Burundi : the State faces an alarming real estate crisis

SOS Médias Burundi

Bujumbura, November 17, 2025 – The Burundian State is facing a worrying real estate crisis. According to data presented at a government meeting last week, the country spends nearly 9 billion Burundi francs annually renting approximately 600 apartments and offices. This is a colossal cost, while the roughly 300 state-owned houses rented out bring in only about 500 million francs, revealing a profound imbalance in the management of public assets.

This meeting brought together the Prime Minister, the Minister of Finance, several members of the government, as well as provincial governors and heritage officials. It followed Prime Minister Nestor Ntahontuye’s tour of northeastern and western Burundi, during which he denounced serious negligence in the registration and valuation of public infrastructure. “Every piece of infrastructure must be identified and its value assessed,” he emphasized.

The crisis is largely explained by insufficient public investment in real estate and the lack of funds dedicated to the construction and maintenance of administrative buildings. This is a reality that the NGO PARCEM (Words and Action for Awakening Consciences and Changing Mindsets) has long highlighted. Its national director, Faustin Ndikumana, particularly laments that “some dignitaries prioritize the construction of private buildings which they then lease to the State, further increasing the national financial burden.”

To address this issue, the Council of Ministers recommended the recovery of all state-owned houses, both in Bujumbura, the commercial capital where UN agencies and the central administration are concentrated, and in the interior of the country. The goal is to evict the current occupants in order to reallocate these buildings to public services, explained Secretary of State Jérôme Niyonzima.

The NGO PARCEM is calling on the government to go further by conducting a comprehensive inventory of public infrastructure and developing a plan to construct new administrative buildings tailored to actual needs. It also emphasizes the importance of rehabilitating abandoned houses to reduce the state’s reliance on private rentals.