Bagaza, born August 26, 1946 died 4 May 2016 in Brussels, is an officer and a man of Burundi State, President of the Republic of 1976-1987.
Officer and former deputy chief of General Staff of the Burundian army, took power on 1 November 1976, following a coup against Michel Micombero, first president who overthrew monarchy in a centuries 1966.
Before taking power, Colonel Bagaza had university education and military at the Brussels Royal Military Academy (Belgium) and was a staff officer in Bujumbura.
Bagaza remain in power until 1987, when he was overthrown in a coup which occurred following a mutiny early soldiers and NCOs who feared being retired early . Bagaza was then traveling to Canada.
In the current configuration of Burundi where ethnicity has become a determining factor, it is important to know that Bagaza is Tutsi and he came to power in a context where the Hutu ethnic majority, had been excluded from all the levers of power by the regime Micombero. Bagaza seems to have wanted during his regime, ignore this and have focused only on the economic field. He strengthened considerably as the influence of the single party UPRONA, inherited the struggle for independence, the country was left graph of party cells.
His mark in the history of Burundi – and most Burundians, despite their divisions, recognize it – it left or rather carved in the economy, infrastructure and education. His voluntarism bore the primary school enrollment rate from 19 to 85% between 1976 and 19861. Most of Burundi’s current infrastructure date from his diet (roads, power plants, water supply, hospitals, health centers, schools, stations coffee washing, telecommunications, etc.).
It is the same for industries and forests that have suffered from the war years 1990 and 2000. Coffee production (main export) has more than quadrupled between 1976 and 1987 thanks to an expansion policy plantation and rejuvenation of plants.
Bagaza had a high opinion of the role of savings in economic development that imposed a compulsory savings in the country. He was less successful in its attempt to consolidate rural settlements in villages (the Burundian rural dwellings are scattered over the hills) and multiply cooperatives, two ideas collided head-Burundian traditions and mentalities.
This policy of economic development was supported by donors (the World Bank, the Western countries, China and the Arab countries).
At the political level, besides the Hutu-Tutsi latent ethnic conflict that President Bagaza ignored, it is inevitable to mention his conflict with the Church which, in retrospect, seems to have been because ethnic antagonism and intervention in foreign religious one. Under his regime, many Hutu refugees who fled the country during the ethnic massacres in 1972 have returned, but not all.
At the diplomatic level, Burundi has pursued a non-alignment policy and diplomacy Bagaza refrained from any militancy, not insisting on good relations with economic partners. However, strong enmity for President Mobutu and Rwandan President Habyarimana was public knowledge. It is probably the source of the help he gave to lessen its isolation in the region, Yoweri Museveni when the latter was armed struggle to seize power in Kampala, Uganda.
In 1987, after his overthrow by Major Pierre Buyoya, Bagaza was forced into exile and access to the territory of his country was forbidden. He did not return after the first democratic elections that consecrated the victory of Melchior Ndadaye, the first Hutu president of Burundi.
The assassination of the latter immediately plunged the country into a crisis that is not yet completed in 2008. Bagaza tried to influence the situation by creating a political party, the Parena.
He reached significant influence in 1996, primarily within the Tutsi community before Major Pierre Buyoya only operates its second coup. Today Bagaza is a senator for life, dignity given by the Constitution to all former presidents.
Source: Igihe.com