Burundi Coup Leader Received U.S. Funds

A day after toppling his second government in a military coup here, Burundi’s new strongman had an unusual description Friday of his political philosophy.

“I think I am a true democrat,” explained Pierre Buyoya, a former army major who overthrew the government in 1987 and ruled by junta until 1993.

That is when Buyoya allowed Burundi’s first free elections. When he lost, he became the nation’s first leader to voluntarily step down. Nearly every other president since independence from Belgium in 1962 has been overthrown or killed in office.

Buyoya’s resume has another credential. The U.S. Agency for International Development has given a total of $145,000 since 1994, including $115,000 this year, to a foundation headed by Buyoya for projects and studies ostensibly aimed at promoting democracy, according to the U.S. Embassy here.

Those ties clearly are awkward now for the Clinton administration. It has denounced Buyoya’s coup and said it will not recognize his regime. It is also protecting the president Buyoya overthrew, Sylvestre Ntibantunganya. He has taken refuge at U.S. Ambassador Morris Hughes’ home here since Tuesday, refusing to leave or to resign his office.

“This is a situation that cannot go on for long,” one worried official said.

The U.S. grants to Buyoya’s Foundation for Unity, Peace and Democracy began with $2,500 to send him as an election observer to South Africa in April 1994.

The next year, he received $25,000 for a study on how to help Burundian Tutsis who had fled into the bush or into exile, as well as $3,000 to attend a conference in Benin on “Democratization and the Role of the Military.”

So far this year, the U.S. agency has given the foundation $51,250 to study the “Institutional System Adapted to Burundi,” $51,125 for a study on the “Judicial System Adapted to Burundi” and $12,580 for a refugee “Reinsertion Action” program in Bururi province.

J. Brian Atwood, the agency’s administrator, announced during a visit here in April that he was halting all nonessential aid to Burundi until concrete steps were taken to end the bitter bloodletting between ethnic Tutsis and Hutus that has left an estimated 150,000 people dead since 1993.

Bill Hagelman, an agency officer here, explained Friday that grants to the Buyoya foundation were not cut because they were covered under a program called “Democratic Governance.”

Agency documents show the program tries to support conflict resolution, reconciliation and restoration of peace.

More than $6.6 million in grants have gone to UNICEF, the U.N. Center for Human Rights, study tours and training for women and community leaders, an independent radio station and the like.

“The money given to the Buyoya foundation is relatively minor compared to what has been spent in the overall democracy governance sector,” Hagelman said. Total spending figures were not immediately available.

Buyoya, 48, did not mention his foundation at the news conference.

Instead, he appeared under a portrait of himself in the de-medaled military uniform from his previous regime and explained that he launched the coup Thursday “not against democracy . . . but to restore democracy.”

Indeed, he added that not sending armed troops to overthrow the constitutional government “would have been an act of treason” given the country’s ongoing crisis.

The comments clearly were aimed at appeasing the White House, the United Nations and senior African leaders, who have widely condemned the coup and refused to recognize the new regime.

Buyoya also sought meetings with ambassadors and U.N. officials here Friday.

But his attempt at spin control was undercut by the rest of his message.

He suspended the constitution, warned that the junta would be “very, very strict” with those who oppose it and refused to say how long his self-proclaimed “interim” presidency would last.

“We have to bring back peace, and we don’t know how long that will take,” he said. “We don’t know if it will take 12 months, 18 months or more.”

On Thursday, the military suspended all political parties, closed the National Assembly, banned protests and strikes and sealed the country’s borders and airport.

Buyoya said the borders would be opened today.

Given his mixed background, Western diplomats were in a clear quandary over Buyoya’s rise to power.

“He’s a putsch-ist,” one senior envoy said. “But maybe he’s the best of a bad lot.”

Hany Abdel-Aziz, a senior U.N. official, said Buyoya had at least some credibility with the four main forces in Burundian political life: the army, Western embassies, Tutsis and Hutus.

In the 1993 election he noted that Buyoya, a Tutsi, won about 20% of votes from rival Hutus.

“The question is, ‘Is this enough to run a country?’ ” Abdel-Aziz asked.

He said the test of the new regime will be if it opens the door to “free and fair negotiations” with Hutu rebels, who have now spread the war across the entire country. Nearly 400 people have been killed so far this month.

But at his news conference, Buyoya took a hard line toward the insurgents, repeating previous army demands that the rebels lay down their arms before a dialogue can begin. He indicated that he would seek a military solution to the conflict.

Relief agencies said radio messages from across the country reported calm in provincial capitals. The streets of Bujumbura, the capital, also returned to normal as many of the soldiers retreated to their barracks. Shops were open, buses and taxis honked and bumped on busy roads, and the main market bustled with activity.

Buyoya appealed to Ntibantunganya, at the U.S. ambassador’s home, as well as scores of other senior Hutu leaders hiding at embassies and private homes in town to go home.

“They will be protected,” he promised. “They will have total security.”