The lack of leadership in Burundi has become an academic and public reference point worldwide. With the lowest GDP, Burundi is the poorest country in the world and used as a case study on how terrible leadership actually drives a country in the gutter. The recent UNGA (United Nations General Assembly) trip by its ruler Evariste Ndayishimiye is a fitting sample.
While other countries are concerned about government efficiency for such diplomatic missions, Burundi is visibly careless and wasteful of its meagre and scares resources. For the UNGA, the Burundian delegation travelled earlier than all other delegations and left last: a deliberate extension to skeeze more per idem payments. The President also opted to travel with the first lady Angeline Ndayishimiye which equally deliberately inflated the size of the delegation; a trick to withdraw even more money for the mission.
Sources indicate that close to 1.5 million USD was withdrawn from the state coffers for the UNGA trip. While that might seem to be a relatively small amount for ordinary states, one has to remember that Burundi is not ordinary. The country’s lack of foreign currencies is so severe that it cannot afford fuel, and other basic necessities. For almost 6 years, motorists queue for days at petrol stations just to be given a maximum of 20 litres. Import-export business has collapsed, the country’s transport system has collapsed, and the whole economy is effectively run by cartels that supply the black market of basic necessities at exorbitant prices. Yet Ndayishimiye and his wife jetted to New York on the Burundian taxpayer dime!
Worst of all, the Burundian delegation seemed to be serving other interests. Ndayishimiye was clearly more concerned of acting as a propagandist for Felix Tshisekedi of DR Congo than acting as the Burundian President. He was on a mission to tarnish and blame Rwanda and push anti-Tutsi hate speech. In his speeches and interviews, Ndayishimiye forgot to scream, “Help, Burundi is bankrupt and Burundians are dying due to extreme and absolute poverty!” Instead, the Burundian dictator feigned some knowledge on global issues, and offered unsolicited advice to the world while his wife went on massive shopping sprees.
Although Ndayishimiye had additional funds from his ally President Felix Tshisekedi, modesty as the leader of the poorest country in the world was not on the menu. The Ndayishimiye couple, visibly suffering from an inferiority complex, wasted even more money on their fake show of wealth. A retired diplomate observed, “Ndayishimiye and his wife reminded me of Mobutu. They want to be seen as the richest, as the most extravagant, while their country is the poorest. Sad to see that such people still play a role in Africa”.
So far, this year, Ndayishimiye and his wife have more than 40 foreign trips and none seem to change anything in Burundi. A frustrated clerk at the Central Bank summarized, “Someone should stop Ndayishimiye’s foreign currency withdraw for missions. Or maybe we should just pay him to go and never come back!”
ellenkampire