First of all, thank you for your donation and your continued support of International Bridges to Justice’s Burundi program! With your help and support, we are continuing to see great success in Burundi as we move forward with training criminal defenders and conducting legal rights awareness campaigns. A lot has happened in the past few months, and significant progress is being made! Read on for our project updates:

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June 29 – July 3: IBJ criminal justice training accelerates progress in Bujumbura, Burundi
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Last month, IBJ held a highly successful second training session on the Burundian penal process, with attendance by 58 stakeholders of Burundi’s justice system. The training covered the process from arrest through interrogation to detention, treating each theme separately to facilitate the attendees with precise skills.

Employing diverse means such as role-play, visual representation and group discussion, the training brought a dynamism to the intricacies of legal practice. Roundtable discussions hosted by Burundian IBJ Fellow Astère Muyango closed Monday’s training for police officers, magistrates and officials from the penal system and Thursday’s session for lawyers, bringing together the preeminent minds of Burundi’s penal system to brainstorm solutions to the crucial issues of juvenile justice and jurisdictional aid.

Friday, the highlight of the week for many, brought these groups together in a mock-trial with judges playing detainees, prison directors as magistrates and General Commandant of Police Bernard Sekeganda trying his hand as a lawyer. At the training, IBJ also distributed copies of Burundi’s new penal code, encouraging the use of this document which marks much progress made – such as a new precision in the definition of torture, aiding in its eradication.

During the trip to Burundi, IBJ staff also had the chance to visit Mpimba Central Prison and Gitega Prison. Mpimba is the country’s largest detention center; although the official capacity is 400, it currently holds more than 1,800 prisoners. The story is similar in Gitega prison -- while the official capacity is 400, 1497 detainees are actually confined in Gitega. 566 detainees are men awaiting trial, 23 are women, and 37 are juveniles. More than 40% of the prison population has not yet appeared before a Judge. Visiting the prisons really brought to life the challenges we are facing as we strive to ensure legal representation to every man, woman and child in Burundi.


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June 2009: Legal Rights Awareness Campaign in Ngozi, Burundi
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Along with local partner APRODH, IBJ conducted a rights awareness campaign in Ngozi, Burundi’s third largest city. IBJ distributed “Know Your Rights” posters and handed out questionnaires in order to gain a better understanding of the real knowledge that the population has of its rights. 3000 of these posters – highlighting the rights of accused persons should they find themselves in police custody – had been printed a year ago. Yet, at that time we lacked the resources to distribute them. This year, IBJ has been able to expand the Burundi program with increased funds, and thus has been able to go ahead with the distribution of these posters, aimed at curbing torture and legal abuse.

However, after going to our first stop – the little village of Gasikanwa, we realized that IBJ will face several challenges while trying to improve the human rights situation in Burundi. It was almost impossible to find French-speakers; no activities would have been possible without the help of APRODH’s translators. Moreover, it was clear that a significant part of the rural population is still illiterate, and it became obvious that we wouldn’t achieve our initial goal of collecting around 50 responses.

Although at first we encountered some suspicion while trying to pass out our legal rights awareness posters, as one person then another decided to go ahead and take our posters the whole community decided, all of a sudden, that they did want what we were offering. We were soon unable to meet the demand as numerous hands reached out, hoping to take one - demonstrating the power of our rights awareness posters.


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June 29th: Two Roundtable Sessions engaging magistrates, police, and prison officials
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The roundtable event, taking place after the 2009 training, allowed for lively conversations about the Burundian juvenile justice system. The group was made up of around 17 stakeholders in Burundi’s judicial system, and the event was chaired by Astère Muyango, IBJ Burundi fellow.

A recent report from the penitentiary administration stated that there are 444 juveniles imprisoned in Burundi. Due to lack of financial resources, many children are held alongside adult convicted criminals. Some of the participants argued for the necessity of alternative sanctions including re-education and rehabilitation services for juveniles, which can help them reintegrate into society. Others mentioned that the root cause of juvenile detention – poverty – must be attacked first. The participants enjoyed the discussion and came away with a better understanding of the challenges facing juvenile justice in Burundi, and what needs to be done to change the status quo.



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Thanks for reading our project updates! We hope you enjoyed hearing about our latest news, and we hope you will continue to support IBJ's work providing legal support and rights awareness for indigent women and children in Burundi.
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Links:

• IBJ Blog: Burundi!

Pictures:

• Burundi Rights Awareness Posters (JPG)
• A boy with the head in his hands, Gitega Prison, Burundi (JPG)
• Mock Trial portion of criminal defense training in Burundi (JPG)