“We were chased away with the army” : UPRONA denounces massive electoral fraud in Bururi province

SOS Médias Burundi

Bururi, June 7, 2025 – In several localities in Bururi province, in the south of the small east African nation, the legislative and district elections held on Thursday, June 5, were marred by blatant irregularities. Expulsions of UPRONA electoral monitors, ballot box stuffing, multiple voting, and intimidation : according to testimonies collected by SOS Médias Burundi, these frauds were aimed at ensuring a landslide victory for the CNDD-FDD, the ruling party.

The reported incidents multiplied throughout the day, particularly in the district of Mugamba, in the villages of Mugendo Ruko, Mugendo Ndengo, and Nyakigano. There, UPRONA monitors claim to have been forcibly expelled from the polling stations around 3 p.m. while attempting to comment on the vote count.

“We were told we had nothing to suggest about the process. Then they called the police and the army to chase us away. Our phones were confiscated. The count continued without us,” said one of the electoral monitors contacted by SOS Médias Burundi.

UPRONA officials in the province also denounced other fraudulent practices observed in several localities : representatives prevented from accessing polling stations after their accreditations had been unexplained; ballot stuffing observed in broad daylight; and the refusal to register the party’s national electoral monitors.

In the few polling stations where their presence was tolerated, polling station agents claim they were not allowed to verify the consistency between the ballots and the declared results. Some polling station agents even allegedly cast ballots in place of absent voters, while CNDD-FDD activists were able to vote multiple times, given the lack of indelible ink.

Another reported incident : in several centers, Uprona agents were reportedly forced to sign the final ballots before the count even began. Almost all of the centers visited were also reportedly marked by intimidation and threats against opposition party monitors.

According to several witnesses, in some centers, voting for CNDD-FDD activists began as early as 4 a.m., well before the polling stations officially opened. Worse still, some polling station agents claim to have seen ballot boxes already full, hidden under opaque objects, even before the polling operation began.

Faced with this situation, local UPRONA officials are taking a stand :

“We will never recognize the results of such an electoral sham,” they warn.

In this climate of heightened tension, UPRONA officials are calling on the CENI and international observers to shed full light on these irregularities.