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Protesters claim that the government has been clamping down on free speech in recent years.
The Burundi government blocked access to social media websites Thursday, including Twitter, Facebook and WhatsApp, as people across the country have been protesting all week against the president’s announced re-election bid. Protesters have been mainly organizing and mobilizing through social media websites.
"Over the past days, Burundi has suffered a wave of killings, arbitrary arrests, detention, the closure of media outlets and the targeting of human rights defenders," United Nation experts said in a statement from Geneva on Thursday. They urged the president to give way for peacful protests and warned that the country could lapse back into conflict.
Following the protests, the government also suspended the live feed of three radio stations, including the popular African Public Radio known locally as the “voice of the voiceless.” Government said the radio stations were “disrupting the peace.”
Massive protests swept the country on Sunday, a day after the ruling party announced that its candidate for the upcoming elections due in June was current President Pierre Nkurunziza.
Nkurunziza has been the head of the state since 2005 after the end of a 12-year civil war that claimed the lives of more than 300,000 people. Under the constitution, a president is allowed only two terms in office and must be elected by a popular vote.
Opponents of the president say that his bid for a third term in office is unconstitutional, while Nkurunziza’s allies say that his first term does not count because he was elected by the Parliament, not by a public vote, to lead the transitional government in 2005 after the end of the civil war.
The country’s Constitutional Court will be reviewing the legality of Nkurunziza bid for the presidency, according to the country's senate.
The Burundi Red Cross said 15 protesters were injured during clashes with the police on Thursday. Late in the day a soldier was killed by unknown gunmen, who were later arrested.
Six people have been killed so far as the police keeps its heavy-handed crackdown on the protesters. The government has banned all forms of demonstrations and deployed troops who were reportedly firing live ammunition at protesters.
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