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Giharo : a former CNDD-FDD activist converted to the UPRONA party threatened with death

Partial view of CNDD-FDD members and supporters in Bugendana (central Burundi) on April 27, during the first day of the 2020 electoral campaign (SOS Médias Burundi)

Théoneste Juma, a former CNDD-FDD activist, close to the late President Pierre Nkurunziza, is under death threats. Administration authorities and local CNDD-FDD officials are said to be behind these threats since he joined the UPRONA party, the Union for National Progress. INFO SOS Médias Burundi

Théoneste Juma was a CNDD-FDD activist until 2020 before joining the UPRONA party of Prince Louis Rwagasore, hero of Burundi’s independence.

Pastor of the United Methodist Church, Théoneste Juma was also chief of Kibimba village in Giharo district since the CNDD-FDD came to power.

« He was so close to the late Pierre Nkurunziza that he was always designated to pray at the beginning of activities during Pierre Nkurunziza’s visits to Rutana province, » insists a witness.

Neighbors and family are sounding the alarm about his safety and that of his family, which has been threatened since he joined the UPRONA party.

These threats come from administration authorities and CNDD-FDD officials at the district and provincial levels.

According to neighbors, this manhunt against Théoneste Juma and his family began in 2021.

Administration authorities even expropriated his land properties.

« Juma confided in the competent courts before he was thrown in prison in September 2022 where he spent a year and 2 months, » laments a relative.

Persecutions have not stopped despite his imprisonment without a file.

Worse, his wife was raped by Imbonerakure (members of the youth league of the CNDD-FDD party). Despite the medical expertise provided by services of the Kinyinya hospital, the police in Giharo refused to arrest the suspects.

« We cannot welcome you, it is an order from above », the judicial police officer threatened the victim in front of witnesses.

The governor of Rutana, Olivier Nibitanga, and Sylvain Nzikoruriho, provincial secretary of the CNDD-FDD, are behind all these persecutions, according to sources close to the case, following his membership in the UPRONA party.

Last July, a group of 13 people attacked Théoneste’s family while they were in the cropfields, arguing that « they could even be completely decimated and that the case would be closed without further action because this group is supported by administration authorities and those responsible for the CNDD-FDD at both the district and provincial levels ».

Neighbors and family are asking that Théoneste Juma’s family be protected, especially since activists of opposition parties in Giharo district were assassinated under the complicit silence of Governor Olivier Nibitanga and Sylvain Nzikoruriho, secretary of the CNDD-FDD in this province, charge opponents in Rutana.