Police in Burundi has said it closed 15 foreign-exchange offices and arrested 12 money-changers as the East African country, struck by more than a year of unrest, struggles with a dollar shortage.
The actions were taken against speculators who committed ‘economic crime’ by not complying with the official exchange rate, police spokesman Pierre Nkurikiye wrote on his Twitter account.
An inadequate supply of dollars from Burundi’s central bank has forced companies into the black market, where the cost of greenbacks has surged. The central bank this year ordered banks, non-government organizations and embassies to open accounts with it to regulate foreign-exchange supplies.
The landlocked, coffee-exporting nation has a gross domestic product of about $3.1 billion. It has been rocked by violence that’s killed more than 470 people since April 2015, when President Pierre Nkurunziza decided to stand for re-election; a move his opponents said was unconstitutional.
Meanwhile, traders and growers of fruit and vegetable crops in Cibitoke province, 70km northwest of the Burundian capital Bujumbura, are complaining about the ban on export of food items to Rwanda.
In Cibitoke, the measure taken by the Burundian government last week, affects sellers and growers of several fruit and vegetable crops, including tomatoes, onions and eggplants “I grow and sell tomatoes, onions and other vegetables in Rwanda. My tomatoes are getting rotten in fields because we are not allowed to sell any food items in Rwanda,” said Generose Nisabwe. “The government (of Burundi) should suspend this measure because most of people living near the border with Rwanda sell their food products in Rwanda,” added Nisabwe.
