Authorities deny forcible repatriation plans

The Ministry of Home Affairs has convened mass meetings in refugee camps to dispel rumours that the government intends to forcibly repatriate all Burundian refugees, according to a WFP emergency report on Friday, 15 June. The threat of a forced repatriation of refugees from Tanzania has seemed more and more likely in recent months, despite reluctance on the part of Burundian refugees to return to their war-stricken country, according to NGO sources. These rumours were fuelled by a call by President Benjamin Mkapa for the UN to repatriate Burundian refugees to “safe areas” in their own country. Some refugees had already started selling their household items, while others were withdrawing from various communal activities in the camps, WFP reported on Friday.

UNHCR had heard reports that some Burundian refugees were preparing to leave for home, to “jump before they were pushed”, officials told IRIN on Monday. However, refugees had been assured by the Tanzanian authorities that repatriation would take place on a voluntary basis once the security situation in Burundi returned to normal, they added. For instance, the outgoing district commissioner of Ngara had, on 7 June, told refugees in Lukole A (which, along with Lukole B, hosts up the largest number of Burundi refugees in western Tanzania) that they should “not give ear to rumours” and that Tanzania would stand by its commitment that any repatriation would be voluntary.

The UN refugee agency holds that the best solution for the Burundi refugees is to return to their home country, but insists that repatriation cannot take place while conditions are insecure. “We cannot send people to this kind of situation. At the moment, the condition on the ground is just not conducive for mass-scale repatriation in Burundi,” UNHCR’s external relations officer in Dar es Salaam, Ivana Unluova, told IRIN in late May.