of Rwanda’s political sphere and open radio airwaves accelerated the genocide.

Even if you accept that Kagame’s restrictions on freedom are acceptable in light of Rwanda’s very unique experience, or that a little authoritarianism goes a long way in stabilizing an economy (think of Kagame as a kind of 21st century, central African Park Chung-hee), you can still doubt whether Kagame is doing enough to build a formal political structure for Rwanda.  Even in non-democratic countries like the People’s Republic of China, a (surprisingly responsive) political system still exists to tend to policymaking, provide stability, deal with issues of succession, and the like.

Though it’s now a faux pas in Rwanda to make reference to ‘Hutu’ or ‘Tutsi,’ the fact remains that the RPF is a chiefly Tutsi force that liberated Rwanda from the grip of a largely Hutu-based wave of terror.  While Kagame’s administration has worked to approach justice very gently through the use of gacaca community-based trials, the absence of many high-level Hutus in government risks putting Rwanda in the same position that it was throughout the colonial era — a largely Tutsi elite and an increasingly resentful Hutu mass.  Today, Kagame remains popular with a wide swath of all Rwandans, but that could one day change.  Or a successor to Kagame could not be as fortunate in office.  What may work today for Rwanda may work only because of the legitimate role Kagame played in healing such a broken nation.  That’s why it’s even more important for Kagame to build a lasting, broad-based political system for his country, even if it’s an artificially choreographed system designed to keep both Hutu and Tutsis committed to stability — think of Lebanon’s stage-managed democratic system, for instance.

All of which makes last week’s parliamentary elections a missed opportunity to build whatever follows the Kagame era.

Rwanda

Rwandan election highlights tension between ethnic, economic stability and authoritarianism

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It’s hard not to have strong feelings about Paul Kagame, Rwanda’s president.rwanda

The one-time rebel leader, who grew up in a Ugandan refugee camp after many Tutsis were pushed out of Rwanda in the 1950s and 1960s, marched into Rwanda’s capital in mid-1994 to take power as the international community dithered, thereby ending the country’s horrific genocide.  He spent the next six years working to pacify the country through various security measures and then set about modernizing Rwanda.  When he became president in 2000, he announced his Vision 2020 plan to develop the country.  Since 2000, his efforts have won the praise of everyone from former president U.S. Bill Clinton to Microsoft icon and philanthropist Bill Gates for rebuilding the country’s infrastructure,  developing Rwandan education and health care and restoring the rule of law.  He can boast an attractive record of foreign investment, and it’s hard not to credit Kagame for an average GDP growth rate of 8.1% in the past 12 years.

But Kagame has served as Rwanda’s de facto or de jure leader since 1994, and he presides over a country where political parties and freedom to assemble are severely restrained and press freedom is very low, a country where critics charge that he rules with an authoritarian style and where dissenters are forced into exile.  His angelic reputation among the international community has been tarnished by his support for the M23 rebels in eastern Congo who are fighting against Congolese president Joseph Kabila.

Suffice it to say that Kagame is a complex figure — Rwanda’s semi-authoritarian savior.  But as a rising power in eastern and central Africa and a touchstone for the failure of the international community to stop genocide two decades ago, the country’s political progress is just as important as its impressive economic progress.   Continue reading Rwandan election highlights tension between ethnic, economic stability and authoritarianism →

African Union, Cameroon, Guinea, Madagascar, Mali, Rwanda, Swaziland, Togo, Zimbabwe

Eight sub-Saharan African elections within nine weeks highlights region’s fragile democracy

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In the next three months, eight sub-Saharan African countries will go to the polls to elect a new president and/or parliament, a relative blitz that will not only highlight the region’s growing, if fragile, democratic institutions, but will call attention to many unique issues facing sub-Saharan Africa: unequal and unsteady growth rates, the role of Islamic jihad and security, improving health outcomes, the rule of law and governance standards, and further development of vital infrastructure.african union

Between July 21 and September 30, voters in countries with an aggregate population of around 100 million are scheduled to cast ballots, though of course not all elections are created equal — or conducted on incredibly equal ground.  In some countries, such as Guinea and Togo, it will be a success if the elections actually take place as planned; in other countries, such as Swaziland and Cameroon, elections will be essentially a sideshow of powerlessness.  In  Zimbabwe, where longtime president Robert Mugabe (pictured above) is seeking yet another term after 33 years in power, and in Madagascar, where voters will choose a new president and legislature after a problematic 2009 coup and a four-year interim government, the vote could herald once-in-a-generation leadership transitions.

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Here’s the rundown, in brief:

Togo: July 25togo

Togo, a small west African nation of 7.15 million people, is scheduled to vote for a new parliament, despite the fact that elections have been cancelled twice — first in October 2012 and again in March 2013.  There’s no guarantee that elections this month will actually go forward, either.  While the government and opposition have apparently now reached a deal to hold elections later this month, the composition of the electoral commission remains a major open issue.

Togo’s president, Faure Gnassingbé, took office in 2005 with the support of the country’s military following the death of his father, Gnassingbé Eyadéma, who had served as Togo’s president since 1967.  Despite winning election in presidential votes in 2005 and 2010, he’s seen as somewhat of an authoritarian leader and his party, the Rassemblement du Peuple Togolais (RPT, Rally for the Togolese People) dominates the unicameral Assemblée nationale, holding 50 out of 81 seats.  Unlike its neighbors, there’s neither a Christian nor Muslim majority in Togo — out of every two Togolese adheres to indigenous beliefs, though one-third of its residents are Muslim and one-fifth are Christian.

Continue reading Eight sub-Saharan African elections within nine weeks highlights region’s fragile democracy →