<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0GITEGA, JUNE 25, 2021<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Your Excellency Vice-President of the Republic of Burundi,<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Honourable First Deputy Speaker of the Senate,<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Honourable Second Deputy Speaker of the Senate,<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Honourable Senators,<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Excellencies Ministers,<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Mister President of the Supreme Court,<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Mister President of the Constitutional Court,<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Mister President of the Audit Court,<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Mister Attorney General of the Republic,<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Dear Presidents of the various National Commissions,<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Mister Governor of the Province of Gitega,<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Your Excellencies Ambassadors and Representatives of the Diplomatic and Consular Corps accredited to Burundi,<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Dear Representatives of International Organizations in Burundi,<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Dear Heads of the Defense and Security corps,<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Dear journalists,<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Distinguished Guests,<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Ladies and Gentlemen,<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n 1.<\/strong> First of all, let us thank God who continues to protect our country and who allowed us to see this day. I ask you to please acclaim the Lord as a token of thanks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 2.<\/strong> Today, on June 25, 2021, we are honoured to welcome you in this hemicycle, where the Senate solemnly closes the conferences inaugurated on April 28 of this year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 3.<\/strong> These conferences were organized around the theme: \u201cremember and properly qualify the events of 1972 in Burundi\u201d. We would like to reiterate to you our sincere thanks for having enhanced these ceremonies with your presence despite your multiple occupations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 4.<\/strong> When the Senate thought of organizing these conferences, it wanted to achieve the following main objectives:<\/p>\n\n\n\n a) Give time to any Burundian who wishes to say something about the crimes committed in Burundi in 1972 so as to know the truth and thus reconcile Burundians;<\/p>\n\n\n\n b) Give an opportunity to all those who have something to say, whether for or against, the alleged perpetrators or victims of these crimes, in order to help the Senate to collect testimonies and reflections that could make it possible to reach the truth about the nature of the crimes committed in 1972.<\/p>\n\n\n\n c) Collect ideas in order to assess whether everything necessary has already been done for the Senate to apply article 289 of the Constitution of the Republic of Burundi which stipulates that “a period of five years is granted to the Senate to assess in order to end or extend the ethnic quota system in the Executive, Legislative and Judiciary after the establishment of the institutions provided for by the Constitution\u201d. In a country bereaved by ethnic conflicts, this article cannot be applied if our ethnic divisions are not properly qualified and if we do not know the step already taken by Burundi in the reconciliation of Burundian victims of these conflicts, especially the events of 1972.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 5.<\/strong> Since the beginning of these conferences, a lot of things were said. There are people who frightened others by telling them \u201cbe vigilant, they are digging up the past\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 6.<\/strong> The five conferences that we are closing today allowed us as Burundians to reflect on our past, because, at the beginning of these conferences, there are descendants of the perpetrators of the 1972 crimes who were scared to hear the name of their parent pronounced. These conferences reassured them. They heard with their own ears that no one is punished for a crime of which they are not the author and that children do not inherit crimes committed by their parents. We once again reassure these descendants that they should no longer be frightened. They are not guilty of the dark period that Burundi went through in 1972.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 7.<\/strong> These conferences also enabled the descendants of the victims of the 1972 crimes to know the truth. They realized that it is not an ethnic group that kills, but rather a bad system of governance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 8.<\/strong> The truth is the only way to reconciliation for Burundians. This is the only surest way to build a new Burundi, which should be just, equitable and truly reconciled.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 9.<\/strong> The Senate warmly thanks many Burundians who testified during these conferences. We therefore call on you, to sensitize all those who still have doubts so that they overcome their fear in order to be able to testify what they know before the Truth Reconciliation Commission or when such conferences are organized again, without exaggeration, anger or lie, in order to support this noble work, which sole aim is a better future for our country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 10.<\/strong> We have collected sensitive recommendations that you made towards different institutions. In accordance with the laws governing its missions, the Senate will analyze them in depth before submitting them to the institutions concerned, which will in turn ensure their implementation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 11.<\/strong> Before closing, we would like to appeal to Burundians to put an end to the bad habits of globalization and stigmatization in order to achieve sustainable development.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 12.<\/strong> We thank once again all those who have contributed to making these conferences successful. We reiterate our sincere thanks to the leaders of political parties, media and religious denominations because, during these conferences, they have shown that they are thirsty of a Burundi characterized by peace and security.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 13.<\/strong> We solemnly declare closed the work of these conferences which have just lasted two months and which gathered Burundians from different sectors, without forgetting our brothers and sisters living in different countries of the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n God bless you!<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0GITEGA, JUNE 25, 2021 Your Excellency Vice-President of the Republic of Burundi, Honourable First Deputy Speaker of the Senate, Honourable Second Deputy Speaker of the Senate, [\u2026]<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,3,54],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/senat.bi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8194"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/senat.bi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/senat.bi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/senat.bi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/senat.bi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8194"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/senat.bi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8194\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8198,"href":"https:\/\/senat.bi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8194\/revisions\/8198"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/senat.bi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8194"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/senat.bi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8194"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/senat.bi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8194"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}