BURUNDI-POLITICS/PROTEST Protesters in Bujumbura defy government, refuse to back down

Record ID: 154915

  • Title: BURUNDI-POLITICS/PROTEST Protesters in Bujumbura defy government, refuse to back down
  • Date: 19th May 2015
  • Summary: BUJUMBURA, BURUNDI (MAY 19, 2015) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF CROWD OF PROTESTERS WALKING DOWN STREET CARRYING BANNERS AND SINGING PROTESTERS FEET MORE OF PROTESTERS MARCHING, SINGING AND CLAPPING THEIR HANDS ARMED SOLDIERS STANDING NEXT TO WOODEN HOUSE LOOKING ON (SOUNDBITE) (Swahili) ROBERT NDIHOKUBWAYO, BUJUMBURA RESIDENT SAYING: "They have been telling us about Al Shabaab for
  • Embargoed: 3rd June 2015 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Burundi
  • Country: Burundi
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVAEDN14LI0TJKA8JGV3W5QSIOB5
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: The Bujumbura protest on Tuesday (May 19) began peacefully with demonstrators chanting slogans against Burundi's President, Pierre Nkurunziza, and demanding he drop his bid for a third term in office.
    The march was in defiance of government threats of a crackdown on demonstrations. It snaked through the capital's suburb of Nyakabiga, a flash point during three weeks of unrest that have triggered fears of another bout of ethnic bloodletting in Africa's Great Lakes region.
    They say Nkurunziza's bid for five more years in power violates the constitution and a peace deal that ended an ethnically-fuelled civil war in Burundi in 2005.
    Nkurunziza says his participation in elections this year would not violate a two-term limit in the constitution, as his first term does not count, because he was appointed by parliament not chosen by a popular vote.
    A group of generals, laying the same charge against the president, tried and failed to overthrow him last week.
    Later in the day police fired tear gas and beat protesters. A Reuters photographer said at least eight of the flag-waving and chanting demonstrators were dragged off by police on Tuesday. Some in the crowd responded by pelting officers with stones and rocks.
    Demonstrators held bullet casings to the cameras accusing authorities of using unreasonable violence against them.
    Nkurunziza on Sunday (May 17), in his first public appearance in Burundi since the coup attempt, said Somali Islamist group al Shabaab was plotting an attack against the country and made no mention of the failed putsch.
    The government said late on Monday it would treat any future demonstrators as accomplices of the coup plotters.
    But the protesters in Bujumbura said they were against both Nkurunziza and the attempted coup.
    "They have been telling us about Al Shabaab for a long time. They are playing games with us... even the the coup d'etat was a joke. They are playing games and we can see right through him and we will not allow it. We will continue to protest until the day he accepts to step away from the elections. We will continue even though they want to finish us, our grandchildren will continue... until the last generation we will fight," said one of the demonstrators, Robert Ndihokubwayo.
    Nkurunziza sacked his defence minister on Monday (May 18) and appointed Emmanuel Ntahomvukiye - the first civilian in that post since 1966.
    "The new defence minister first of all is not from the military he is there illegally, that's why it's a way of killing protesters but all we know is they will not kill us all. We don't know the minister we don't accept his nomination they can't tell us to accept it because there is no government. We do not have a government right now," another protester told Reuters.
    Burundi, an impoverished nation with a population of 10 million, is still recovering from its civil war that killed about 300,000 people.
    Neighbouring Rwanda, which shares a similar ethnic mix between a Hutu majority and Tutsi minority, suffered a genocide in 1994 genocide in which 800,000 people, mostly Tutsis and moderate Hutus, were killed.
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
  • Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2015. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
  • Usage Terms/Restrictions: None
Register