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Tuesday, May 22, 2018

2018 Burundian Constitutional Referendum May 17,2018 - Burundi backs new constitution extending presidential term limits

Voters in Burundi have backed constitutional amendments that coud potentially allow President Pierre Nkurunziza to stay in office until 2034 as well as boost his powers.

Pierre-Claver Ndayicariye, election commission chief, said 73 percent of voters had voted "Yes" in the referendum to change the constitution, including whether the current five-year-presidential terms will be increased to seven years. No change to the limit of two terms in office was proposed.

Nineteen percent voted "No", with a turnout of 96 percent. More than five million people had registered to vote in the referendum on May 17, according to officials

The new document also scraps one of the country's two constitutionally enshrined vice presidents and shift a number of powers away from the government to the president

Before the vote, the opposition had decried it as an undemocratic foregone conclusion.

The referendum came three years after Nkurunziza won a controversial third term as president during a 2015 election, which was boycotted by the opposition.

Nkurunziza first came to power in 2005, five years after the signing of a nationwide peace deal known as the Arusha Accords, which paved the way for the ending of a 12-year-long civil war that saw more than 300,000 people killed.

According to a provision in the peace deal, no leader could serve more than two five-year terms.
But in early 2015, Nkurunziza claimed it was legal for him to run in the elections because for his first term he had been appointed to the presidency by parliament - as opposed to being voted in.

A political crisis ensued, with the opposition calling Nkurunziza's bid unconstitutional. An attempted coup was quashed, while a crackdown on anti-government protests resulted in the killing of at least 1,200 people.

More than 400,000 others, including opposition leaders, fled the country.

As well as allowing Nkurunziza to prolong his rule, the approved changes to Burundi's constitution also allow the revision of ethnic quotas currently protected under the accords.

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