BRUNDI PRESIDENT PIERRE NKURINZIZA DIED (R.I.P-CONDOLENCES)

President Pierre Nkurunziza, a fitness enthusiast who increasingly relied on religion and repression to rule the impoverished and unstable central African nation of Burundi for 15 years, has died. National sources informed his sudden death as heart attack

Pierre Nkurunziza 18 December 1964 – 8 June 2020) was a Burundian politician who served as the ninth president of Burundi for almost 15 years from August 2005 until his death in June 2020, making him the longest-serving president in the nation's history.

He was a member of the Hutu ethnic group and began a career in physical education before the outbreak of the Burundian Civil War, which brought him into the moderate rebel organization National Council for the Defense of Democracy – Forces for the Defense of Democracy (CNDD–FDD). Upon becoming president of the CNDD–FDD, he advocated a political solution to the conflict and was elected president in 2005, and controversially held the office for three terms rather than the two permitted in the constitution, sparking significant public unrest in 2015. In 2018, he announced he would not stand for a fourth term. Nkurunziza died on 8 June 2020, shortly after the 2020 general elections.

News Date: 08 / 06 / 2020
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