Rolling mass action cripples Burundi

Published Jan 17, 2000

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Todd Pitman

Bujumbura - Public and private trade unions in Burundi launched a general strike against the government on Monday, shutting down schools and crippling state industries in a protest at a wave of recent price hikes.

Twenty-one trade unions called the strike after the government raised taxes in December and January on key consumer goods including fuel, sugar, rice, beer and cement - a move which has outraged many citizens in the capital.

Government officials say the measures were taken to keep the economy afloat and pay the salaries of civil servants, which in the capital average 50 000 Burundian francs per month - worth around $50 on the black market.

"What can I do with that?" said Jean-Claude, an employee at the mayor's office who was among those who attended work on Monday. "Nothing at all. We just can't make ends meet."

A government statement broadcast over the radio on Sunday warned that civil servants who didn't attend work would be fired and called on the strike's leaders to negotiate their demands.

But unionists say there will be no negotiations until the new taxes are lifted.

Burundi's economy is ailing under the weight of a six-year-old civil war which pits ethnic Hutu rebels against a largely Tutsi army and has claimed the lives of around 200 000 people since 1993.

"You can't be in a war and not expect this (price hikes) to happen eventually," said a senior government official who asked not to be named.

"We realise the salaries are not enough and wages have not risen for many years, but there are no other means. We just have to wait for the economic situation to improve."

In the capital Bujumbura, life continued as usual on Monday with most shops open and no street protests to be seen.

The strike's impact varied from one state ministry to another. Directors and managers were generally at their desks but many workers stayed away,

Government spokesperson Luc Rukingama said that around 70 percent of private sector workers had ignored the strike along with 50 to 60 percent of the city's public servants.

Government officials say the strike, whose duration is indefinite, is an expression not of economic dissatisfaction but of political discontent.

They say the three main trade unions leading it have done so under the influence of two politicians opposed to the government - Charles Mukasi, who heads a splinter wing of the main Tutsi Uprona party, and Jean-Baptiste Bagaza, a Tutsi who was overthrown by President Pierre Buyoya in his first coup in 1987.

"All those guys are behind the strike," Rukingama said. "They think they can (use the unions to) make some pressure on the government in political matters. The economy is not the problem, it's just an excuse." - Reuters

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