Journalist, writer and curator of the Wall of Great Africans
Mozambique is teetering on the edge, after an election that has been disputed, left an opposition party official and lawyer murdered, and clashes between the police and protestors.
Mozambique’s opposition Podemos party and its presidential candidate, Venâncio Mondlane, rejected provisional results showing the long-ruling Frelimo party headed for victory and said darkly that the country was in a “revolutionary” atmosphere. With Mozambique’s tragic civil war history, Mondlane’s remarks set off jitters.
It was another African election gone wrong. There have been many of them. Over the past 20 years, there have been over 410 elections in Africa.
The majority of them have been disputed, with the losing parties—occasionally including even the government parties—rejecting them as stolen. Over 100 of them have ended in war, violent protests, or extensive crackdowns.
The 2005 election in Ethiopia saw massive protests and a crackdown after opposition parties claimed widespread fraud. At least 200 people were killed, and some 760 people were also injured.
An even deadlier outcome happened in Kenya in 2007-2008. Post-election violence erupted after the December 2007 presidential election, after Mwai Kibaki was declared the winner amid allegations of vote rigging by opposition leader Raila Odinga. Nearly 1,400 people were killed, and 600,000 displaced.
In the Ivory Coast in 2010 a disputed presidential election between incumbent Laurent Gbagbo and Alassane Ouattara led to a civil conflict. Over 3,000 people died, and Gbagbo was eventually arrested and handed over to the International Criminal Court. Ouattara became president, but the conflict severely destabilised the country.
Elections in Uganda since 2001 have been rejected as flawed by the opposition, and have been characterised by killings, and arrests of the opposition.
In a security crackdown against opposition before and after the January 2021 election, up to 88 people are estimated to have been killed. Hundreds were arrested, and several have been tried before a military court.
Only about 15 per cent of Africa’s elections of the past two decades have ended happily, with the loser conceding graciously, and the victor not lashing out vengefully against the losers.
The cost has been humongous, with Kenya’s 2007/2008 crisis, for example, estimated to have landed a $3.7 billion blow on the economy due to violence, displacement, and disruptions to businesses.
While a handful of countries have consolidated democratic processes, these problems, combined with the utter incompetence and corruption of several of the elected leaders and regimes, have shaken faith in elective government.
They have led to disillusionment with both Western-style multiparty democracy and the African varieties of it that proponents claimed would be “more situated to the continent’s unique conditions.”
In desperation, there have been calls for an end to winner-take-all and first-across-the-post politics. Some have called for something close to Lebanon’s confessional system of government, where political power and state positions are allocated based on the religious affiliations of the population.
The Lebanese presidency is reserved for a Maronite Christian, the Prime Minister for a Sunni Muslim, the Speaker of the Parliament for a Shia Muslim, and the Deputy Speaker and Deputy Prime Minister go mostly to Greek Orthodox Christians.
To get there, they however have to go through elections. Voters elect candidates for parliament regardless of the voter's or candidate's religion, but candidates run for seats allocated to specific sects.
This, however, has led to political alliances across religions, reinforced sectarian identity, entrenched corruption, and made the problem it is trying to solve worse.
Among the reasons many want it reformed, is that it is based on the 1932 population census, when Christians were the majority in Lebanon.
Today Muslims are on the journey. However many Christians, not wanting to lose out, oppose the reforms. It is easy to see how this would be a disaster in most of Africa.
Some African thinkers are eyeing Bosnia and Herzegovina, which does better. It has a tripartite presidency, which was created by the agreement that ended the Bosnian War in 1995.
The presidency consists of three members: One representing the Bosniak (Muslim) population; one representing the Croat population; and one representing the Serb population.
The chairmanship of the presidency rotates every eight months among the three members, and each of them has a veto. However, the system has bolstered ethnic divisions and, least surprisingly, it is hopelessly inefficient and breeds political stalemate. Additionally, it still requires an election.
However, it has brought Bosnia and Herzegovina stability. In December 2022, the European Council granted candidacy status to Bosnia and Herzegovina.
It’s now waiting in the queue for full admission together with Albania, Georgia, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia, Turkey and Ukraine. Bosnia and Herzegovina will also likely join NATO in a few years ahead.
Herein lies an important ingredient. Regional organisations like the East African Community, and the Southern African Development Community (SADC) could be developed into robust supranational organisations like the EU.
It might then work if countries adopt the Bosnia and Herzegovina model because the supranational organisation would run the bigger matters of government like defence, international affairs, and finance (common currency).
Once you take matters like those from the national space of states, you lower the political stakes associated with having to capture power in elections, and the incentive for politicians to murder the opposition in the quest for State House.
East Africa has an answer to the crisis of democracy and the African state in Arusha. But, like the proverbial cow that was taken to the well, will it drink the water?
Charles Onyango-Obbo is a journalist, writer, and curator of the “Wall of Great Africans”. Twitter@cobbo3
