South African Deputy President Jacob Zuma said on Tuesday that Burundi’s neighbours are opposed to any changes in the country’s Constitution that is to be put to a referendum next month.
Zuma, the chief mediator in Burundi’s peace process, said the countries of the region do not support President Domitien Ndayizeye’s controversial proposal to modify the Constitution.
The modification would allow the nation’s voters to cast ballots directly for the president in upcoming elections, now set to be held by the end of April.
”Zuma gave us the message that the region doesn’t want to see an amendment to the Constitution before the referendum,” said Leonce Ngendakumana of the main Hutu political party, the Burundi Democratic Front (Frodebu).
Frodebu was one of Burundi’s 34 political parties represented at a meeting with Zuma, who flew in for talks in a bid to ease tensions between Burundi’s bickering factions ahead of the referendum.
A spokesperson for the country’s main Tutsi party, the Union for National Progress (Uprona), which was also represented at the meeting, agreed with Ngendakumana’s account of Zuma’s message.
”He said he was not here to negotiate, he said very simply that the Constitution should not be touched,” said the spokesperson, Gerard Nduwayo. ”He said that amending the Constitution would imperil the peace process.”
Ndayizeye wants to amend the Constitution to allow for direct universal suffrage, but is opposed by his own party, Frodebu, and the main former Hutu rebel group, the Forces for the Defence of Democracy (FDD).
A spokesperson for Ndayizeye, who was meeting with Zuma on Tuesday, declined to comment.
Whether the referendum will contain Ndayizeye’s proposed change has been the subject of intense debate, which flared again on Monday when the national election commission said the thrice-delayed plebiscite will be held on February 28.
Shortly after the commission announced the new date for the referendum, hundreds of demonstrators took to the streets of the capital demanding the inclusion of the modification.
But opponents have been equally vocal and earlier this month, Burundi’s Constitutional Court ruled that Ndayizeye has the right to put changes to the document to the voters through a referendum.
Burundi is struggling to recover from an 11-year civil war triggered by the assassination in October 1993 of the country’s first elected Hutu president by the Tutsi-dominated army, triggering a Hutu rebellion.
More than 300 000 lives were lost in the conflict. — Sapa-AFP