Domitille Barancira
Domitille Barancira is a Burundian judge who chaired the Constitutional Court from 1998 until 2006. She subsequently served as Burundi's ambassador to Germany.
Career
Domitille Barancira took a law degree from the University of Burundi. She worked as a judge between 1983 and 1996, acting as deputy chair of the Supreme Court from 1992 until 1996. She was chair of the Bujumbura Court of Appeal for two years and afterwards became chair of the Constitutional Court in 1998.[1][2] She was appointed to the latter post by President Pierre Buyoya and held it until 2006. She was also head of the Commission of Reform and Modernization of the Burundian Justice System.[3][2] In 2006, she was a nominee for the African Court on Human and Peoples' Rights.[4]
In 1997, Barancira told Agence France-Presse that 17 people who had been sentenced to death as a result of ethnic violence following the assassination of President Melchior Ndadaye in 1993 had appealed their sentences unsuccessfully. She added that nobody had been executed since cases of cannibalism 15 years previously.[5] In the appellate court, she upheld the death sentence for Pierre Nkurunziza in 1998; she later administered his oath as president in 2005, when she was head of the Constitutional Court.[3] In the 2000s, she became one of Burundi's foremost campaigners for women's rights alongside Catherine Mabobori, Vestine Mbundagu, Marie-Christine Ntagwirumugara and Sabine Sabimbona.[6] In 2007, she became Burundi's ambassador to Germany; she retired from the post in 2010.[2]
References
- Dawuni, Josephine; Kang, Alice (2015). "Her Ladyship Chief Justice: The Rise of Female Leaders in the Judiciary in Africa". Africa Today. 62 (2): 45–69. doi:10.2979/africatoday.62.2.45. S2CID 4876414. Archived from the original on 14 February 2022. Retrieved 19 February 2022.
- "Domitille Barancira". African Women in Law. Archived from the original on 19 February 2022. Retrieved 19 February 2022.
- Vandeginste, Stef (2009). Law as a Source and Instrument of Transitional Justice in Burundi (PDF) (PhD). University of Antwerp. p. 237. Archived (PDF) from the original on 19 February 2022. Retrieved 19 February 2022.
- Ojigho, Osai Justina (13 September 2012). "The Pursuit for Gender Parity in the Composition of African Court Judges". Pambazuka News. No. 597.
- "Excepts from IRIN Emergency Updates on the Great Lakes". Africa Focus. Archived from the original on 2 November 2021. Retrieved 19 February 2022.
- Saiget, Marie (2016). "(De-)Politicising women's collective action: international actors and land inheritance in post-war Burundi". Review of African Political Economy. 43 (149): 365–381. doi:10.1080/03056244.2016.1214113. S2CID 157825863. Archived from the original on 9 July 2020. Retrieved 19 February 2022.