Former Minister of the Interior, Gervais Ndirakobuca directed until 2020 the very feared national intelligence service, accused of being at the heart of the country’s repressive system.
Le Monde with AFP
The president of Burundi, Evariste Ndayishimiye, appointed a new Prime Minister on Wednesday, September 7, five days after denouncing the fans of “coup” on the part of those who believe themselves “all-powerful” and pass their time “to sabotage” its action.
The Minister of the Interior and Public Security, Gervais Ndirakobuca, took an oath in the afternoon, a few hours after seeing his appointment, proposed by the Head of State, validated unanimously by the two rooms of the Parliament.
He replaces Alain -Guillaume Bunyoni, considered – before he was even appointed Prime Minister in 2020 – as the real number two of the regime since the 2015 political crisis and the leader of “hard” among the generals who work behind the scenes of power.
The new Prime Minister Gervais Ndirakobuca also comes from this circle of generals from the former rebellion which now control the country. He directed until 2020 the very feared National Intelligence Service (SNR), accused of being at the heart of the Burundian repressive system since the 2015 crisis.
“White hat, white cap”
In April 2015, the candidacy for a controversial third term by former President Pierre Nkurunziza – died in June 2020 – had sparked a keen opposition movement, brutally repressed with at least 1,200 dead and 400,000 Burundian pushed Burundians to exile. The United States and the European Union had taken sanctions against several figures of the regime, including Gervais Ndirakobuca, for their role in this repression.
In November 2021, the United States announced its lifting, welcoming an upturn since the election of Evariste Ndayishimiye in May 2020. Mr. Ndirakobua remains targeted by EU sanctions. Pacific Nininahazwe, one of the figures of civil society in exile, denounced on Twitter the appointment of Gervais Ndirakobuca, considered a “hard system”. “White and white hat hat,” he wrote.
The reputation of the new Prime Minister, who climbed the ranks of the security apparatus before held government positions, sums up his nickname dating from the bloody Burundian civil war (300,000 dead between 1993 and 2006): “Ndakugarika”, literally “I’m going to extend you again dead” in Kirundi language. In a decree, the Head of State also appointed Colonel Aloys Sindayihebura, the head of the SNR, in the chief position of the civil cabinet, in place of General Gabriel Nizigama.
In his speech on Friday evoking a “coup d’etat”, Evariste Ndayishimiye had repeated his will to tackle monopolies granted to caciques or close to power, in order to absorb the increasingly glaring shortages month and source of growing dissatisfaction in the population. 2>
“disastrous” human rights
In the morning, the Ministry of Commerce published on its Twitter account a statement dated September 6, announcing the liberalization of corn, corn, sugar and cement flour. This decision follows the importation for ten days of fuel by the Public Water and Electricity Society (Regideso), which had made it possible to replenish the country’s service stations.
The country has been held in 2005 since the end of the civil war by the regime, thanks to the Imbonerakure, the youth league of the ruling party, the CNDD-FDD, and the National Intelligence Service .
If the international community has welcomed a certain opening of the country since the coming to power of Evariste Ndayishimiye, a commission of inquiry of the UN affirmed in September 2021 that the situation of human rights remained “disastrous “In Burundi.