POLITICIANS from Burundi

Top 10

The following people are considered by Pantheon to be the top 10 most legendary Burundian Politicians of all time. This list of famous Burundian Politicians is sorted by HPI (Historical Popularity Index), a metric that aggregates information on a biography’s online popularity. Visit the rankings page to view the entire list of Burundian Politicians.

1. Pierre Nkurunziza (1963 - 2020)

With an HPI of 55.52, Pierre Nkurunziza is the most famous Burundian Politician.  His biography has been translated into 73 different languages on wikipedia.

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. A member of the Hutu ethnic group, Nkurunziza taught physical education before becoming involved in politics during the Burundian Civil War as part of the rebel National Council for the Defense of Democracy – Forces for the Defense of Democracy (Conseil National Pour la Défense de la Démocratie – Forces pour la Défense de la Démocratie, CNDD–FDD) of which he became leader in 2000. The CNDD–FDD became a political party at the end of the Civil War and Nkurunziza was elected president. He held the post controversially for three terms, facing bloody opposition, sparking significant public unrest in 2015. He announced his intention not to stand for re-election in 2020 and instead ceded power to Évariste Ndayishimiye, whose candidacy he had endorsed. He died on 8 June 2020 shortly before the official end of his term. He was the longest-ruling president in Burundian history.

2. Jean-Baptiste Bagaza (1946 - 2016)

With an HPI of 54.91, Jean-Baptiste Bagaza is the 2nd most famous Burundian Politician.  His biography has been translated into 33 different languages.

Jean-Baptiste Bagaza (29 August 1946 – 4 May 2016) was a Burundian army officer and politician who ruled Burundi as president and de facto military dictator from November 1976 to September 1987. Born into the Tutsi ethnic group in 1946, Bagaza served in the Burundian military and rose through the ranks under the rule of Michel Micombero after his rise to power in 1966. Bagaza deposed Micombero in a bloodless coup d'état in 1976 and took power himself as head of the ruling Union for National Progress (Union pour le Progrès national, UPRONA). Despite having participated in the genocidal killings of 1972, he introduced various reforms which modernised the state and made concessions to the country's ethnic Hutu majority. His regime became increasingly repressive after it became consolidated in 1984, especially targeting the powerful Catholic Church. His rule lasted until 1987 when his regime was overthrown in a further coup d'état and he was forced into exile. He returned to Burundi in 1994 and became involved in national politics as the leader of the Party for National Recovery (Parti pour le Redressement National, PARENA). He died in 2016.

3. Pierre Buyoya (1949 - 2020)

With an HPI of 54.46, Pierre Buyoya is the 3rd most famous Burundian Politician.  His biography has been translated into 34 different languages.

Pierre Buyoya (24 November 1949 – 17 December 2020) was a Burundian army officer and politician who served two terms as President of Burundi in 1987 to 1993 and 1996 to 2003. He was the second-longest-serving president in Burundian history. An ethnic [[ Hutu]], Buyoya joined the sole legal party, UPRONA and quickly rose through the ranks of the Burundian military. In 1987, he led a military coup d'état that overthrew his predecessor Jean-Baptiste Bagaza and enabled him to seize power. Leading an oppressive military junta, Hutu uprisings in 1988 led to the killings of an estimated 20,000 people. Buyoya then established a National Reconciliation Commission that created a new constitution in 1992 which allowed for a multi-party system and a non-ethnic government. Running as a candidate in the 1993 Burundian presidential election, he was defeated by Hutu candidate Melchior Ndadaye of the FRODEBU opposition party. Ndadaye was assassinated during another attempted coup after only three months in office, leading to a series of retaliatory killings that culminated in the Burundian Civil War. During the war, Buyoya returned to power in another coup d'état in 1996. During his second presidency, he created an ethnically inclusive government by establishing a partnership with FROBEDU. This led to the 2000 Arusha Accords which introduced ethnic power sharing. He selected Domitien Ndayizeye, a Hutu as his vice-president, who succeeded him as president in 2003. The war ended two years later. Following the end of the war, Buyoya became a senator for life under the terms of the 2004 constitution. During his post-presidency, he was also sent as an African Union envoy during peace missions in Chad and Mali. In November 2020, he was sentenced to life in prison in absentia by a Burundinan court for his suspected role in the 1993 coup attempt that assassinated Ndadaye. He died of COVID-19 two months later.

4. Cyprien Ntaryamira (1955 - 1994)

With an HPI of 53.08, Cyprien Ntaryamira is the 4th most famous Burundian Politician.  His biography has been translated into 30 different languages.

Cyprien Ntaryamira (6 March 1955 – 6 April 1994) was a Burundian politician who served as President of Burundi from 5 February 1994 until his death two months later. A Hutu born in Burundi, Ntaryamira studied there before fleeing to Rwanda to avoid ethnic violence and complete his education. Active in a Burundian student movement, he cofounded the socialist Burundi Workers' Party and earned an agricultural degree. In 1983, he returned to Burundi and worked agricultural jobs, though he was briefly detained as a political prisoner. In 1986 he cofounded the Front for Democracy in Burundi (FRODEBU), and in 1993 FRODEBU won Burundi's general elections. He subsequently became the Minister of Agriculture and Animal Husbandry on 10 July, but in October Tutsi soldiers killed the president and other top officials in an attempted coup. Ntaryamira survived the putsch and in January 1994 the National Assembly elected him to become the President of Burundi. After a prolonged constitutional dispute, he was inaugurated on 5 February, declaring that his top priorities would be restoring peace, promoting human rights, and resettling refugees. Throughout his tenure he unsuccessfully sought to mitigate ethnic conflict. He was killed on 6 April 1994 when the plane he was travelling in with Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana was shot down over Kigali.

5. Michel Micombero (1940 - 1983)

With an HPI of 51.79, Michel Micombero is the 5th most famous Burundian Politician.  His biography has been translated into 32 different languages.

Michel Micombero (26 August 1940 – 16 July 1983) was a Burundian military officer and politician who ruled the country as de facto military dictator for the decade between 1966 and 1976. He was the last Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Burundi from July to November 1966, and the first President of the country from November 1966 until his overthrow in 1976. Micombero was an ethnic Tutsi who began his career as an officer in the Burundian military at the time of Burundi's independence in 1962. He studied abroad and was given a ministerial portfolio on his return. He rose to prominence for his role in helping to crush an attempted coup d'état in October 1965 by ethnic Hutu soldiers against the Tutsi-dominated monarchy. In its aftermath, in 1966, Micombero himself instigated two further coups against the monarchy which he perceived as too moderate. The first coup in July installed a new king on the throne, propelling Micombero to the role of prime minister. The second coup in November abolished the monarchy itself, bringing Micombero to power as the first president of the new Republic of Burundi. Micombero led a one-party state which centralised the country's institutions and adopted a neutral stance in the Cold War. Dissent was repressed and, in 1972, an attempt to challenge Micombero's power led to genocidal violence against the Hutu population in which around 100,000 people, mainly Hutus, were killed. His regime finally collapsed in 1976 when he was ousted in a coup d'état by another army officer, Jean-Baptiste Bagaza, who installed himself as president. Micombero went into exile in Somalia, where he died in 1983.

6. Évariste Ndayishimiye (b. 1968)

With an HPI of 51.72, Évariste Ndayishimiye is the 6th most famous Burundian Politician.  His biography has been translated into 39 different languages.

General Évariste Ndayishimiye (born 1968) is a Burundian politician who has served as the tenth President of Burundi since 18 June 2020. He became involved in the rebel National Council for the Defense of Democracy – Forces for the Defense of Democracy during the Burundian Civil War and rose up the ranks of its militia. At the end of the conflict, he entered the Burundian Army and held a number of political offices under the auspices of President Pierre Nkurunziza. Nkurunziza endorsed Ndayishimiye as his successor ahead of the 2020 elections which he won with a large majority.

7. Mwambutsa IV of Burundi (1912 - 1977)

With an HPI of 49.81, Mwambutsa IV of Burundi is the 7th most famous Burundian Politician.  Her biography has been translated into 19 different languages.

Mwambutsa IV Bangiricenge (6 May 1912 – 26 March 1977) was the penultimate king (mwami) of Burundi who ruled between 1915 and 1966. He succeeded to the throne on the death of his father Mutaga IV Mbikije (reigned 1908–15). Born while Burundi was under German colonial rule, Mwambutsa's reign mostly coincided with Belgian colonial rule (1916–62). The Belgians retained the monarchs of both Rwanda and Burundi under the policy of indirect rule.

8. Domitien Ndayizeye (b. 1951)

With an HPI of 49.58, Domitien Ndayizeye is the 8th most famous Burundian Politician.  His biography has been translated into 30 different languages.

Domitien Ndayizeye (born 2 May 1953) is a Burundian politician who was President of Burundi from 2003 to 2005. He succeeded Pierre Buyoya, as president on 30 April 2003, after serving as Buyoya's vice president for 18 months. Ndayizeye remained in office until succeeded by Pierre Nkurunziza on 26 August 2005. Ndayizeye currently serves as head of the National Gathering for Change (RANAC). In 1994 he was appointed director of the National Intelligence Service by President Cyprien Ntaryamira. In 2004, Ndayizeye proposed a draft constitution to the parliament prior to it being put to the electorate in referendum later in the year. Relations with the Tutsi group were strained, reflected in their boycotting of the legislative session due to consider the proposal. Due to a lack of preparation, the ballot was postponed to late November 2004. Burundi is still trying to emerge from a civil war that began in 1993 when several groups drawn from the large Hutu majority took up arms against a government and army then dominated by a Tutsi elite. The interim government pledged to more equitably share power between the two main ethnic groups. On 21 August 2006, Ndayizeye was arrested in Bujumbura in relation to his alleged role in a coup plot earlier in the year. The Senate lifted his immunity as Senator prior to his arrest. He denied the charges against him in court on December 19 and said that he had "never dreamed of organising a coup, in fact I had given up politics to do business and be with my family". On January 15, 2007, he was acquitted along with former vice president Alphonse-Marie Kadege and three other defendants; two others were sentenced to long prison terms. During 2010 general elections, as his party representative, he ran for the presidential seat but decided to withdraw from the race together with all opposition parties, after they accused the ruling party of rigging previous councilors' elections. After opposition politician Zedi Feruzi was killed during the 2015 Burundian unrest Ndayizeye and other opposition parties broke off talks with the government of President Pierre Nkurunziza.

9. Ntare V of Burundi (1947 - 1972)

With an HPI of 46.63, Ntare V of Burundi is the 9th most famous Burundian Politician.  His biography has been translated into 20 different languages.

Ntare V of Burundi (born Charles Ndizeye; 2 December 1947 – 29 April 1972) was the last king (mwami) of Burundi, reigning from July to November 1966. Until his accession, he was known as Crown Prince Charles Ndizeye. He seized power in July 1966 by deposing his own father. He reigned until November, when prime minister Michel Micombero overthrew him, ending the Burundian monarchy. He went into exile but returned in 1972. Later that year, during Martyazo's short-lived bid for independence, he was killed under unclear circumstances.

10. Louis Rwagasore (1932 - 1961)

With an HPI of 46.17, Louis Rwagasore is the 10th most famous Burundian Politician.  His biography has been translated into 16 different languages.

Prince Louis Rwagasore (Kirundi: Ludoviko Rwagasore; 10 January 1932 – 13 October 1961) was a Burundian prince and politician, who was the second prime minister of Burundi for two weeks, from 28 September 1961 until his assassination on 13 October. Born to the Ganwa family of Burundian Mwami (king) Mwambutsa IV in Belgian-administered Ruanda-Urundi in 1932, Rwagasore was educated in Burundian Catholic schools before attending university in Belgium. After he returned to Burundi in the mid-1950s he founded a series of cooperatives to economically empower native Burundians and build up his base of political support. The Belgian administration took over the venture, and as a result of the affair his national profile increased and he became a leading figure of the anti-colonial movement. He soon thereafter became involved with a nationalist political party, the Union for National Progress (UPRONA). He pushed for Burundian independence from Belgian control, national unity, and the institution of a constitutional monarchy. Rwagasore sought to bring UPRONA mass appeal across different regions, ethnicities, and castes, and under him the party maintained a leadership balanced between ethnic Hutus and Tutsis, though the latter were usually favoured for more important positions. The Belgian administration disliked UPRONA and initially attempted to stifle Rwagasore's activities, placing him under house arrest in 1960 during municipal elections. International pressure led the administration to back down, and the following year UPRONA won an overwhelming majority in the legislative elections. As a result, Rwagasore became prime minister of Burundi on 28 September 1961. Two weeks later, he was gunned down by a Greek national at the direction of leaders of a rival political party with the probable support of the Belgian Resident in Burundi. Rwagasore's death derailed his attempts to build national ethnic cohesion and facilitated the growth of Hutu–Tutsi tensions in the country. It also fractured UPRONA, as his former lieutenants engaged in a power struggle to succeed him as the party's leader. Within Burundi, Rwagasore enjoys nearly universal acclaim, and his assassination is commemorated annually with large ceremonies. He remains relatively unknown internationally in comparison to other leaders of independence movements in the African Great Lakes region.