Burundi’s Constitutional Court has ruled that President-elect Evariste Ndayishimiye must be sworn in as soon as possible, following the death of Pierre Nkurunziza.
A court ruling issued Friday and obtained by VOA’s Central Africa service said, “It is necessary to proceed as soon as possible to the swearing in of elected president Evariste Ndayishimiye."
Nkurunziza died Tuesday at age 55 at a Burundian hospital where he had been taken two days earlier.
Nkurunziza served three terms as Burundi’s president, taking over at end of a brutal civil war that killed an estimated 300,000 people.
Ndayishimiye, a retired general who Nkurunziza picked as his successor, won the May 2020 presidential election, and his term of office was originally set to begin on August 20th.
