CORRECTION APPENDED

Burundi law enforcement officials are holding former Shorenstein fellow Alexis Sinduhije in custody for allegedly expressing contempt for the country’s president.

Sinduhije, along with the 36 other founding members of the Movement for Security and Democracy—a new opposition party sympathetic to both the Hutu and Tutsi citizens who live in the country plagued by civil war and ethnic violence—was arrested on Nov. 3 for criticizing the president in a document found in his home, according to the global organization Human Rights Watch.

Police are currently detaining only Sinduhije, as police freed the other 36 party loyalists last week.

Although no official charges have been issued against Sinduhije, officials suggest that the statements that he made in the documents could result in charges of “insulting the President,” Burundi police spokesman Pierre Chanel Ntarabaganyi told the Human Rights Watch. Ntarabaganyi said that the movement’s illegal status alone was enough to result in Sinduhije’s arrest.

His arrest does not come as a surprise in light of Sinduhije’s announcement of his candidacy for the country’s 2010 presidential election.

Human rights activists said they believe Sinduhije’s candidacy is at least responsible for his arrest.

“[The government] is determined to silence him before the 2010 elections,” a Burundi NGO representative, who wished to remained anonymous because of the sensitivity of the situation, wrote in an e-mail. “There is no evidence to justify the charges against Alexis,” the NGO representative said.

Sinduhije has been attacked and arrested on numerous occasions in the past for not only his political involvement but also for his work in radio journalism.

In 2001, he founded an independent radio station in Burundi with the goal of encouraging reconciliation between Hutu and Tutsi Burundians.

The government banned the station in 2003 for airing an interview with an armed rebel group spokesman. The station was allowed to return to its regular programming only after other stations vowed to abstain from reporting on government news until the regime lifted the ban.

While the government has routinely condemned his reporting, the country’s citizenry hails him as a national hero, according to the Boston Globe.

Sinduhije has received international recognition, as well. His work earned him the International Press Freedom Award from the Committee to Protect Journalists last year, and, in 1997, Time magazine named him one of that year’s 100 most influential people. [SEE CORRECTION BELOW]

Those at Harvard who are familiar with his work are skeptical of Sinduhije’s culpability.

“He has been a highly respected journalist,” Shorenstein Center Director Alex S. Jones said, adding that his reputation for stellar journalism makes it unlikely that he did something wrong.

CORRECTION

The Nov. 18 story, "Sinduhije Held in Burundi," stated that former Shorenstein fellow Alexis Sinduhije was named by Time magazine as one of its 100 most influential people in 1997. In fact, Sinduhije received that honor in 2008. An earlier headline on the story also misspelled his surname.