BURUNDI VOTE UNDERWAY
4 July 2005

National elections are underway in Burundi, with observers citing parties linked to the former rebel group Forces for the Defense of Democracy (FDD) as likely to win a majority. The UN has called on all parties to accept the outcome of the vote, use election as opportunity to move toward lasting rule of law.

More than 3,700 candidates from 25 parties will be presenting their candidacy for today's elections. 6 parties represent former rebel groups, and previous phases of the electoral process have been marked by violence, but the election now looks to move ahead in a climate of relative stability.

The election will be finalized when the two houses of parliament cast their votes to elect the nation's new president. The FDD, about to take the majority in the upper house of parliament, renounced armed struggle to join the transitional government, in which power is shared between Hutus and Tutsis. According to the new constitution, minority Tutsis will hold 40% representation, majority Hutus 60%, in hopes of creating more equal representation without raising tensions among ethnic factions fearful of losing power.

FNL rebels comprise the only insurgent faction not having joined the transitional government, and they reportedly continue to mount raids in and around Bujumbura, the nation's capital. The FNL was blamed for attacks shelling civilian neighborhoods around Bujuura in early June, apparently in an effort to scare voters and prevent the election re-vote from running smoothly.

In early June, President Domitien Ndayizeye charged that the first round of elections, in which the FDD gained a near majority, "were not free, transparent" and called for action to correct the flaws by annulling the outcome altogether. [For more: News24]