As anyone who has lived in Uganda will know, they take their religion very seriously indeed, with half the shops and businesses having religiously-oriented names – the ‘God is Great Butcher’ or the ‘Jesus Loves You Hair Salon’. After the improvement in the state of the roads, one of the big shocks of crossing the border from Uganda into Rwanda is the immediate disappearance of these names. The reason is even more distressing; the people of Rwanda turned away from religion en masse after the participation of many priests in the genocide.

Burundi lies between the two; religion is there, but not worn on their sleeves. A few shops have somewhat religious titles, but subtle, as, as I have blogged earlier, they seem keener on ‘peace’. The Catholic Church has historically been the dominant force and retains a powerful position, despite a period of repression under Bagaza (Tutsi military dictator number 2 of 3) between 1976 and 1987. However, there is also a fairly large Greek Orthodox community – the Greeks arrived en masse with the Germans, trading across the lake, and stayed through most of the 20^th Century, building a church even bigger than the Catholic Cathedral in the process. Greeks have also played a part in the country’s history; Prince Louis Rwagasore, the first Prime Minister of independent Burundi, was assassinated by a Greek settler in the pay of his political opponents. According to Pierre Claver, a fairly significant Orthodox population remains, a mixture of Greeks who have stayed throughout, and people converted over the years. His confusion at my fascination with the church also reveals how established the community is, and how it is taken for granted in Burundi – and this makes me keen to investigate whether there are similarly large populations elsewhere that I’ve somehow missed.

Orthodox church

As in Rwanda, there have been changes due to the war; the Catholic Church lost ground to various strains of evangelical Protestantism, as the conversion of Pierre Claver’s family shows. Finally, there is a small Muslim community – estimates range between 5% and 13% of the population – and there are some indications that this is growing as a result of the role played by Muslims during the war, when they showed enormous courage in protecting large numbers of Hutus and Tutsis alike. However, unlike Kigali, Bujumbura remains full of churches, and gospel music is popular. Nearly everyone I speak to tells me that things are good ‘thanks to God’, and that they hope for peace ‘with the Grace of God’ or tell me early in conversation that they are a Christian, and asks what denomination I am*.

I think this moderation is one of the things I like about the country; I found Uganda’s evangelical fervour somewhat disconcerting, and generally used to dread the occasions when it was my turn to lead the prayers at work meetings. Similarly, there is something eerie, if understandable, about Rwanda’s empty churches and mass abandonment of faith. Attributing good fortune to God, discussing religion over beers, going to church every now and then, and good-natured inquiries about others’ faith seem much more normal and healthy. It may also have positive benefits; Uganda’s first lady’s enthusiasm for promoting abstinence may be one reason for the start of a rise in HIV infection rates, while Rwanda – and Burundi in the past – showed the way in which a powerful church can become a tool for marginalisation. It may be hoped that this seeming lack of interest in mixing church and state can help Burundi to avoid either pitfall in future.

* Happily I have yet to meet an Anglican, so have yet to be invited to church. It may also be because Europeans are known for being heathens, and they’d rather not know.

To say that Burundi isn’t well understood would be something of an understatement. Even as a long-term Africa specialist I had to look up the capital before my interview for The Advocacy Project. So, just so everyone knows what I’m talking about….

A potted history of Burundi:

Following independece and a coup by the Tutsi-led military in 1973, ethnic tensions gradually increased, culminating in the murder of the democratically elected President in 1993. Although the coup was officially called off, the constitutional crisis took months to resolve – and just as agreement had been reached, the new president died in the same plane crash as Rwandan president Habyarimana, sparking the Rwanda genocide. These events sparked massive massacres of both Hutu and Tutsi, and a myriad of armed groups emerged in the ensuing war. Peace talks in Arusha in2000 produced agreement, but it was not until 2006 that this was fully implemented, when the final rebel group joined the peace process. Since then, demobilisation has been underway, but violence has not been eliminated. Elections are scheduled for 2010.

The country is often compared with neighbouring Rwanda; both countries have undergone decades of ethnic violence between Tutsi and Hutu – but whereas Rwanda’s civil war ended fifteen years ago, Burundi’s only came to an end in 2006, when the final rebel group agreed to join the peace agreement. While Rwanda has been flooded with aid (and it shows in the state of the roads), Burundi is still very much ‘off the map’ – something that also shows in how little it has been studied. Rwanda is seen as an important US ally in Africa, while Burundi isn’t very important to anyone. And while Rwanda’s war ended in military victory for the RPF under current president Kagame, Burundi’s ended in a negotiated peace, and the country is taking steps to restoring democracy. I’ve studied Rwanda a lot in the last few years, and I’m pretty familiar with the history and the issues there – but I know very little about Burundi. Finding out more so that I can compare the countries better is going to be part of the adventure!

Where do I fit in?

I am travelling to Burundi as a Peace Fellow for The Advocacy Project, where I will be working with Survivor Corps Burundi. Survivor Corps are active all over the world, primarily working with disability rights and on campaigns to ban specific weapons, but in Burundi they are widening their reach to work with female ex-combatants who have been victims of gender based violence. This fits in with loads of stuff I’ve studied in my degree, especially the ways in which women can be marginalised by donor communities, and the extra difficulties female ex-combatants face in reintegrating into their communities, so I’m really excited to be working with an organisation that tries to make their voices heard. I’ll be profiling some of these survivors on this blog, as well as some of the community organisations that Survivor Corps work with, and hopefully I’ll be able to tie it in with some wider issues to do with aid management, post-conflict reconstruction, and donor priorities.

Please feel free to come back or make comments; pour les gens de IHEID, ce blog est un éspace bilangue, donc les commentaires en français sont bienvenues!