Plea for new constitution, electoral law

The transitional government of Burundi should ensure that the country has a new constitution as well as an electoral law to enable it to move to democracy within the time stipulated in the 2000 Arusha peace accord, the president of the accord's Implementation Monitoring Committee, Berhanu Dinka, said on Monday. Dinka, who is also the UN Secretary-General's Representative to Burundi, made the remarks when he opened the 17th session of the committee in the capital, Bujumbura. This session is expected to last five days. A committee member, Jean Baptiste Mukuri, told IRIN that the committee was mandated to draft a constitution if the government failed to adhere to the accord's requirement to enact a new constitution during the second phase of its three-year transition. "The Arusha accord authorises us," Mukuri, who represents the ABASA political party in committee, said. In January, Burundian President Domitien Ndayizeye gave all political parties a preliminary project on the electoral law to approve and asked them to reach an agreement by March. Under the Arusha accord, which was signed on August 2000 by 19 Burundian parties, elections should take place within the next nine months, before the transitional period expires. However, the elections issue has generated disagreement within the implementation committee. "It is not possible to organise elections unless we have a new integrated army incorporating all former rebel movements that have signed the Arusha accord," Gerard Bikebako, the committee member representing the former rebel movement Front national de liberation, said. "This is not the only challenge," he added. "We have thousands of refugees and internally displaced people who have not yet regained their homes." During the opening of the committee's session, members accused the government of failing to implementing some recommendations made in the accord, especially those dealing with the repatriation of refugees and the release of political prisoners. The committee announced that it would summon five government ministers, including the defence and state ministers, to update it on progress made, so far, in the implementation of the recommendations. "The defence minister will tell members how far he has gone with the cantonment of former combatants," a committee member, who requested anonymity, said. Dinka urged all former rebel movements to assemble their former combatants urgently, to facilitate their demobilisation and reintegration into society.