The last few weeks have seen Burundi plunge into violent political chaos following a decision by incumbent President Pierra Nkurunziza to run for a third term which will explicitly go against the constitution of that country.
Nkurunziza is using a technicality to prolong his stay in power beyond a mandatory tenure.
This is a simple fact that our African leaders should be able to see through.
It does not seem to matter to him that in so doing, Nkurunziza risks plunging his country into political and ethnic turmoil which besieged it and spilled into the neighbouring Rwanda a little over twenty years ago. All that matters to him is staying in power. And he would do that at all cost.
The world should not lose sight of the fact that like Rwanda, Burundi is a country that still has a long way to go in its healing process.
Self-centeredness as that demonstrated by President Nkurunziza does little to help that country to put its tragic past behind.
The decision by Nkurunziza should not be looked at in isolation.
There are many examples of leaders in Africa who when faced with retiring from office on account of constitutional limits tried to circumvent such imperatives.
Sam Nujoma of Namibia tried it. But to their credit, the Namibians, including and especially those from within his party stood firm and made it clear to him that they would not tolerate it.
As Botswana we should count ourselves really lucky that so far we have not seen a sitting head of State who when faced with retirement tried some tricks which elsewhere have included planting surrogates to sponsor Constitutional changes on his behalf.
African leaders should learn from such stalwarts like Nelson Mandela who served only one term and voluntarily chose to forgo the second even as he could easily have done that given his popularity.
Like we say, the issue of Nkurunziza should not be looked at in isolation.
Laurent Gbagbo of Ivory Coast clung to power after losing an election until he was removed by the intervention of the French army. That was however not before scores of people had died and many were displaced.
Tragically African leaders did not on their own act to show Gbagbo that his unprincipled stance would have no place.
He was allowed to destabilise not just his country but the entire region. We see this playing out again in the instance of Nkurunziza in Burundi.
Not a single African leader has come out to publicly criticize the incumbent.
Because he is viewed as a member his indiscretions are being tolerated.
Even the attitude of the African Union, which has to its credit tried to intervene seems to be treating the aggressor and the aggrieved equally.
The African Union should see clear that the fault is with Nkurunziza and not anybody else.
For ordinary Africans this behavior by their leadership comes at a cost.
Every time this kind of thing happens and we turn a blind eye until such time that the situation is out of control, invariably lives of ordinary people are always lost.
When outsiders come in and say that Africa still has a long way to go before we can internalize democracy, our instinct is always to close rank and accuse people of racism.
The truth though is that as typified by Burundi we still have a long way to go.
In the next 18 months, Barrack Obama will leave the White House after serving for eight years.
Can we imagine him trying to use a technicality to extend his stay? Certainly not!
That is the difference between Africa and the rest of the world.
