Alain Willy Nyamitwe “African Union Commission is turning a deaf ear to legitimate requests of Burundi government”
“We decided not to participate in the Executive Council and the Conference of Heads of States for two reasons”, explained Alain -Aimé Nyamitwe, the head of the Burundian diplomacy.
The first reason he gave is that Burundi wanted to give a message to the African Union Commission that is turning a deaf ear to legitimate requests of Burundi government. “This is related to acts contrary to AU Constitutive Act which prohibits states from being used or to use elements to destabilize the security of other member states”, he added.
Minister Nyamitwe recalled that these concerns were transmitted and expressed repeatedly, through direct contacts between the Government of Burundi and the Chairman of the AU Commission.
Burundi Minister of Foreign Affairs recognizes that Burundi uncomfortable security situation is directly related to the Rwandan government’s acts.
So, secondly, he stated for the above reason that Bujumbura demanded to have specific security guarantees for the ministerial and presidential delegations in Kigali.
“These guarantees never came, so we felt that it was perhaps not prudent to participate in this high level meeting as these guarantees were not given.
For these two main reasons, our country decided not to participate in and support an exercise that might have been counter-productive”, he said.
Alain-Aime Nyamitwe added that the Burundian government chose to only participate in the Permanent Representatives Committee. “It’s a choice we made consciously to show our good faith”.
The opposition platform CENARED condemns what it calls “the empty chair policy’. According to Pancras Cimpaye, its spokesman, the government of Burundi shouldn’t have boycotted the 27th AU summit while “the question of the serious crisis in Burundi” was on the agenda.
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Edouard Madirisha translated by Lorraine Josiane Manishatse
IWACU Open Data
