Burundi: Ridiculous social imbalance; the greatest thieves compete with arrogance
In a country where impunity has firmly established itself, it is the big bandits who make the law. They have the money, they have the power, they keep stealing and they don’t hide it. The cases of Marechal Prime Minister Allain Guillaume Bunyoni, Prosper Hakizimana aka Gisiga and Olivier Suguru are eye-opening.
Bunyoni who is currently richer than the state has started chasing money since he became head of the national police. Acts of corruption, concussion and economic malfeasance were the basis of the acquisition of so much dirty money that enriched it at a very young age. He told the media that to be so quickly rich like him, you have to work hard. But let him remember how many dollars the officers on assignments in Darfur or elsewhere sent him every time they asked for extensions of warrants! If he has forgotten it, those who gave it will never forget that it was equivalent to a monthly salary for each officer. And it’s in dollars, don’t forget. The management of fuel to the police, the management of their rations, clothing and equipment has always been an opaque affair; and this only benefited the chiefs, led by Allain Guillaume Bunyoni. Ask Tatien Nivyinyeretse, a Rutana native like Bunyoni, how he got rich in a little while. And now Allain Guillaume Bunyoni is prime minister, he makes the law, he gives lessons in good management to Para public companies, threatening to close or liquidate them; not for the sake of the state, but for the sake of selling them to the private sector and either buying them itself (through other people) or putting its own shares in them. There is no shortage of money in him.
His arrogance reached the peak to such an extent that every birthday of his wife, he buys her a brand new jeep. Today, her photos and videos circulate around the world giving the keys to the contact of an E1230A jeep to her daughter who has just finished university. A girl also known around the world for her extremist writings on social media.
The businessman Prosper Hakizimana aka Gisiga knew how to approach the circle of generals and it is he who wins all the markets. He bought a Mercedes cross country jeep to compete with Olivier Suguru, another businessman close to the cnddfdd circle, who bought the same jeep brand a month ago.
This behaviour of exposing certain signs of their wealth shows not only that they know that no one can ask them the origin of these excesses of wealth; well-known money that comes from corruption and economic malfeasance. Psychologists also interpret it as a gesture of the upstarts because all those who have wealth do not expose them on the internet as Marshal Bunyoni likes to do, even spreading his private life on social media.
Gisiga and Suguru have taken a monopoly on all markets, particularly within the national defence force and the police; some products are even bought over the counter, with a confidential stamp (it’s like some weapons, ammunition, vehicles and others). Because they know that they will not go through rigorous controls because they know how to give money at every stage of control, they even provide “second hand” equipment or even in poor working order and they are paid without any constraints. This material will have been bought cheaply, but they will sell it as new. That’s how they make a lot of money quickly. And every leader, at every level, has a share reserved for him. And you want the country to grow!
The rich will continue to fly and become richer; the children of the poor will continue to sit on tree trunks or stones or on the floor in class for lack of desk benches. A single jeep can buy desk benches for at least 100 classrooms. And a Gisuru peasant with ripped trousers on his buttocks will be called ”umwenegihugu” just like the Marechal Prime Minister Allain Guillaume Bunyoni. Ridiculous.
URN HITAMWONEZA always calls on the People of Burundi to examine their conscience and note that those who impose themselves as leaders today are only there for their own interests and never care about the interests of the people. It is very unfortunate, in the 21st century, that there are still children sitting on the floor in an uncovered classroom, without doors or windows, while the so-called elected leaders change jeeps as they wish. It is high time that the people stand up and drive away from power this handful of men who hold all the wealth of the country; it is in this way that looted goods can be handed over to the public treasury to be beneficial to all Burundians. Anything is possible; it only takes awareness, a will and a determination to overcome their only weapon’s force.