In December 2018, there was trouble at the East African Community (EAC) secretariat. The source of discomfort was Burundi, one of the smallest countries in the bloc, who joined in 2007.
The 20th Ordinary EAC Heads of State Summit was set to take place on November 1 and the bloc’s top players; Yoweri Museveni (Uganda), then the chairperson, the host Tanzania’s John Magufuli and Kenya’s Uhuru Kenyatta, were all in Arusha and ready to discuss business.
However, Burundi chose to boycott the function. While Rwanda sent Foreign Minister Richard Sezibera and Juba sent Minister of Trade, Industry and EAC Affairs Paul Moyom Akec.
Apparently, Burundi boycotted the meeting in protest over the “short notice” given to them and the dismissal of their call for a postponement by the EAC chair, President Museveni. Mr Museveni had turned down President Nkurunziza’s November 24 request, seeking for postponement of the summit.
“We consider this period a very short notice for thorough preparations for a summit that requires four weeks,” the Burundi leader had argued, citing Rule 10 of the Rules of Procedure for the Summit of the Heads of State.
Burundi had asked for a postponement of the summit to two weeks after the meeting of the Council of Ministers.
But President Museveni declined the request, saying Bujumbura was well aware of the date of the meeting and ought to have prepared, considering that its ministers had attended various sectoral council meetings, including one for permanent secretaries held on October 24-25.
However, with the news of the postponement hardly under the radar, came more intriguing news from Bujumbura, which partly explains the country’s absence at the summit.
President Pierre Nkuruziza on December 4 wrote to President Museveni on what he described as an ‘open conflict’ with neighbours Rwanda.
In the letter, Bujumbura accused Kigali of offering militarily training to Burundi refugees to destabilize Burundi’s democratically elected institutions and sheltering the plotters of the failed 2015 coup.
Nkurunziza called for a special summit of the EAC to discuss the conflict. Heads of State of the EAC scheduled to meet on December 27.
The Burundian leader seemed uncomfortable traveling out of his country without adequate preparations. Nkurunziza survived a coup while attending a similar EAC meeting in Tanzania.
Relations between Burundi and Rwanda have gone from bad to worse in recent years. Bujumbura accuses Rwanda of harboring dissidents planning to take over government in Bujumbura, accusations President Kagame denies.
Instead, Kagame’s government accused Burundi of training Rwandan militants to destabilize his country. Burundi followed this by blocking the movement of people and goods across the common border, an action Kigali protested as a blatant violation of the EAC Common Market Protocol.
While Kigali said it will not “waste time” petitioning the EAC over those actions, Burundi filed multiple reports with the EAC, the United Nations and the African Union, accusing Rwanda of supporting rebels opposed to President Nkurunziza’s government.
Burundi’s commitment to the bloc was in question, especially after it sought to join the SADC in 2017.
Burundi was also the biggest defaulter in terms of budget contributions, with reports showing that it has not remitted monies in the financial year 2017/18. Burundi and Juba together owed more than $12 million.
More interestingly, Rwanda was expected to take over the rotational chairmanship of the EAC, meaning the Rwandan Foreign Minister Richard Sezibera would serve as leader of the Council of Ministers. This, coupled with procedural concerns, rattled feathers of officials from Burundi who expressed concern with Rwanda taking over the EAC chairmanship.
According to pundits the standoff between Rwanda and Burundi spilled over to the region thereby affecting integration. Article 5 of the 1999 EAC Treaty says that the objectives of the Community is to develop policies and programmes aimed at deepening co-operation among the partner states in political, economic, social and cultural fields, research and technology, defence, security and legal and judicial affairs, for their mutual benefit.
But of great importance was Article 5 (3) d, which states, “The strengthening and consolidation of the long standing political, economic, social, cultural and traditional ties and associations between the peoples of the Partner States so as to promote a people-centred mutual development of these ties and associations.”
However, then Secretary-General of the East African Community Libérat Mfumukeko, stated categorically that the Secretariat would not interfere in bilateral matters. “However, we trust that relations between the two countries will soon normalise. They are both part of the EAC family and Article 6 of the EAC Treaty has set peaceful co-existence and good neighbourliness as fundamental principles of the Community,” he was reported to say.
Several leaders called for amendment of the EAC Treaty to curtail individual leaders’ animosities affecting regional integration.
Harold Acemah, a retired Ugandan diplomat, stated; “If the EAC were people-driven, many of the tensions that are causing divisions would not arise. If challenges arose, I believe they would be manageable and easier to resolve. In many ways, East Africa has not fully recovered from the tragic collapse of the original Community in 1977.”
According to Nicodemus Minde, a Tanzanian political commentator, the EAC, modelled along the European Union, has failed because the integration process is still elite-driven. He says that the EAC should endeavour to use its legislative organ (the East African Legislative Assembly) to push for a people-centred integration. It has so far failed.
President Museveni’s effectiveness as the chairperson of the East African Community was questioned by some with respect to the stand-off between Rwanda and Burundi.
The bloc had also been unable to finalise a deal on the Economic Partnership Agreement with the European Union.
The EPA provides access to the European Union market and is one of the critical issues awaiting resolution by EAC partner states.
President Museveni was mandated to follow up on the trade agreement at the EAC Summit of February 23. However, a government official in Kampala said “Nothing of note has been achieved since.”
Kenya is keen on finalising the EPA in order for its exports, particularly flowers, to continue enjoying duty-free, quota-free access to the EU market.
With cracks then appearing within the EAC following Burundi’s accusations of Rwanda, some commentators said it is not far-fetched to think that such differences could see the bloc suffer a second collapse.
Experts argued that Kenya and Rwanda could go ahead to trade with the EU based on the EPA they signed, while Uganda, Burundi, Tanzania and South Sudan explore other trade partnerships. Clearly a regional approach would be more beneficial though.
