In the summer of 2023, I conducted a series of interviews with some Burundian journalists in exile in Belgium with a view to writing an academic article. During our conversations, these journalists told me about their work and life and trajectories, from their first steps in a newsroom to their promotions, their assignments, their “historic” reports, their work-related problems, and finally, their departure from Burundi and life in exile. Among these journalists were women, men, young and older, who had worked for different media and in different periods of time.
While listening to their stories, I realised that these journalists were actually telling me pieces of the history of journalism in Burundi, experienced first-hand and seen through their eyes. I decided that these insights, true hidden treasures, could not remain dormant in my laptop’s memory, and I began to think of a way to give them visibility. This is how the project Histoire(s) vécue(s) du journalisme au Burundi came about.
To talk about the history of journalism in Burundi, however, I could not have relied solely on the stories of a few journalists in exile in Belgium. Therefore, in the spring of 2024, I went to listen to and collect the stories of other journalists and former journalists* residing in Burundi. The book Histoire(s) vécue(s) du journalisme au Burundi and this website are the result of this work.
* In Histoire(s) vécue(s) du journalisme au Burundi, journalists and former journalists are or have been presenters, reporters, freelancers, editors-in-chief, and even media directors. The term “journalists”, in a simplistic way, refers to this diversity of profiles.