BURUNDI, FLAG OF

red and green national flag with a white saltire (diagonal cross) and a central white disk incorporating three large stars. Its width-to-length ratio is 3 to 5. The leading traditional symbol of Burundi was an ancient drum, Karyenda, which had a semidivine status. The mwami (ruler) alone could interpret the messages of Karyenda and transform them into rules governing society. Karyenda was thus chosen as a symbol for the national flag when Burundi emerged from Belgian colonial rule. A sorghum plant, representing a chief agricultural product of Burundi, was also shown. The drum and plant appeared on the central white disk of the flag authorized by the mwami on March 30, 1962, and hoisted on July 1 when independence was achieved. The flag background incorporated a white saltire, a design idea that may have been borrowed from Belgium (the Spanish Netherlands), whose cross of Burgundy was a common flag motif from the 17th century. The white colour of the saltire and central disk symbolized peace. The remaining areas were red, for the independence struggle and the suffering of the nation, and green, for hopes placed on future development. After the monarchy was overthrown in November 1966, Karyenda was removed from the flag. A new design, most recently reconfirmed by the decree of September 27, 1982, became official on June 28, 1967. The three six-pointed stars of red with green borders correspond to the national motto, Unity, work, progress. For many, however, they undoubtedly recall the three main ethnic groups of Burundithe Tutsi, Hutu, and Twaand the loyalty that Burundians once pledged to their god, king, and country. Whitney Smith History This discussion focuses on Burundi since independence. For a treatment of earlier periods and of the country in its regional context, see Central Africa, history of. The origins of the Burundi monarchy are shrouded in legend. According to one set of traditions, Ntare Rushatsi, the founder of the original dynasty, came from Rwanda in the 17th century; a more reliable source suggests that Ntare must have come from Buha, in the southeast, and laid the foundation of the original kingdom in the neighbouring Nkoma region. Until its overthrow in 1966, the kingship was the linchpin of the political system and the most obvious element of continuity with the past. The type of monarchy that emerged from the debris of the Belgian trusteeship at the time of independence in 1962, however, had little in common with the weakly structured and highly decentralized archaic kingdom in existence at the time Germany conquered the region in 1903. Although Belgian rule did little to defuse the tension between the two rival dynastiesthe Bezi and the Batarethe legislative elections of 1961 resulted in a landslide victory for the representatives of the ruling Bezi dynasty, identified with the UPRONA, whose leader at the time was Prince Rwagasore, the eldest son of Mwami (King) Mwambutsa. Rwagasore was the embodiment of populist aspirations and the strongest supporter of the monarchy. His assassination on October 13, 1961, ushered in a crisis of legitimacy from which the country has yet to recover. The First and Second republics The turning point came on October 18, 1965, when a group of Hutu officers unsuccessfully tried to overthrow the monarchy, yet came close enough to realizing their objective to cause the panic-stricken Mwambutsa to flee the country. By then the inability of the crown to handle the competing claims of the Hutu and Tutsi had become palpably clear. The assassination by a Tutsi gunman of Pierre Ngendandumwe, the Hutu prime minister, on January 15, 1965, provided dramatic evidence of the spillover of ethnic hostilities from the UPRONA into the government. The critical factor behind the abortive coup, however, was Mwambutsa's decision to ignore the results of the May 1965 elections, which had given the Hutu 23 seats in the National Assembly out of a total of 33. By appointing his private secretary, Lopold Biha, as prime minister, Mwambutsa had made it unequivocally clear that power would continue to rest with the crown. In the complicated sequence of events that followed the abortive coup, some 34 Hutu officers were executed in the first of a series of steps intended to give Tutsi elements unfettered control of the government. The second came in July 1966, when Michel Micombero was appointed prime minister. A Tutsi-Hima from Bururi province, Micombero had played a key role in thwarting the 1965 coup and in organizing anti-Hutu pogroms in the countryside. Finally, with the formal overthrow of the monarchy in November 1966less than three months after the official transfer of the crown from Mwambutsa to his younger son, Prince Charles Ndizeyeand the formal proclamation of the First Republic, the last obstacle in the path of Tutsi hegemony was removed. No other event cast greater discredit on the First Republic than the genocidal killings perpetrated against the Hutu community in April and May 1972. The carnage took the lives of approximately 5 percent of the population and virtually wiped out the stratum of educated Hutu. Anywhere from 100,000 to 150,000 Hutu were killed in the repression triggered by the outbreak of Hutu-instigated uprisings. Besides creating deep and lasting hatred on both sides of the ethnic divide, the events of 1972 became the source of considerable tension within the Tutsi minority, thus paving the way for the overthrow of Micombero in 1976 and the advent of the Second Republic under the presidency of Jean-Baptiste Bagaza. Though himself a Tutsi-Hima from Bururi (like Micombero), Bagaza set out to reinvigorate the UPRONA on a scale that Micombero had never contemplated. At the same time every effort was made to bring the Roman Catholic church firmly under the control of the state. The economy Agriculture is the economic mainstay of the country, with industrial activities accounting for less than one-fifth of the gross national product (GNP). Coffee, chiefly arabica, is the principal export crop and source of foreign exchange. Cash crops of lesser importance include cotton and tea. By the late 1990s more than three-fifths of the country's population was living in poverty, a result of civil strife and the ravages of war, the predominance of traditional subsistence agriculture, the persistence of low income levels, chronic deficits in the balance of trade, and heavy dependence on foreign aid. Western nations and surrounding African countries imposed economic sanctions against Burundi following a Tutsi-led military coup in July 1996, which affected all of Burundi's exports and its oil imports. Some of the sanctions were eased in April 1997, and a regional embargo was lifted in April 1999, but the process of economic recovery has been slow. Resources Unexploited mineral resources include nickel deposits in the eastern region, which could amount to 5 percent of world reserves, as well as significant reserves of vanadium, uranium, and phosphates. Geologic assessments also indicate possible major petroleum reserves beneath Lake Tanganyika and in the Rusizi valley. Mineral production, however, is limited to small quantities of gold, tin, and wolframite (a source of tungsten). Peat and firewood are the two major local sources of fuel. Electrical production is mostly hydro-generated, with a large proportion imported from Congo. The land Relief and drainage Burundi's topography is the prolongation of a chain of mountains and high plateaus of ancient Precambrian rock forming the eastern flank of the Western Rift Valley. These rise to 9,055 feet (2,760 metres) at Mount Heha, the country's highest point. In the northwest the narrow Imbo valley extends southward from Rwanda to Lake Tanganyika and includes the Rusizi (Ruzizi) River, which separates Burundi from Congo. Farther south and west, along the shores of Lake Tanganyika, the land rises steeply to form part of the Congo-Nile divide, which in places reaches elevations of 8,500 feet (2,600 metres). To the east of the divide, plateaus slope gently to elevations of 5,0006,000 feet (1,5002,000 metres) to the southeast; the Ruvyironza River flows northeast, cutting through the plateaus. A few valleys and shallow lakes occupy the northern frontier near Rwanda. Soils Light, forest-derived soils predominate, forming a thin layer of humus over lateritic (i.e., iron-rich) subsoils. Soil erosion is a serious problem, caused by a combination of steep slopes and frequent rainfall. The leaching away of the fertile topsoil is a major constraint on agriculture. The best soils are formed from alluvium, but their extent is confined primarily to the lower portions of larger river valleys. The people Ethnic composition As in Rwanda, Tutsi and Hutu are the principal ethnic communities, with the Hutu constituting the overwhelming majority and the Tutsi a significant minority. Other groups include the Twa Pygmies, the descendants of the princely families (ganwa), and a sprinkling of Swahili-speaking peoples from Tanzania and Congo. Popular images of Tutsi as uniformly tall and graceful and of Hutu as short and stocky do not fit the reality of physical variations. A more meaningful distinction refers to ethnoregional identities, as between Tutsi-Hima, in the southern province of Bururi, and Tutsi-Banyaruguru, found primarily in the north. The former constitute the bulk of the armed forces. The Hutu and Tutsi have long viewed each other with mutual dislike, mistrust, and fear. Throughout Burundi's colonial history, various European groups exploited these ethnic differences as a means of keeping the two groups at odds. Regardless of how or why these distinctions arose, they have resulted in continued violence and bloodshed. Linguistic composition Rundi (Kirundi), a Bantu language, is the standard medium of communication throughout the country; it is unusual among the languages of Africa in that it is spoken by all members of the population regardless of ethnic background. It has joined French as an official language of Burundi. Swahili, the language of trade, is, along with French, widely spoken in Bujumbura.