Burundi's president appoints commission mandated to draft new constitution

The appointment of a commission mandated to draft Burundi's new constitution is aimed at "correcting" errors of the past, the Burundian President's spokesman said Monday.

The appointment was made by Burundian President Pierre Nkurunziza.

"The commission has been appointed in order to correct errors of the past. In 2015, Burundi faced problems because of misunderstandings around some provisions of the national constitution," said Jean Claude Karerwa.

According to him, the appointment of the commission mandated to suggest amendments to the constitution will avoid errors of the past.

However, some other groups including some political parties, some civil society groups as well as former Tanzanian President Benjamin Mkapa, facilitator in the inter-Burundian dialogue, have said the amendment of the constitution should be done at the end of the talks initially set for this June.

Burundi has suffered turmoil since then when President Nkurunziza decided to run his controversial third term in violation of the national constitution and the 2000 Arusha Agreement that ended a decade-long civil war.

Protests against Nkurunziza's third term bid turned into a failed coup on May 13, 2015.

Over 500 people in Burundi are reported to have been killed during the crisis while some 400,000 people fled to neighboring countries mostly Tanzania, Rwanda, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo) and Uganda since the outbreak of the crisis. Endit