Africa's Democratic Deficit
By Chris Fomunyoh
After decades of autocratic, personal, and military rule, the
fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the emergence of the third
wave of democracy provided new opportunities for the longsuppressed
democratic aspirations of Africans to rise to the
surface.1 Since then, there have, indeed, been genuine transformations,
including the end of apartheid in South Africa
and the quelling of violent civil strife in Mozambique, Angola
and even Sierra Leone. But overall, democracy's record in
contemporary Africa is a mixed bag of accomplishments, challenges,
and largely unmet aspirations. Ultimately, the causes of
the democratic deficit in Africa are multiple. This paper will
explore several, including the role of the predatory state, the
extreme personalization of politics, and the overwhelming
poverty factor, and suggest further steps that must be taken to
foster democracy in the heart of Africa.
Without a
doubt, the third wave of democracy found fertile soil on the
African continent in the early 1990s. A confluence of factors
seemed complicit in propelling democracy to the fore. First,
the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet empire
produced what some African capitals fondly referred to as "the
wind from the East." The ripple effects reached far across the
continent. A range of left-leaning African governments, satellites of the Soviet bloc, eventually collapsed
under the weight of state dysfunctionality.
Countries that had embraced
Marxist-Leninist principles-including
Congo (Brazzaville), Madagascar, and
Benin-and where the morning bells once
rang with nationalistic salutes of "revolution
or death," began rewriting their constitutions
and renegotiating the social
contracts so as to redefine the relationship
between the citizenry and political elites.
That was the era of national conferences
and citizen activism, similar to the sort
now sweeping through parts of the former
Soviet Union. Pro-western African governments
in countries such as apartheid
South Africa, Kenya, Cote d'Ivoire, and
then Zaire awoke to the new era in which
political pluralism and democratic governance
were exalted within the realm of
international relations.2 New political
parties formed, vibrant civil society organizations
emerged and a freer media
began to blossom across the continent.
Nelson Mandela, the world's longest serving
political prisoner, walked out of prison
in 1990 and four years later became president
of a free and democratic South
Africa. Between 1990 and 1994, approximately
a dozen African autocrats and / or
military rulers lost power either through
credible competitive elections or as a result
of mass movements.3 Africans of all political
leanings celebrated the end of military
and single party rule. In short, the continent's
future looked promising.
Surprisingly, even former military
leaders who initially came to power
through coups abandoned the uniform
and side pistol in favor of suits and the
rhetoric of democracy, civil rights and
citizen participation. Individual countries
began to fine-tune existing institutions to
meet the demands of more competitive
politics, and by the end of the 1990s, the continent-wide Organization of African
Unity transformed itself into the African
Union (AU), which placed a premium on
political and economic reform, respect
for human rights, and the rule of law. The
cause of democracy became the rallying
cry of Africa's leaders, just as previous
generations of rulers had professed their
common destiny with Africa's then
nascent independence movements.
The preamble of the AU's constitutive
act highlights the common vision of an
Africa that caters to all segments of society
including women, youth, and civil society,
and one that is "determined to promote
and protect human and peoples' rights
and consolidate democracy."4 By 2000,
the flurry of nascent initiatives such as the
Peer Review mechanism, a cornerstone of
the New Partnership for African
Development (NEPAD), raised additional
hopes that African political leadership
would lead the march toward democracy.
Even regional organizations such as the
Southern African Development
Community (SADC) and ECOWAS
renewed their eagerness to champion the
adoption of new democratic standards,
including free and fair elections and more
open and representative governments.