After a spate of arrests of members of the media over the past six months, Burundian authorities recently released three journalists who had been detained for more than a month. The Mail & Guardian spoke to them on a recent visit to Burundi.
”Everything is still in a blur,” says Domitile Kiramvu. ”I still ask myself questions. It is too good to be true.”
On January 3 Kiramvu, Serge Nibizi, editor in chief of the privately owned station Radio Publique Africaine (RPA), and Mathias Manirakiza, the director of privately owned Radio Isanganiro, were acquitted of ”disseminating information likely to disturb public order and security”. A fourth journalist, Corneil Nibaruta, who fled the country, was tried in absentia and was also acquitted.
The journalists’ release spells victory for the media in Burundi, which has been regularly threatened and harassed by the government. Since he came to power in 2005, President Pierre Nkurunziza and the ruling Forces for the Defense of Democracy (FDD), which won democratic elections in a landslide, have grown hostile to opposition and criticism from the media.
”Every time you do something that displeases the government, you will be summoned,” says Nibizi, who, along with his colleague Kiramvu, was summoned to the state prosecutor’s office before being jailed. Nibizi described the arrest as ”illegal”, and all three agree that their detention was politically motivated.
Both Nibizi and Kiramvu spent 44 days in jail, while Manirakiza spent 37 days in prison.
In December last year, the state prosecutor requested that the three journalists be jailed for three years for breaking Burundi’s media law when they reported on an alleged coup plot. According to the prosecutor the journalists broke the law because they reported on a case still under judicial investigation.
”They wanted to lock us up till the 2009 elections, to keep us quiet,” says Kiramvu.
For Nibizi the experience was ”mental torture”. ”I had about 10 people watching my every movement.”
Manirakiza was arrested after Radio Isanganiro broadcast a story saying the army was pretending to have foiled a coup so that it could pin the matter on the alleged plotters, who had already been arrested. According to Radio Isanganiro, the coup was to involve an attack on the presidential palace and the residence of Hussein Radjabu, the leader of the party in power.
Seven people, including the former president, Domitien Ndayizeye, were arrested in August and subsequently accused of plotting to overthrow the government. A court recommendation that they be released on bail was overturned by the state after prosecutors protested. It is widely believed that the government staged the coup plot itself to justify a crackdown on political opponents, but the government has denied the allegations.
When questioned at the state prosecutor’s office Manirakiza was asked to reveal his sources. When he quoted Article 8 of the Constitution, which states that he does not have to reveal his sources, he was immediately taken to jail.
”I was sharing a room with 163 persons, sharing one shower and toilet. I did not understand what happened to me,” said Manirakiza.
Commenting on how the arrest has affected his work as a journalist, Nbizi said: ”We will double our efforts” — a sentiment echoed by Manirakiza and Kiramvu.
Kiramvu says: ”I will continue talking, I will not change. Perhaps my voice disturbs the government,” she adds with a smile.
The Burundian media plays a central role in challenging the status quo. ”We are going to work so that law is respected and conditions in detention are improved,” says Manirakiza.
Nibizi says that problems in Burundi are a result of ”political leaders who lack the required political culture to govern”. He adds that leaders are trying to find a way out in the case of the suspected coup plotters. The government has failed to produce conclusive proof against those arrested for allegedly plotting a coup.
”We do think about pursuing the government in court. But not now; not yet,” says Manirakiza.