Don’t blame democracy for Africa’s problems

A recent article in the Daily Monitor equated pro-democracy advocacy on the African continent, with the goodwill and aid of Western countries, to an iteration of colonialism. Such a stark comparison has the effect of fetching raw emotions to a conversation that requires a clear lens of objectivity. To see democracy as a niggling relic of colonialism is a deeply flawed perspective. 

To many Africans, colonialism evokes memories of the indignities and brutalities that their forebearers lived through. The historical record is clear that the colonial project was designed specifically for the economic benefit of the European countries that parceled up African lands and aggregated its people to administrative units principally overseen from the capitals of Europe. That had nothing to do with democracy for Africans and the colonialists made no pretentions about it.

Instead, in much of colonial Africa, the typical administrative setup had African kings or chiefs being charged with directly ruling over “natives” and being answerable to European colonial administrators. In other words, such African rulers were given the latitude to perpetuate to a degree, the sort of authority they held over their peoples before colonialism.

It could be reasonably argued that as the clock wound down on colonialism, democracy was inevitable in much of Africa. Both Africans and European colonialists saw that. The alternative to democracy would have required a hasty and precarious undoing of the geographic maps that colonialism had drawn up, or some sort of unprecedented deal making to forge unified futures. It is, therefore, not farfetched to assert that this reality guided the sensibilities of the Kwame Nkrumah generation, who were charting the course of African independence at the time. 

At face value, democracy should be easy. It’s simply the process by which a people come together to agree, via consensus, as to who they entrust with running their affairs. Indeed, as you were probably taught in school, democracy is the government of the people, by the people, for the people. It’s a beautifully succinct definition.

It is a wonder how the idea of letting people have a meaningful say in who gets to govern them can be even remotely considered as a trojan of colonialism. For anyone to claim the existence of democracy in a country, there has to be common sense and fair election rules and laws that do justice to its straightforward definition.

Democracy is a vital pillar for building an egalitarian society, but it is inherently delicate. It easily collapses whenever a fair political contest is nonexistent, or the will of the majority is blatantly usurped, which is an ever-present risk in most societies. Countries with strong democracies not only have systems in place to guard against such risks, but it would also appear that democracy is seen as everyone’s baby, and therefore the responsibility of all to safeguard it.

In reality many African countries have relatively strong election laws, but these are often abused by the governments in power to gain illegal advantages in the electoral process. This explains the arrested development of democracy in much of post-independence African countries, which were and are still complex and sometimes uneasy societies, never in short supply of quarrels and ruthless opportunists.

For this reason, most Africans of the post-independence age have only got to experience a poisoned version of democracy, whenever they’ve escaped outright dictatorship. It is no wonder that there is a growing, albeit flawed, chorus that is critical about democracy as an idea, and especially its compatibility to African societies.

However, such naysayers have to recall that amidst the joys, optimism, and comradeship that officially escorted out colonialism and ushered in new independent states, there existed fierce political differences, and maybe even mutual suspicion. Despite this, many of the newly formed African countries still embraced democracy in principle to settle policy and ideological contests.

Indeed, the first governments of many African countries that survived the brutal wars of independence were birthed by consensus among various political groups that forged alliances that gave them electoral majorities to claim governing mandates. In Uganda, the UPC-KY alliance that outfoxed DP is well known. Despite its intrigues, that was democracy at work.

Before democracy is hang out to dry in Africa, it should first be practiced properly, along with good governance and accountability. As former U.S. President Barack Obama once said, democracy is often messy but it’s still the best system a people can use to govern themselves.

The alternative is sitting back voluntarily or involuntarily and hoping that those who have declared themselves as your governors will always do what’s best for you and your community. Given an opportunity to choose between the two, my gut instinct says the decision should be easy.

Tobias Oker, Researcher