In Burundi, President Evariste Ndayishimiye, head of the Burundian state since June 20, 2020, has made the fight against corruption one of his priorities in a country ranked among the ten most corrupt in the world, according to Amnesty International. Nine months later, people were still waiting for signals that were hitherto considered contradictory. This weekend, the general was a guest on a famous private radio show, Isanganiro. He finally clarified his policy regarding the fight against this scourge, enough to arouse controversy.
For those who wondered, General Evariste Ndayishimiye was clear he will not shake the coconut palm. Otherwise, he said, all those who have plundered Burundi’s wealth since the Belgian colonial era should be prosecuted. So he set a starting point.
“Your problem is that you want to offset the past, instead of saying, let’s draw a line of zero tolerance as of today. For if we prosecute those who have previously looted public property. In recent years we will waste time in investigations we no longer work and the country is getting poorer.Today I say: “those who stole, it’s done. We will present your case to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission “because the people asked me to monitor national prosperity since the day of my construction. Ed,” the Burundian president declared.
L’Olucome, the main anti-corruption organization, condemns what it describes as the “inauguration of impunity”. Its president recalls that “corruption has been institutionalized” in the sixteen years that the Cndd-FDD, the presidential party, has just come to power.
“The laws have been in place since 2006 under the Cnnd regime. Moreover, he [Evariste Ndayishimiye] is still a lawyer. He studied law. Olucome can in no way understand how he can promote this dissertation. There is also the principle of state continuity. So for us it is really impunity that he wants to inaugurate, but also we can put forward the hypothesis that he was afraid of the corrupt who have become stronger than the state “, stressed the president of the observatory for the fight against corruption and economic embezzlement Gabriel Rufyiri.
But “it’s not too late,” assesses Olucome, who insists that Mr. Ndayihimiye has a picture of “Mr. Pure” in terms of corruption.
