This time last year, the world was seized with the fear of the novel coronavirus. Africa was thought to be particularly vulnerable because of its underdeveloped healthcare system and its known incapacity to handle virulent health pandemics. While most African countries started taking precautions and rolling out public safety measures to prevent the spread of the virus, two countries in Africa and their leaders choose another strategy – deny the existence of the virus, play it down as much as possible, spiritualise it and tag it a Western or Eastern conspiracy against Africa.
The first is Burundi and its former leader, Pierre Nkurunziza, the football-loving, born again Christian leader. The 55-year-old former rebel leader came to power in 2005 immediately after the country’s civil war and was initially hailed as a bridge builder and ambassador of peace. But after a decade in power, all the progress he made melted away when he illegally organised a referendum to allow him run for a third term in office – arguing that his first term in office won’t count because it wasn’t a universal mandate. Of course protests erupted and he unleashed violence on protesters and opponents alike. Hundreds of thousands fled the country.
Nkurunziza’s third term was meant to expire in August 2020 and while many were expecting him to make another bid for a fourth term, he surprised them by backing an ally, retired general Evariste Ndayishimiye, to succeed him. This was however at the price of naming him Paramount Leader and “Supreme Guide of Patriotism” with a retirement pension of $540,000 and a furnished villa. It was in the middle of preparations for the elections and at the suppression of the opposition that Covid-19 struck. While every other country was learning how to respond and putting public health measures in place, Nkurunziza chose to downplay the virus. Although, he initially claimed the country lacked the capacity to respond to the pandemic, he flatly refused to domesticate any of the preventive protocols suggested.
It was not until Denmark officially reported that two of its citizens tested positive for the virus after travelling to Tanzania that Magufuli grudgingly conceded and blamed Tanzanians who travelled abroad for bringing the virus home
The government encouraged people to continue their lives and activities as usual, assuring them the virus would have no effect on the country because unlike others, “it has put God first.” Burundi, Nkurunziza said in March 2020, “has signed a special covenant with God, whether you believe it or not.” The government heavily criticised foreign-run schools for closing their doors. Schools, places of worship and even sporting events continued to operate as normal.
Nkurunziza was particularly determined to press ahead with national elections to choose his successor. He led the campaigns with tightly packed rallies and political gatherings. When the World Health Organisation (WHO) representative to Burundi raised concerns about the huge crowds at political rallies without any concern for spread of the virus, he and other WHO workers in the country were declared persona non grata and expelled from the country.
After reporting just 83 cases of Covid-19, the government rolled back testing and tracking of the disease and on March 25, 2020 reiterated in an official statement that “only the grace of God has protected Burundi” from Covid-19 while warning residents not to take any preventive measures ahead of the authorities.
In the first week of June, Nkurunziza collapsed after playing a game of volleyball and was rushed to the hospital. He died after displaying symptoms consistent with Covid-19. Other members of his family, including his mother, wife, sister, the newly elected president and many government officials tested positive for Covid-19. Officially, though, Nkurunziza was said to have died from “a heart attack”.
While Nkurunziza’s death and the hospitalisation of British Prime Minister, Boris Johnson made other world leaders sit up, Tanzanian President, John Magufuli – incidentally a very close friend of Nkurunziza – remained defiant. The Bulldozer, as he came to be known because of his no-nonsense approach to corruption, waste and grandiosity in governance, was sceptical of the whole Covid-19 business from the word go. A very rigid man who has no tolerance for the opposition, press freedom or even human rights in the pursuit of his antiquated socialist and nationalist policies, continued to deny the presence of the pandemic in Tanzania dismissing it as a global scam. It was not until Denmark officially reported that two of its citizens tested positive for the virus after travelling to Tanzania that Magufuli grudgingly conceded and blamed Tanzanians who travelled abroad for bringing the virus home.
As the African Centre for Disease Control distributed testing kits to all African countries, Magufuli claimed he secretly sent samples of goats and chickens and the results came back positive. He banned the reporting of case numbers, sacked the head of the laboratory in charge of testing and instead recommended steaming, traditional remedies, including Madagascar’s concoction and prayers as the ultimate solution. “Coronavirus is the devil” he said at a time; “and it cannot survive in the body of Jesus”.
The government would not even recommend wearing masks and social distancing with Magufuli warning at a church service that Tanzanians must avoid wearing facemasks from abroad because they may be contaminated with the virus. He declared the virus defeated by prayers and ordered a public celebration. Like Nkurunziza, Magufuli criminalised dissemination of information or taking preventive measures not coming from his government.
Even when the vaccines were approved, he would make no effort to procure the vaccines or even accept those allocated to Tanzania by Covax – the vaccine initiative championed by the Gavi, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) and WHO.
“Vaccines don’t work,” he told a mask-less crowd in January. “If the white man was able to come up with vaccinations, then vaccines for AIDS would have been brought. Vaccines for tuberculosis would have made it a thing of the past. Vaccines for malaria would have been found. Vaccines for cancer would have been found,” he argued.
Instead of vaccines, the health minister and her officials, at a news conference, drank a herbal concoction including ginger, garlic and lemons, and inhaled steams from herbs, promoting them as natural means of killing the virus. It took the strong criticism of the Catholic Church in Tanzania (of which he was a staunch member) to bring the government to acknowledge the thousands of sudden deaths with symptoms similar to Covid-19 being recorded in the country.
Then, after February 27th, Magufuli disappeared from the public scene. Soon after, rumours of his ill health began to circulate with government officials strenuously denying the president was sick. Then, on Wednesday, March 17, the news of his death was announced. Like Nkurunziza, the official cause of his death was “heart complications” but virtually all diplomatic sources say it is most likely of complications from Covid-19.
