|
BURUNDI: Vice president resigns, attacking ruling party chairman 
BUJUMBURA, 5 Sep 2006 (IRIN) - Burundi's second vice president, Alice
Nzomukunda, resigned on Tuesday in protest at interference by the
chairman of the ruling party.
"The government's hands are tied
by [the chairman] Hussein Radjabu," Nzomukunda said at a news
conference in the capital, Bujumbura.
Alice Nzomukunda was
Burundi’s second highest ranking official in the ruling party. Burundi
recently emerged from 12 years of brutal civil war, but Nzomukunda said
Radjabu was not respecting the country's institutions and was
obstructing efforts to create a functional peace-time government.
Nzomukunda’s accusations come when several organisations are accusing the government of human-rights abuses.
The
spokesman for the ruling Conseil national pour la defense de la
democratie - Forces de defense pour la democratie (CNDD-FDD), Evariste
Nsabiyumva, denied that Radjabu was an obstacle to good governance.
"We
are in a democracy in which everyone is free to express their views and
in which government leaders are free to resign," he said. "However,
what Nzomukunda says about the party chairman are big lies."
Nzomukunda
said the catalyst for her decision to resign was a public statement
Radjabu made on Sunday at a CNDD-FDD rally in Bujumbura. Nzomukunda
said Radjabu wrongly claimed that the World Bank agreed to donate US
$35 million to Burundi.
"What he called a donation is nothing
but a loan." Nzomukunda said. "He contradicted what I told
parliamentarians on Thursday. I was disgraced in Sunday’s rally, a
celebration in which I was taking part."
Nzomukunda is a top
official of the CNDD-FDD and was a fighter with the former rebel
movement before it signed a ceasefire agreement with the government at
the time in December 2002.
She also said Radjabu did not say
that the World Bank would only disburse the money following an audit of
the sale of the presidential jet. |
HOME
