Officials jailed for roughly tackling Burundi's President in football match

dimeji akinloye

March 3, 2018 12:40 PM

A judicial source said the suspects were arrested on charges of "conspiracy against the president".

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Nkurunziza is a 'born-again' evangelical Christian who spends much of his time travelling Burundi with his own team, Haleluya FC.

He travels with his own choir, "Komeza gusenga", which means "pray non-stop" in the local Kirundi language.

According to BBC, on February 3, 2018, his team faced a side from the northern town of Kiremba.

The report said that the opposition is normally well aware they are playing against the country's president, and they are expected to go easy in the games, even perhaps allowing Nkurunziza to score.

But as the Kiremba team contained Congolese refugees who did not know they were playing against Burundi's president, they "attacked each time he had the ball and made him fall several times", a witness told AFP.

Following the manhandling, Kiremba's administrator Cyriaque Nkezabahizi and his assistant, Michel Mutama, were reportedly imprisoned on Thursday, March 1.

A judicial source said they have been arrested on charges of "conspiracy against the president", AFP reports.

In 2017, President Nkurunziza and his government were implicated in a United Nations report that said there was strong evidence of crimes against humanity committed in the country.

The report said government forces - but also opposition groups - had committed killings, torture and rape after violence erupted in 2015.

The violence was sparked after Nkurunziza decided to run for a third term.

He was later re-elected in a poll that was boycotted by the opposition.

dimeji akinloye