Angelo Izama
4 May 2008
column
Beheadings are back in Bujumbura the restive capital of Burundi. Tensions have been simmering for months between the government of Pierre Nkuruzunza and the only rebel group that has remained outside the Burundi peace process, FNL.
In the last few days open fighting has erupted, government troops are on the move, air raids and mortar shells are raining on the capital in what resembles an all out war.
An emergency meeting between President Jakaya Kikwete who is currently holds the chair of the African Union and his colleague President Yoweri Museveni took place in Kampala behind closed doors on Wednesday.
Kikwete extended his visit and a joint communiqué prepared by the Foreign Affairs Ministry has not been made public.
The one- on-one meeting (s) between the two men signify how serious the problem in Burundi is and its understated ramifications for the East African region and the geo-politics of the Great Lakes.
Officially Uganda, which along with Tanzania and South Africa nurtured the Burundi peace process through a half-decade of power-sharing talks that eventually led to a new constitution and elections, supports the legality of the Nkuruzinza government.
Next week Foreign Affairs Ministers of the three countries are meeting in Arusha to develop a position on the renewed violence which is likely to say just as much.
FNL leader Agathon Rwasa is perceived as a spoiler to the process and this is more than likely to see a hardening of the consensus toward his men who are now in pitched battles with the government. In the last months leading up to the fresh violence, Mr Rwasa has pushed demands that ultimately suggest he will only play ball on his own terms.
He would like an amendment of the constitution to include FNL-PALEPEHUTU in contravention of a deal arrived at earlier not to promote ethnic based identities.
Mr Rwasa is also demanding millions of dollars for his group, a point that scores with the thousands of FNL fighters whose botched re-integration and resettlement has kept them disgruntled even as negotiations with their leaders looked doomed to fail.
Recently Mr Rwasa has also asked some Francophone countries like Gabon to join the process and insiders say with help from France, Belgium and Norway, he is determined to remain out of the process.
Even if the fighting stops, as long as FNL can remain out of the process, the new Burundi government will never be stable. Security matters, which include unreported targeted killings between FNL and government operatives continue to divert the government and spoil the air in Bujumbura.
For Uganda, long a proponent of a federation in East Africa as well as the AU, fixing Burundi is a test case for similar situations creeping up in South Sudan, in Somalia and even in Rwanda down the road.
Success has come in Burundi but its consistency will be important to answer the question of just how well regional containment can work for domestic conflicts.
Uganda is grappling with the same problem as far as the Lords Resistance Army is concerned as it crosses borders in Central Africa and Sudan. It is also crucial that a peace in Burundi succeeds so that proponents of increased regional integration can make their case.
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