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The Twa were the original inhabitants of Burundi and were followed (c.A.D. 1000), and then outnumbered, by the Hutus. Probably in the 15th cent., the Tutsis migrated into the area, gained dominance over the Hutus, and established several states. By the 19th cent., the country was ruled by the mwami (king) : a Tutsi who controlled the other Tutsis of the region in a vassal relationship. In 1890, Burundi (along with Rwanda) became part of German East Africa, but the Germans began to govern the area only in 1897. During World War I, Belgian forces occupied (1916) Burundi, and in 1919 it became part of the Belgian League of Nations mandate of Ruanda-Urundi (which in 1946 became a UN trust territory). Under the German and Belgian administrations Christianity was spread, but the traditional social structure of Burundi was not altered, and there was little economic development.
On July 1, 1962, the country became an independent kingdom ruled by the mwami of Burundi. The mid-1960s were marked by fighting between the Tutsis and Hutus and by struggles for power among the Tutsis. In 1965 a coup attempted by Hutus failed, and the Tutsis retaliated by executing most Hutu political leaders and many other Hutus. In July, 1966, Mwambutsa IV was deposed by his son, who became Ntare V. The new ruler was himself deposed by a military coup in Nov., 1966, when a republic was established.
Michel Micombero, a Tutsi, became president; a new constitution was adopted in 1970. Renewed fighting between Tutsis and Hutus in the early 1970s resulted in the death of many thousands of Hutus. In 1972 a rebellion attempting to return Ntare V to power was crushed by the government; Ntare was executed and the Hutus were further repressed. Many priests and missionaries suspected of sympathizing with the Hutu population were expelled in 1985.
Pierre Buyoya, a Tutsi who became Burundi's head of state after a coup in 1987, introduced reforms designed to lessen ethnic divisions. Buyoya appointed a majority of Hutus to the cabinet, including the prime minister, and encouraged enlistment of Hutus in the military. Many Hutus fled Burundi after massacres in 1988 and settled in Tanzania. By mid-1989, however, most of them had returned.
A new constitution adopted in 1992 provided for a multiparty political system; in the 1993 elections, Melchior Ndadaye, a Hutu, defeated Buyoya to win the nation's first free presidential election. Soon afterward he was overthrown and killed in a coup attempt by Tutsi soldiers. Burundi was convulsed by ethnic violence in which thousands of Hutus and Tutsis died, and many fled the country. The coup collapsed, but civilian authority was restored slowly, and sporadic violence continued. In Apr., 1994, Cyprien Ntaryamira, a Hutu who had been chosen as president by parliament, was killed with the president of Rwanda when their plane crashed, possibly having been shot down. He was succeeded by Sylvestre Ntibantunganya, an ethnic Hutu, while a new power-sharing arrangement provided for a Tutsi prime minister.
Ntibantunganya, however, was unable to exercise control over the army. Fighting between Hutu militants, who had taken up arms after the 1993 coup and won control of much of NW Burundi, and Tutsi soldiers persisted, along with a high rate of civilian casualties and the continued flight of Hutus from the country. In July, 1996, the army overthrew the government, and Pierre Buyoya was once again installed as president. Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania applied economic sanctions against the country in the wake of the coup but lifted them in 1999 as talks between the warring factions progressed. In Dec., 1999, Nelson Mandela was appointed by a group of African nations to act as a mediator in the conflict. An accord was reached in 2000, but some aspects of the agreement were left incomplete. In addition, two Hutu rebel groups refused to sign the accord, and young army officers unsuccessfully attempted to overthrow Buyoya twice in 2001.
In July, 2001, the Arusha accords, a Tutsi-Hutu power-sharing agreement, were finalized. Under them, Buyoya remained president, with a Hutu vice president (Domitien Ndayizeye), for 18 months; the new government was installed in Nov., 2001. Fighting with the Hutu rebel groups remained unaffected by both the accord and a Dec., 2002, cease-fire agreement with one of the rebel groups. Ndayizeye succeeded Buyoya as transitional president in Apr., 2003, also for an 18-month term, at the end of which elections are to be held. Alphonse Kadege, a Tutsi, became vice president.
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