Migration in Burundi: History, Current Trends and Future - MGSoG ...

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3. Historical Overview of Migration in Burundi From the 1960s on migration flows in Burundi have been substantial. Burundi was one of the largest migrant-sending countries in the world in the period 1960 to 1980 together with Rwanda, Mozambique, and countries located in the Horn of Africa such as Ethiopia (Spaan & Van Moppes, 2006). Most migrants were involuntary migrants, forced to leave their homes out of security reasons or to seek opportunities elsewhere. This chapter presents a historical overview of migration flows in and from Burundi for the period between roughly 1960 and 2000. The main trends as well as the main drivers of these migration flows are discussed. Since Burundian migration patterns were heavily embedded in regional migration issues in the Central African Great Lakes Region, the regional context is presented first. 3.1 Migration Patterns in the Great Lakes Region: 1960-2000 Conflict and displacement of large groups of people are characteristic for the whole region of Eastern Africa (Spaan & Van Moppes, 2006). Apart from some small labour migration flows to the coffee, tea, and cotton plantations in Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, and Burundi (Spaan & Moppes, 2006), most of the migrants in the Central African Great Lakes Region (consisting of Burundi, Rwanda, the north-eastern part of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda, north-western Kenya, and Tanzania) were refugees, people trying to escape violent civil and political conflicts in their home country. All countries in the Central African Great Lakes Region have known refugee immigration and refugee emigration flows at some point in time. Countries often even received and sent refugees simultaneously (Rwamatara, 2005). As a result of the 1959 revolution in Rwanda, Burundi hosted refugees from Rwanda, mainly Tutsis, escaping the violent power transfer to the Hutu majority in their country (Ngaruku & Nkurunziza, 2005). In 1975 almost 350,000 refugees were hosted by Rwanda, Burundi, Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania. Most of these refugees came from neighbouring countries (Spaan & Van Moppes, 2006). At the end of the 1980s, Burundi and Rwanda collectively received more than 50,000 refugees from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (former Zaire). Then, due to the ongoing conflict situation in Rwanda, Burundi housed almost 250,000 Rwandans at the end of 1993 (Spaan & Van Moppes, 2006). When the Rwandan genocide broke out in 1994, almost 300,000 Rwandans fled to the neighbouring Burundi and Uganda. At the beginning of the 1990s, all countries in the region were home to a substantial amount of refugees. The largest population of refugees could be found in 20
Zaire. In the late 1990s, however, more than 50,000 former refugees from Zaire were again hosted by Rwanda and Burundi (UNHCR, 1999). Conflict and migratory flows have evolved into a cyclical pattern in the Central African Great Lakes Region. Conflict generates refugees, and large flows of involuntary migrants can then have an impact on conflict. Instability increases, also outside the real conflict zone, for conflicts are often transferred by the migrants (Hovil, 2008). Rwamatwara (2005) states, for example: “In some countries, failure to find a permanent solution to the refugee problem has pushed uprooted people to organize themselves to force their way back home through military means and this has caused more waves of population displacement. The cases of Rwanda and Burundi are good examples” (p. 179). In the Central African Great Lakes Region, local rebel groups were often able to increase their activities after military groups who were defeated joined them (ibid.). This has led to spill-over effects of violent conflict across countries. Moreover, return migrants can bring back old tensions when they move to their home countries again (Hovil, 2008). 3.2 International migration from Burundi: 1960-2000 Burundi has experienced different waves of out-migration in the period 1960-2000. Most of these migration flows were conflict-induced, and the majority of refugees fled to neighbouring countries such as Tanzania, Rwanda, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Burundi also served as a refugee-hosting country in that period, receiving refugees from neighbouring countries that struggled with political and civil conflict. This section provides an overview of the most important refugee flows from and to Burundi and places them in historic context. 3.2.1 Refugee flows from Burundi When looking at the root causes of refugee flows in Burundi, the impact of civil conflict in the country cannot be overlooked. As discussed in section two, Burundi has experienced five major civil conflicts in the period between 1960 and 2000. These took place in 1965, 1972, 1988, 1991, and 1993. The 1972 and 1993 conflicts generated especially large migration flows. In 1972 the violent actions of the Burundian military against the Hutu population in the country led to a refugee movement of around 300,000 people., most of whom fled to Tanzania (ICG, 2003; Ngaruku & Nkurunziza, 2005). The 1988 and 1991 conflicts generated relatively small refugee flows with the former producing 50,000 refugees and latter producing 38,000 (Ngaruku & Nkurunziza, 2005). 21
Page 1 and 2: Migration in Burundi: History, Curr
Page 3 and 4: Content Abbreviations..............
Page 5 and 6: Abbreviations ABASA Burundi African
Page 7 and 8: List of Tables Table 1: Ethnic Dist
Page 9 and 10: country is just beginning to recove
Page 11 and 12: 2. General Country Profile Burundi
Page 13 and 14: 2.3 Colonial history Together with
Page 15 and 16: with donor assistance and low level
Page 17 and 18: Table 4 shows, the 1993 war, which
Page 19: In terms of diseases, malaria and t
Page 23 and 24: ecognized internationally (Rwamatwa
Page 25 and 26: 4. Current Migration Patterns This
Page 27 and 28: the West of Tanzania, and 300,000 w
Page 29 and 30: government and several internationa
Page 31 and 32: 5. Burundian Diaspora in the Nether
Page 33 and 34: Map 2: Number of Returnees per Prov
Page 35 and 36: According CBS 14 figures there were
Page 37 and 38: (Gemeente) that an asylum seeker sh
Page 39 and 40: immigration. The transitional exper
Page 41 and 42: Burundians in the Netherlands exhib
Page 43 and 44: live in the Organisation for Econom
Page 45 and 46: 6.3 Remittances 39 Given the relati
Page 47 and 48: service providers and agents and ar
Page 49 and 50: and engagement is intended to bridg
Page 51 and 52: 7. Policies Regarding Migration Mig
Page 53 and 54: Coherence for Development (PCD) in
Page 55 and 56: collaboration between the Burundian
Page 57 and 58: whereby highly-educated foreign nat
Page 59 and 60: 9. Future Perspectives on Burundian
Page 61 and 62: 10. Conclusion Diaspora The Burundi
Page 63 and 64: References Adamson, F. (2006). Cros
Page 65 and 66: Garcia, M. & Fares, J. (2007). Yout
Page 67 and 68: MFA 2009. Available via Accessed 3
Page 69 and 70: Migration in Sub-Saharan Africa. Wo
Page 71 and 72:
Appendix I. Burundi Diaspora organi
Page 73 and 74:
- Participate in the peace process
Page 75:
Appendix II Commonly used terms for
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