Burundi’s leader deposed while abroad

Press, 5 September 1987, Page 10

Burundi’s leader deposed while abroad

NZPA-Reuter Nairobi President Jean-Baptiste Bagaza of the tiny central African state of Burundi has been overthrown while attending a meeting of French-speaking leaders in Canada. A military faction led by Major Pierre Buyoya seized power on Thursday and announced on national radio that Bagaza had been deposed and the Constitution suspended. An official communique said Major Buyoya had set up a Committee for National Salvation to take over the reins of government Colonel Bagaza, aged 41, joins a substantial list of African leaders who have been deposed while out of their countries. They include Kwame Nkrumah, of Ghana, who was deposed while on a trip to China in 1966, Jaafar Nimeiri, of Sudan, visiting the United States in 1985, and Milton Obote, of Uganda, attending a Commonwealth conference in Singapore in 1971. Burundi’s new military rulers have not yet explained their reasons for overthrowing Colonel Bagaza, but their coup came during the run up to parliamentary elections, scheduled for October 23.

It also took place against a background of growing conflict between the Government and the Roman Catholic Church, which has traditionally been powerful in Burundi. The new leadership said on Thursday that it had dissolved the oneparty Parliament and suspended the central committee of the ruling Union for National Progress (Uprona) Party. The coup leaders imposed a 7 p.m. to 5.30 a.m. curfew, recalled all military personnel from leave and gave an assurance that Burundi’s international agreements would be respected. Telephone and telex links with Burundi were cut and it was not immediately clear whether the coup had met any resistance. Upon learning of the coup, Colonel Bagaza hastily left the Francophone summit in Quebec City and flew to Paris. It was not clear whether this was the final destination of Mr Bagaza, who himself came to power in a coup in November 1976. Little is known about Burundi’s new military leader, but like Colonel Bagaza, Major Buyoya is a

member of the country’s minority Tutsi tribe, which has traditionally dominated government. Ethnic strife between the Tutsi and the Hutu, who account for 85 per cent of Burundi’s five million population, has characterised the political life of the former Belgian colony since independence in 1962. About 100,000 Hutus were massacred in Tutsi reprisals after a 1972 Hutu rebellion, but Colonel Bagaza introduced policies aimed at national reconciliation when he seized power four years later. Burundi is a very poor and densely populated country. Its economy centres on coffee and tea exports, but it is not suffering any particular economic crisis. Since 1984, Colonel Bagaza has expelled most foreign missionaries, and jailed many local priests, accusing the Church of attempting to challenge his Government’s authority. He also banned Church lay organisations, stopped catechism classes and prohibited Church services on weekdays, provoking protests from the Pope.