Humanitarian agencies worry that the crisis in Burundi is already tending towards the worst case scenario they had anticipated would unfold within the first six months of possible election-related violence.

The United Nation’s humanitarian agencies and partners had projected that about 50,000 people would be affected during the first eight weeks of election-related violence. This, in the worst case scenario, would rise to 400,000 people in the next 24 weeks after the elections.

However, the first planning figure was reached within days of the eruption of civil unrest on April 26, after the ruling CNDD-FDD party nominated President Pierre Nkurunziza as its presidential candidate.

Although that figure has now been revised to 200,000 people, it is dangerously close to the second projection, which is also likely to be surpassed soon, according to information available to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

“This worst-case scenario is particularly bleak: 300,000 people displaced (250,000 IDPs and 50,000 refugees), representing about three per cent of the total population in one of the most densely inhabited states in Africa and in a context of very high pre-existing levels of chronic vulnerability,” notes a flash update about the country’s present crisis that OCHA released on May 12.

Before the chaos, Burundi already had 79,000 internally displaced persons, 52,000 refugees, 80,000 returnees and expellees, as well as 1.3 million food insecure people, according to OCHA.

As such, humanitarian agencies fear that unless calm is quickly restored, the outcomes of the present chaos are bound to increase the fragility of a country whose capacity to cope was already overstretched, despite years of recovery and development efforts. It will also surely worsen the vulnerabilities of its neighbours, who are taking in tens of thousands of its fleeing nationals, they add.

READ: Burundians fleeing to Rwanda deepen Kigali’s refugee crisis

“Given the pre-existing precariousness of the landlocked Burundian economy, heavily reliant upon imports; the existing low baseline of key humanitarian indicators, notably in the domains of nutrition and food security; and the collective trauma of a population that has endured episodes of mass killings and upheaval since its Independence from Belgium in 1962, rapid deterioration in the humanitarian situation is likely,” states the OCHA update.

It adds that national vulnerabilities are also high in refugee-receiving countries — particularly in the DRC, where 6.5 million people are food insecure and 2.7 million people are internally displaced. Some 400,000 DR Congolese refugees are already hosted across the Great Lakes Region.

READ: Burundians fleeing to Tanzania reach 11,000

The gravity of such influxes in receiving countries was underlined in a May 5 European Union statement that announced a €1.5 million contribution for immediate needs for assistance and protection of these people.

“Such sudden and massive displacement is a humanitarian tragedy and a serious challenge to neighbouring countries’ capacities to accommodate refugees.  It is a serious concern in an already fragile region,” noted Christos Stylianides, the EU Commissioner for Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Management.

“The Inter-Agency Contingency Plan for Burundi seeks $11.6 million for immediate preparedness and $58 million for a possible six-month emergency response,” said Matthew Conway, OCHA’s spokesperson.

The money is needed to provide necessary co-ordinated protection and assistance for people in need of food, water, sanitation and hygiene services, shelter, non-food items, and health.