Burundi - A transitional government assumed office in trouble-torn Burundi yesterday under the benevolent eye of South African elder statesman Mr Nelson Mandela. The former president who played a critical role in negotiating the peaceful settlement in the central African state, writes Patrick Laurence, in Johannesburg.
The settlement provides for a transitional government in which power will be shared between the minority Tutsis and the majority Hutus. Burundi has had a civil war since 1993, triggered by the murder of the last democratically-elected Hutu president by Tutsi officers. The war has cost at least 200,000 lives.
South Africa's contribution to the settlement is significant. Apart from Mr Mandela's input as chief negotiator, South Africa's own peace settlement, forged between 1990 and 1993, served as a model, while 700 South African soldiers have been sent to Burundi to protect exiled political leaders returning to take up positions in the new transitional government.
The transitional government will remain in power for three years. During the first 18 months the president will be a Tutsi and the vice -president a Hutu; thereafter a Hutu will serve as president and a Tutsi as vice-president.