Conflict and Coffee in Burundi 141
activities in the country.) It is this powerful cabal that derailed the 1993 dem-
ocratic experiment and, following the slide of the country into generalised
chaos between 1993 and 1996, restored President Buyoya to power to protect
its threatened interests.'I6 The other regions of the country, dubbed 'the Third
World' of Burundi, include Kayanza and Ngozi provinces, which produce the
bulk of the country's coffee.
The 1993 the liberalisation of Burundi's politics threatened the privileged
political and economic base of the country's minority, especially the Bumri
Tutsi, through sweeping political and economic reforms. It is unclear, how-
ever, what reforms were envisaged for the coffee subsector. President
Ndadaye had intimated reforms in the agricultural sector, including the
restructuring and reform of OCIBU.'" The intended reform threatened to cut
off a major source of patronage largesse for some.'38 It is instructive to note
that FRODEBU campaigned on a platform of reforms.
The strategic importance of coffee in Burundi's economy has brought with
it legal sanctions on the farmers' freedom to choose what they deem to be
economically more viable. Thus they cannot uproot their coffee tress as this
is viewed as economic subversion and treason.'19 The result has been com-
petition between subsistence agriculture for food and coffee cultivation for
income. The country's expanding population and concomitant diminishing
land resources aggravate the problem.'20
It is reported that rebel groups and opposition political panies have par-
ticipated in exhorting coffee farmers to uproot their coffee trees. Their argu-
ment is that the government uses revenues from coffee to procure arms to
protect the interests of a privileged elite and not for de~elopment.~'~ They fur-
ther argue that the armed forces oppress the very farmers who produce the
bulk of the country's foreign exchange. The 'coffee propaganda' began in the
mid-1980s, its emergence motivated by unfavourable government policies
and evidence that some food crops like bananas were more profitable in the
long run. But the government, through the law and a 'misinformation' cam-
paign, effectively countered these attempts.'22
Recent anti-coffee campaigns by rebel groups appear to be a twin-pronged
strategy through their mobilisation propaganda:
to incite acts of economic sabotage on the part of the peasants and thus
reduce government revenue and disable the army; and
to incite government retaliation which would in turn justify the continua-
tion of the rebellion and their opposition to the government.It is difficult to assess how successful this message has been, partly because
of the multiple consequences of the civil war on the agricultural sector, region-
al economic sanctions (1996-1999) and the policy of regroupment or the
forcible relocation of rural populations into protected camps. It is difficult to