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Breaking Down Barriers in Burundi
Thanks to the support of the World Bank and USAID’s Office of Transitional Initiatives (OTI), with supplementary support from the European Commission and the British Department for International Development (DfID), in 2002 the Africa Program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars (WWICS) launched a major capacity-building initiative in Burundi (Central Africa). This initiative has become a model for rebuilding war-torn societies, overcoming deep-seated ethnic hostility, and spurring post-war economic reconstruction.
The Program
Under the leadership of former Congressman and Presidential Special Envoy to Africa’s Great Lakes Region Howard Wolpe, now Director of the WWICS Africa Program, the Burundi Leadership Training Program (BLTP) seeks to enable leaders from belligerent parties to address four challenges that are key to the achievement of a durable peace: shifting key leaders from a zero-sum mindset to one that recognizes interdependence and the importance of collaboration; rebuilding the trust and relationships among key leaders that have been fractured by conflict; strengthening their communication and negotiation skills; and rebuilding a consensus on how power should be organized and decisions made.
The program consists of a series of interactive workshops where facilitators help Burundian leaders develop the skills needed to guide Burundi's recovery and transition to democracy. The core training features simulations, role-playing, and other interactive exercises designed to strengthen skills in negotiation, communication, the analysis of conflict, group problem-solving, and strategic planning. Following their initial workshop-retreat, the participants repeatedly reconvene for further training. A diverse cross-section of Burundian leaders–from government, the army, former armed rebel groups, and civil society–have been strategically chosen for this initiative, which aims to work across traditional lines of ethnic, regional and political division to forge a sustainable network of leaders who can work in a cohesive and collaborative manner.
In mounting this effort, Wolpe is assisted by Project Manager Steve McDonald, a consultant with the Africa Program, Elizabeth McClintock of CMPartners, who leads the BLTP training team in Burundi, and ESSEC-IRENE (a Paris-based training institution).
Background on Burundi
A nation of just over 6 million—comprising three groups: Hutus (84%), Tutsis (14%), and Twa (1%)—Burundi is one of the world's poorest and most densely populated nations. Following its independence from Belgium in 1962, Burundi endured four decades of deep polarization between its politically dominant Tutsi minority and marginalized majority Hutu population, a brutal civil war, and inter-communal massacres that resulted in hundreds of thousands killed and displaced. Perhaps the biggest challenges confronting Burundi's post-war economic reconstruction were the deep-seated mutual fears and suspicions among Tutsi and Hutu that were the legacy of long-standing social inequities and repeated episodes of mass slaughter. In August of 2000, a peace accord was signed in Arusha (Tanzania) between the then Tutsi-dominated government and a number of the Hutu rebel groups. A three-year political transition period was established. In 2003, a cease-fire was signed between the transitional government and the largest Hutu rebel group, the National Council for the Defense of Democracy-Forces for the Defense of Democracy (CNDD-FDD). In 2005, local, legislative and presidential elections were won by the CNDD-FDD. Its leader, Pierre Nkurunziza, became president. However, a second Hutu rebel group, the FNL, has yet to reach a political accommodation with the government.
Building the Model
Howard Wolpe has been engaged with Burundi for over a decade, including five years as presidential special envoy to Africa's Great Lakes region where he was intimately involved in the negotiations of the Arusha Accords which established the transitional government and set the stage for constitutional development and the first elections in Burundi since 1993. The BLTP grew out of a proposal that Wolpe submitted to the World Bank, following the conclusion of his formal diplomatic role. His experience with the Burundian peace process, the relationships he established with the Burundian adversaries and the regional facilitators, and the neutrality of the Wilson Center appealed to the World Bank as the right combination to conduct such a capacity-building initiative.
During the winter of 2002 and January 2003, Wolpe and McDonald spent over two months in Burundi laying the groundwork for the training program. They participated in dozens of meetings, securing a broad "buy-in" from political and military leaders within both the government and the armed rebel groups, and from a vast number of civil society sectors. They also consulted extensively with members of the diplomatic community in Burundi and Europe, and peace process facilitators in Uganda, Tanzania and South Africa. They were given the approval of all the relevant stakeholders and received pledges of additional assistance from several donor nations.
To insure Burundian ownership of the training program, from the project’s inception two Burundians were part of the project’s management team—former Minister of Human Rights, Eugene Nindorera, and Fabien Nsengimana, a former staff member in the Office of the Presidency—both of whom were widely trusted by and enjoyed the confidence of Burundi's contending factions. Financial support from the Office of Transition Initiatives (USAID) enabled Nindorera and Nsengimana to establish a local BLTP office in Bujumbura to serve as an administrative center, and as a focal point for the BLTP training participants. Today, the BLTP is an independent Burundian NGO. It works with a broad cross-section of key Burundian leaders to support the country’s democratic transition. The BLTP’s initial focus on the training of national elites was intended to complement and reinforce inter-communal reconciliation initiatives occurring at the grassroots. BLTP workshops have been held in the towns of Ngozi, Gitega, Burasira, and Bujumbura.
One of the guiding principles of the training initiative was that the participants needed to be strategically important to the Burundian transition. The original intention was to organize three diverse working-groups of 30 to 35 participants – half drawn from Burundi’s “political class” (the political parties, the army, the rebel groups) and half drawn from civil society (churches, women’s organizations, media, business, academia and students). The consultations Wolpe and McDonald undertook at the program’s inception guided the selection of these participants. Each of their Burundian interlocutors was asked to “nominate” a diverse group of Burundian leaders that they believed were capable of shaping Burundi’s future, for better or for worse. The Wilson Center management team then selected participants from a database of over 340 names created from these recommendations, targeting those who received multiple mentions and, therefore, were perceived by their fellow Burundians as best able to determine Burundi's future. Care was also taken to insure both ethnic and gender inclusivity, with women constituting 30% of the participants.
Developing Skills
 The first core retreat workshop with 34 Burundian leaders took place in March 2003 in Ngozi; the second group of 31 met in September 2003; and a third group met in May 2004. In total, nine workshop sessions, a combination of six-day retreats and shorter follow-on sessions, were held from March 2003 to September 2004.
The BLTP takes a participant-centered approach. The selected leaders all participate in their individual capacities, not as representatives of their respective organizations and institutions. It is the participant expectations that shape the content of the initial and follow-on training workshops. Participants also identify their own training requirements and decide how to organize themselves. The training consists of interactive, practical exercises that help to break down ethnic and political barriers, and provide the participants with a framework for measuring the quality and sustainability of group decisions; considerable attention is given to strengthening the skills of active speaking and listening, and to the techniques of effective negotiations and strategic planning.
A highlight of the training is an all-day simulation called SIMSOC, developed by William Gamson, an American sociologist. SIMSOC is a simulated society comprised of four regions that possess dramatically unequal resources. Members of SIMSOC must operate as they would in the real world: they must subsist, secure employment, and decide how to use whatever resources they have. They can invest their "simbucks" in one of SIMSOC's two industries, in public welfare programs to maintain the cohesion of the society, in establishing a police force, etc. They can “riot,” and they can establish a government if they choose to do so. They are free to make their own decisions, but the choices the participants make, individually and collectively, determine whether the society thrives or collapses. Such factors as levels of unemployment and the level of investments in public programs affect the national indicators. If the indicators go up, the income available to the society increases; if the indicators decline, societal income declines; if any indicator falls to zero, the society collapses. The SIMSOC exercise helps participants develop powerful insights into the dynamics of social and political conflict. They learn, through their participation in SIMSOC, the dangers of acting on the basis of untested assumptions; how poor communication can produce unintended messages; the impact of social inequities on political perceptions and conflict; the importance of inclusive decision-making processes in building trust, and the importance of “putting yourself in the shoes of the other.”
Workshop participants are encouraged to apply their insights and new skills to their real-world situations and decide how they want to structure and strengthen their widening leadership network and how they want to address the problems that Burundi is facing. Follow-up meetings for each group trained are integral to sustaining the fruits of BLTP’s labor. The BLTP leadership network has now formed its own registered NGO. Many of its members have been trained to be facilitators and mediators, and the network has developed its own strategic plan for its future development and is currently seeking additional donor support for new training initiatives.
Continued Success
The dramatic impact of the BLTP training program on the original three Ngozi workshop-groups (named after the initial training venue), inspired a number of spin-off activities that were not part of the original World Bank-funded proposal. Probably the most significant “spin-off” has been extensive work with Burundi’s security sector. Within six months of the project’s inception, the dramatic progress on building trust and cohesion among former bitter enemies led the Chief of Staff of the Army and leaders from several of the armed resistance groups to ask the WWICS to quickly mount a workshop for their field commanders to prepare for the implementation of the cease-fire agreement that was about to be signed, and to assist in the disarmament, demobilization and reintegration of the combatants. A first workshop was held for 37 commanders from six Hutu armed groups and the predominantly Tutsi led Burundian army in Nairobi in November 2004. As the war was still underway, this workshop had to be held outside the country and many participants literally came directly from the battlefield into the workshop. The six-day training experience was so successful in building a cohesive and collaborative mindset among these commanders that the BLTP was then asked by the two sides and by the United Nations mission to Burundi to significantly expand security sector training. Over the past several years, BLTP training was extended to the Ceasefire Commission itself, to the Commission established to lay the foundations for the newly integrated Burundian army and to the UN Joint Monitoring Teams, comprised of mixed groups of ex-combatants, that observed the demobilization and disarmament process. After the formation of the newly integrated Army (FDN), the BLTP was then asked by the government to work on the integration and leadership development of the high commands of both the army and the new national police force (PNB). This work is still on-going today, supported by the British government. Beyond working with over 100 senior FDN command officers and 100 senior PNB command officers, the BLTP has started a Training of Trainers program aimed at strengthening the training capacities of the military and police academies.
Further spin-offs of the original BLTP training initiative have included specific work with the leaders of Burundi’s multiple political parties in the lead-up to the Constitutional Referendum and elections of 2005. Bringing in senior representatives of 31 parties, the first political party leadership retreat led the participants to write their own election code of conduct, which was adopted by the Ministry of Interior as the national code. In addition, the political party leaders decided to issue a joint communiqué before the elections to reassure an anxious population of their joint commitment to elections without intimidation or violence. They also engaged in joint radio broadcasts before the elections, requested further joint training, and asked that the media be present during their second training workshop so the leaders could be seen collaborating instead of competing. Then, after the successful 2005 elections, newly elected President Nkurunziza asked that the BLTP program be extended to his new Cabinet, key presidential aides, and top parliamentary leaders.
Still a further “spin-off” of the initial BLTP training program was a Community-based Leadership Program (CBLP) launched by the Office of Transition Initiatives of USAID. The WWICS was asked to train up twenty Burundian “master trainers” for grassroots engagement in the provinces of Ruyigi and Gitega. The purpose of this two-year initiative was to build local capacity for handling the difficult issues and conflicts involved in the reintegration of returning refugees, displaced persons and ex-combatants. But, in this instance, all of the training was done in Kirundi (rather than in French), and was based on a curriculum accessible to Burundi’s large illiterate population.
The work of the BLTP continues – driven by Burundian leaders themselves. Thus, in September 2007, at the request of President Nkurunziza and other Burundian leaders, the Woodrow Wilson Center’s Africa Program and the BLTP organized a “Key Leaders Retreat” to help break a political stalemate that had led to a paralysis of government. The ruling party had divided and had lost its parliamentary majority, and the government and opposition parties were having difficulties collaborating. In an effort to calm the situation, and to create the conditions for multi-party collaborative decision-making, the four-day retreat brought together all four of Burundi’s living former presidents, the leaders of all of the principal political parties, the chief of staff of the army, the heads of the national police force and of the demobilization commission, and several highly respected civil society leaders. Within two weeks of the workshop, the President was able to announce a new power-sharing agreement.
According to Wolpe, "The Burundi Leadership Training Program is designed to be a long-term process. We hope and expect that BLTP participants, for years to come, will collaborate with one another in stabilizing the Burundian transition and in guiding the country's post-war economic, social and political reconstruction."
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