Burundi: The colonizer reduced the areas of Burundi and Rwanda to weaken Tutsis and better control these states (fifth part).
The German colonizer did not find a favourable ground in Burundi; He faced a fierce resistance even though he was able to impose himself by the force of arms. He will leave Burundi too by the small window, after allowing German corpses to the country; Germans died in 1915 are buried in Rugombo in the province of Cibitoke, others would be buried in Gitega in the centre of the country. It was during the fighting that opposed the Germans at the Belgo Congolese military coalition. After Germany lost its colonies at the end of the First World War, a mandate from the League of Nations (SDN) placed most of German East Africa under the administration of the British and the new territory was called Tanganyika . A mandate on a small part of the colony was entrusted to Belgium, which administered the territory since the Belgian Congo, the renaming Ruanda-Urundi. He remained under Belgian mandate until the independence of Rwanda and Burundi in July 1962.
Before arriving independence, in accordance with the principles of the mandate, Belgium had an obligation to manage Ruanda-Urundi as a territory with a particular status different from that of a colony. But a 1925 law will come as to change the game. It must be said immediately that under this law, the territory under mandate is administratively attached to the Belgian Congo and therefore subject to the laws governing the Belgian Congo.
But before reaching this annexation of Burundi, it must be said that the Belgians started with unions. Thus, explains the historian Joseph Gahama, from 1922, the customs and financial union between the territories under mandate and the colony was a reality. And the law of 30 June 1922 established the exemption from customs duties both at the entrance and exit on trade between the two countries. The Congolese franc replaced the Rupees and German Heller in 1920.
The troops installed in Ruanda-Urundi were already placed under the orders of the commander of the garrisons of the East Province of the Belgian Congo, thus devoting a military union. Nothing prevailed Belgium to complete annexation. Accuracy here: At that time, the soldiers of the police were all Congolese since according to the Belgian mandate on the territories of the Eastern African, prohibition is made to the agent of organizing an indigenous military force.
So there was a desire to standardize all colonial possessions to better administer them. A bit like the realization of a dream of Leopold II, Gahama tells us, that of controlling the highlands safe, fertile and well populated between Lake Tanganyika and the High Nile.
According to Joseph Gahama, the reasons for this annexation were multiple: having received the mandate of Ruanda-Urundi from the NRD, Belgium was not guaranteed to keep this territory eternally to administer it. The fear of being removed from this country (Ruanda and Burundi were considered at the time as a single country) would have encouraged it to hasten this union. The second reason is economically. Ruanda-Urundi, by its dense population, contrast remarkably with Congo and especially Katanga where the lack of labour is worrying. To exploit the wealth of Congo, the Belgians planned to channel the emigration of Burundi and Banyarwanda to this colony. And to feed certain regions of the Congo, the abundant foods of the plain of the Rusizi would be valuable input. Finally, always tells us Gahama, the theorists of direct administration, accusing the indirect administration of not having obtained good results despite resounding proclamations, ask the attachment of the Ruanda-Urundi to the Belgian Congo pending the training of education Indigenous “shaped”, condition according to them sine qua non of the indirect administration.
Joseph Gahama states that this 1925 law was a violation of the NRD’s mandate because it wants to take off each state the right to become independent. It should be noted here that this law has allowed the transfer of human resources between the three countries, Congo, Burundi and Rwanda. This justifies that we find in the current DRC of people of Burundian and Rwandan origin who are installed there before independence.
URN Hitamwoneza finds that recurring conflicts in this region of the Great Lakes can have origins in this disruption of the administration of countries by Belgian colonization; But also in his policy of “dividing to reign” that she has introduced in Burundi and Rwanda; Inciting at the same time the majority Hutus to massacre the Tutsis she had at the beginning presented as smart and elegant men, only able to lead even if they were numerically minority. The damage caused by Belgian colonization in Burundi are very numerous. When the country has real leaders, this question will have to be discussed with Belgium to find common ground on certain points so far obscure.