More than 100 protesters chanted slogans against President Pierre Nkurunziza and his bid to for a third term in office on Tuesday.
Police in Burundi have beaten and threw tear gas on protesters in Bujumbura for trying to demand President Nkurunziza to reverse his decision to run for a third term in office.
“We will not stop until he gives up the third term,” the protesters shouted in the capital’s suburb of Nyakabiga, a flashpoint during three weeks of unrest that have triggered fears of another bout of ethnic bloodletting in Africa’s Great Lakes region.
Protesters say Nkurunziza’s bid for five more years in power violates the constitution and a peace deal that ended an ethnically-fueled civil war in Burundi in 2005.
A group of generals, laying the same charge against the president, tried and failed to overthrow him last week. The government said late on Monday it would treat any future demonstrators as accomplices in the failed coup.
But the protesters in Bujumbura said they were against both Nkurunziza and the attempted coup.
Nkurunziza says his participation in elections this year would not violate a two-term limit in the constitution, as his first term does not count, because he was appointed by parliament not chosen by a popular vote.
Police in Burundi have beaten and tear-gassed protesters in the capital who were demanding President Pierre Nkurunziza reverse a decision to run for a third term in office, a Reuters has reported.
At least eight people were arrested as the police tried to disperse the demonstration in Bujumbura on Tuesday, according to Reuters. Some protesters responded by throwing rocks at police ranks.
