{"id":19926,"date":"2015-06-25T05:02:11","date_gmt":"2015-06-25T05:02:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/burundi-s-2nd-vp-flees-country-joins-opposition\/"},"modified":"2015-06-25T05:01:59","modified_gmt":"2015-06-25T05:01:59","slug":"burundi-s-2nd-vp-flees-country-joins-opposition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/burundi-s-2nd-vp-flees-country-joins-opposition\/","title":{"rendered":"Burundi’s 2nd VP flees country, joins opposition"},"content":{"rendered":"
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{The second vice-president of Burundi announced late Wednesday that he had fled the country due to his unwillingness to support what he described as an \u201cillegal\u201d third term in office for President Pierre Nkurunziza.}<\/p>\n

Speaking from Brussels, Gervais Rufyikiri asserted: \u201cI left Burundi because I was no longer able to support the attitude of the president of the republic [and] his desire to lead the people of Burundi on the path of constitutional illegality.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Pacifique Nininahazwe, who has organized protests against Nkurunziza\u2019s plan to run for a third term as president, Pie Ntavyohanyuma, president of the Burundian Assembly\u2019s lower house, has also fled the country and joined the opposition. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe second vice-president and the president of the lower house of the assembly will not return to Bujumbura soon,\u201d Nininahazwe declared via Facebook.<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cThey have fled Nkurunziza\u2019s dictatorship.\u201d<\/p>\n

Government officials, for their part, derided the defections.<\/p>\n

Speaking via Twitter, Willy Niamitwe, an advisor to Nkurunziza, declared: \u201cGoodbye and good riddance, Rufyikiri.\u201d<\/p>\n

Niamitwe had earlier said the second vice-president had gone on \u201ca working mission.\u201d<\/p>\n

The two officials were not the first to abandon Nkurunziza\u2019s controversial administration.<\/p>\n

Several other Burundian officials had earlier announced their defection, including Judge Sylv\u00e8re Nimpagaritse, vice-president of Burundi\u2019s constitutional court, who fled to Rwanda in May.<\/p>\n

Presidential spokesman Leonidas Hatungimana, too, recently announced his defection from Tanzania, along with a handful of military officials, including Maj. Gen. Pontian Gaciyubwenge, a former national defense minister.<\/p>\n

Since protests broke out in April against Nkurunziza\u2019s plans to seek a third term in office, at least 70 people have been killed, 500 injured and some 1,000 detained, according to the Association for the Protection of Human Rights and Detained Persons, a local NGO.<\/p>\n

{{Video News}}<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

{The second vice-president of Burundi announced late Wednesday that he had fled the country due to his unwillingness to support what he described as an \u201cillegal\u201d third term in office for President Pierre Nkurunziza.} Speaking from Brussels, Gervais Rufyikiri asserted: \u201cI left Burundi because I was no longer able to support the attitude of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2000068973,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[75],"byline":[170],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-19926","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-homenews","byline-igihe"],"bylines":[{"id":170,"name":"IGIHE","slug":"igihe","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":8}],"contributors":[{"id":170,"name":"IGIHE","slug":"igihe","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":8}],"featured_image":{"id":2000068973,"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton19926.jpg","alt":"","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","width":0,"height":0,"sizes":{"thumbnail":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton19926.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"medium":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton19926.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"medium_large":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton19926.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"large":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton19926.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"full":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton19926.jpg","width":0,"height":0}}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19926","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19926"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19926\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2000068973"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19926"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19926"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19926"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=19926"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=19926"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}