Nairobi — Burundi has launched the campaign for a referendum on constitutional change that could enable President Pierre Nkurunziza to stay in power for another 16 years. Twenty-six parties, most of them aligned with the governing CNDD-FDD party, have been authorised to campaign for the May 17 plebiscite. The vote is taking place in tightly controlled conditions, and parties that advise electors to abstain from voting risk up to three years in jail. Burundi’s exiled opposition, gathered in an alliance called CNARED, has called for a boycott of the referendum, which it describes as the "death knell" of a 2000 agreement that helped end a bloody civil war. Nkurunziza, a 54-year-old former rebel leader, has governed the central African nation since 2005. No president can govern Burundi for more than 10 years under the 2000 Arusha peace accords, which helped to end a 1993-2006 conflict that killed more than 300,000. But if the amendment is approved, Nkurunziza would be entitled to stand ...
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