Presidential power passed on Wednesday from a member of Burundi’s Tutsi minority to Domitien Ndayizeye of the Hutu majority in a ceremony intended to demonstrate that the peace process to end the central African nation’s nine-and-a -half-year civil war is on track.
Under the terms of an August 2000 power-sharing agreement, Ndayizeye, a senior member of Frodebu, Burundi’s largest Hutu party, took over from Pierre Buyoya, a retired Tutsi army officer who presided over the first 18 months of the three-year transitional government.
That a Tutsi peacefully handed over power to a Hutu is significant. Despite being in the minority, the Tutsis have controlled Burundi for all but a few months since independence from Belgium in 1962.
But unless Ndayizeye can secure the peace, the transition will mean little to most Burundians.
”Burundians see this transition as a time of fear, not a time of hope,” said Alison Des Forges; a senior advisor to the Africa division of New York based NGO Human Rights Watch.
”Civilians still have no faith that they won’t become the targets of unpredictable violence, either from the government or the rebels.”
At least 200 000 people, most of them civilians, have died in the present conflict that was unleashed when Tutsi paratroopers assassinated the country’s first democratically elected president, Hutu Melchior Ndadaye, four months after he defeated Buyoya in June 1993 elections.
Buyoya first became president after ousting a fellow officer in 1987. He bowed to the call for elections in 1993 under the impression he would win, but seized power again in July 1996.
The power-sharing accord led to the transitional government in November 2001, but fighting between Hutu rebels and the Tutsi-dominated army has continued, with the rebels taking no part in the peace talks that began in 1998.
Three of the four rebel factions have since signed cease-fires with the government, but the one with the largest group, the Forces for the Defense of Democracy (FDD), has not held.
Two weeks ago the FDD fired dozens of rockets into Bujumbura, killing at least six people in a four-day attack on the city.
”There are negotiations for peace; meanwhile they are shooting each other. It’s not serious,” said Pierre Claver, a Tutsi whose wife was killed in the rebel attack on the capital on Lake Tanganyika.
Jan Van Eck, a South African analyst who facilitated talks between the rebels and the government, said there are so many unresolved problems that the transition period could end without a solution in sight.
”Nothing, nothing has changed … Burundians do not feel that anything has been solved,” he said.
Few people expect a repeat of October 1993, but Ndayizeye does face major challenges.
Van Eck said the 49-year-old politician will have to convince Tutsi military officials that he will look after their interests while dealing with divisions within the Hutu political community. He will also have to try to end the war, either by military means or negotiations.
Six of the seven Hutu parties that signed the 2000 accord now say they will no longer support Frodebu. Analysts say Frodebu is worried that the FDD could become a political group that would challenge its dominance of Hutu politics.
”The problem he is going to have is managing many considerations. If he is going to be president for everybody, he’s going to have to make decisions which Frodebu is not going to be happy with,” said Eugene Nindorera, a human rights activist.
”If he can show he’s the president of everybody, he will get the support of everybody, but if people feel he’s working for one group, he will have problems.” Ndayizeye will be president for 18 months, after which further elections will be held.
”The last 18 months are going to be more taxing because there is nothing we can leave undone. We have to conclude everything before we reach the time of general elections,” said South African Deputy President Jacob Zuma, the chief mediator between the rebels and government.
He joins former South African president Nelson Mandela, who also helped to broker the peace deal, at the ceremony on Wednesday. – Sapa-AP