Burundi Enabling Environment Snapshot

Period covered by the report: August 2025-March 2026.

Between August 2025 and March 2026, Burundi’s civic space experienced sustained deterioration across all six principles of an enabling environment for civil society. Despite constitutional guarantees of freedoms of expression, association and peaceful assembly, the period was marked by intensified state repression. The 2025 legislative and local elections consolidated CNDD-FDD control with 96.5% of the vote, in a context of intimidation, arbitrary arrests, enforced disappearances and tightly restricted media reporting. UN experts similarly reported rising cases of torture, sexual violence, arbitrary detention and extrajudicial killings targeting civil society actors and political opponents, warning of widespread impunity and narrowing civic space. 

The CIVICUS Monitor highlighted increased killings, disappearances and crackdowns on freedoms, including the disqualification of opposition election candidates and weaponisation of eligibility rules to limit political participation. Freedom House also reported continued repression, systemic intimidation and constraints on fundamental rights, reinforcing evidence of a closed and shrinking political landscape. The Ligue Iteka Annual Report (2025) recorded 662 serious incidents, including killings, torture, abductions and arbitrary arrests—mostly attributed to state-aligned actors, particularly the Imbonerakure militia and security forces. The ACAT-Burundi Human Rights Situation Report (2025) highlighted persistent unlawful detentions, extreme prison overcrowding and systemic judicial delays, underscoring the lack of accountability and limited access to justice. 

Institutionally, the UN Human Rights Council renewed the mandate of the Special Rapporteur on Burundi in October 2025 due to ongoing violations and government non-cooperation with UN mechanisms, reaffirming concerns that the state was neither open nor responsive to oversight. Although Burundi’s electoral commission (CENI) held consultations with selected CSOs in early 2025, participation was largely restricted to government-aligned organisations, while independent groups continued to face suspension or deregistration, limiting meaningful engagement and weakening the broader civic culture.

Across the reporting period, these dynamics demonstrate a sustained decline in fundamental freedoms, a restrictive legal and regulatory framework, diminishing access to resources, a largely unresponsive state, a constrained civic culture, and an insecure digital environment—collectively undermining the enabling environment for civil society in Burundi.