Burundi: Is Burundi a democratic or dictatorial state
(First part)
We are starting a series of analyses on democracy to see especially if our country of Burundi is a democratic state or simply a nameless military dictatorship. Indeed, in the days of the military powers resulting from the putsch, the West made it clear to politicians or to the African people that there was a need at all costs for a pluralist system in Africa, that the people must be governed by leaders elected by the people. The powers resulting from military coups are almost gone, but we observe in most countries in Africa so-called civilian powers, democratically elected, but which are more military than the military powers themselves because they have quite simply removed the cap but the spirit remains the same; others don’t even hesitate to wear the outfit when the circumstances require. Would it be an African-style democracy?
It has long been understood that the word “democracy” comes from the Greek word “demos” which means “people” and “kratos” which means “power”. We therefore speak of the power of the people, of the government of the people.
Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States from 1860 to 1865, is said to have once said that democracy is “government of the people, by the people and for the people.” According to this principle, sovereignty therefore belongs to the people, who choose those who will govern them.
Yes, the people choose those who rule them. But, in our countries where the illiterate rate is very high, the people do not choose leaders on the basis of the projects presented (they would not even be able to understand them), but on the basis of subjective criteria such as ethnicity, or buying conscience by paying them money or drinks or any other form of corruption. With direct elections, we will often see that in Africa, it is the voice of the ethnic or clan majority that wins; and our politicians will do everything to touch on this sensitive chord which, in the long run, creates tensions and even conflicts between citizens. Hence we are witnessing the outbreak of ethnic or clan wars. And when this ethnic majority wins, the main tendency is that the power will crush the minority (s) more. This is why Albert Camus would like “democracy not to be the law of the majority, but the protection of the minority”.
John Stuart Mill argues in his book “From Freedom (1859)” that “the tyranny of the majority” is one of the evils against which society must protect itself. He says: “The will of the people means in practice the will of the many.” This is where the shoe pinches in our still underdeveloped African countries and especially in our country Burundi. A handful of unenlightened leaders rely on this ethnic majority to get elected. And once elected, they no longer care about the interests of their constituents to think about their development, they do everything to line their pockets, build floors and buy luxury vehicles first, then hide the rest of their money in foreign banks and paying their children luxury schools in developed countries, when the lower classes are starving, their children are studying in schools without doors, windows or desks. This is why Fred Lafrite talks about the illusion of democracy. For him, “democracy as it is today being an illusion which serves to protect the minority of the rich and powerful”. They are therefore hiding behind the fact that they were elected to remain in power, to enrich themselves and to have the means to corrupt in order to retain this power for a long time to come when they do not show any positive results. And these are the effects of digital majority democracy. John Stuart Mill asserts in his work “From Freedom” (1859) that “the tyranny of the majority” is one of the evils against which society must protect itself. For him, “the will of the people means in practice the will of the greatest number”.
We will see that this kind of multiparty system was introduced by France in most of our African countries (the La Baule conference with François Mitterrand, June 1990) with a sort of threat to cut aid if our countries do not accept their democratic system, not by seeking good governance for the good of our peoples, but with a political objective of these European countries and of France in particular. We will see that perhaps most of our conflicts which divide us take root in this policy of Europeans imposed on our States
And URN HITAMWONEZA advises Burundians to already think about a democratic system that promotes the participation of all human resources in the construction of the country because exclusion and persecution only lead to the result recorded by the cnddfdd military clique since 2005.
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