The expectations were high that the burning issue of quenching the raging fires in Burundi would be addressed. The senseless violence in that country is primarily the decision of President Pierre Nkurunziza to run for an unconstitutional third term. Deby, a retired war lord, and presumably, most of his colleagues, knew full well the implications of allowing the Burundian fires to rage unchecked.
Rwanda, Burundi’s neigbour to the north had witnessed horrendous violence which led to the 1994 genocide in which the Hutu population tried to wipe out its fellow Tustsi citizens. In less than a hundred days, over 850,000 human beings were slaughtered. Burundi has the same ethnic mix with Rwanda and in the 1993-2005 civil war between both sides, over 300,000 perished.
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The renewed Burundian crisis began with mass protests in April 2015 against the decision of Nkurunziza who had been president for 10 years, to violate the constitution by seeking a third term. His reaction was swift; he let loose the security forces, closed down the internet, media houses and universities, and blood flowed on the streets. A coup on May 13, led by General Godefroid Niyombare in a desperate attempt to end the bloodshed failed.
Nkurunziza was re-elected on July 21, and the violence spiraled out of control with the government increasingly presenting the crisis as an ethnic one in which the Tustsi and opposition were labeled “terrorists”. On November 12, the United Nations Security Council condemned the mass killings and human rights violations in the country. The bloodiest day in the renewed conflict was on December 11, 2015 when according to government spokesman Gaspard Baratuza, the clashes produced “79 enemies killed, 45 captured, and 97 weapons seized, and on our side eight soldiers and policemen were killed and 21 wounded.”
The AU would condone this no longer; six days after this clash, it convened a meeting of its Peace and Security Council (PSC) which decided to send 5,000 peacekeepers under an African Prevention and Protection Mission in Burundi (MAPROBU). The troops were to come from the East African Standard Force comprising 10 countries from the region: Burundi, Uganda, Sudan, Seychelles, Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Comoros, Rwanda and Somalia. Burundi might have been uncomfortable with troops from Rwanda which it considers an ally of the opposition forces, and from Uganda which is seen as a partner of Rwanda. But this would merely have been a question of details.
However, Nkurunziza would brook no intervention especially when his government is the primary source of violence and he perceived that he has the upper hand. He threatened to attack the AU peacekeepers if they were sent. He warned the AU “Everyone has to respect Burundian borders; in case they violate those principles, they would have attacked the country and every Burundian will stand up and fight against them . The country would have been attacked and it will respond.”
Despite Nkurunziza’s rejection, the AU is empowered under its Constitutive Act to override such a national objection. Section 4(h) of the Act reiterates “The right of the Union to intervene in a Member State pursuant to a decision of the Assembly in respect of grave circumstances, namely: war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity”
The Burundian case was a test between the parochial interest of a sitting president and the will of the African people to prevent further bloodshed and likely genocide. The Burundian government’s argument at the AU Summit was that it was still too early for the AU to intervene. In the stand-off, the AU blinked and backed down from its decision. In explaining off the AU’s feeble mindedness, its Special Representative to the region, Ibrahim Fall claimed that it was “never the intention of the African Union to deploy a mission to Burundi without the consent of Burundian authorities”.
That singular act of kowtowing to a power-drunken regime painting its cities and villages in the blood of its citizens, cast a dark pall on the entire Summit; it showed AU as too weak to defend African lives. Burundians would be left to drown themselves in rivers of blood unless powers outside Africa decide to intervene.
Although the Summit decided to set up a Task Force comprising five Heads of State to check bloodshed in the once promising and prosperous African state of Libya, but who really has faith in such a body? If the African leaders could not call their member, Nkurunziza to order, how do they hope to bring peace to a country with at least four centres of power; Tripoli, Tobruk, Sirte and Benghazi and fractious terrorist groups? The tragedy in Libya was the AU folding its arms while the West tied the hands of the Pan Africanist and patriotic Ghadaffi administration and allowed religious extremists, thugs and terrorists ride to power.