Earlier last semester, the UWA
Politics Club was to host Dr. Roger Chongwe, Zambia’s opposition leader-in-exile,
to talk about problems with democracy in southern African countries. Since
we had trouble coordinating times with other speakers, this forum is still
on the long term agenda. As background, then, this paper will discuss
perspectives on current democratic dilemmas facing southern African countries.
These obstacles are largely the legacy of colonial rule, which didn’t
imbue the ‘weak’/ ‘threshold’/ ‘quasi’- states with enough of a democratic
tradition to ensure accountability and regime continuity; facilitating
corruption, nepotism and entrenched power in leadership.
This in turn leaves the people
increasingly cynical as to whether anything has changed, or whether democracy
can work in their country. Too often we hear disillusioned cries of "Democracy
has not worked in Southern Africa". Are these cries justified or
are expectations of ‘democracy’ unrealistically high?
The advent of political pluralism
in the early 1990s throughout South African States brought new hopes for
democracy, human rights, and economic prosperity. Since 1990, the year
of the rise of political changes in Africa, multi-party elections have
been held in more than 40 African countries. Many leaders and their movements
which had been in power for so long, like Kenneth Kaunda (The father of
Zambia’s independence) or Dr. Hastings Kamuzu Banda (Malawi) were removed.
However, the shortcomings in the first and second batch of multi-party-elections
show that new ‘democratic’ institutions have created their own challenges.
Violence, corruption, human rights abuses and the entrenchment of leaders
and their increasingly authoritarian stances continue, indicating that
after decades of one-party rule, change doesn’t come easily.
Entrenched leadership
With few exceptions, the leadership
elected at the first fair elections entrenched itself, disregarded democratic
constitutions and replaced them with single party constitutions, thus
in effect becoming dictators. Political rhetoric continues, but due to
the way ‘democracy’ is seen and played out in these South African States,
little consensus mitigating raw political conflict is the order of the
day. The crushing of high hopes has largely been because of the misunderstanding
and abuse of ‘democracy’ by political leaders, because of their false
and unrealistic promises to the people, and because of the peoples’ tendency
to equate democracy with economic advancement.
As mentioned, colonial rule didn’t
create any lasting democratic tradition. The one party system was seen
as a valid tool to create national unity and political stability against
a background of ethnic and geographical diversity. Since independence,
only a few leaders of the 48 black African countries have voluntarily
resigned. The rest have been overthrown by their armies, killed or removed
at the first democratic elections. Many constitutions have had loopholes
and provisions to remove any limits to the number of terms in office,
and this helps explain the high number of military coups. Nelson Mandela’s
promise not to stand for a second term was so outstanding, since many
African leaders still see themselves as irreplaceable – vital to their
country’s unity. The constitutions of Zambia and Zimbabwe allow the President
to nominate up to eight and up to thirty persons (respectively) to the
National Assembly.
The undemocratic nature of this
practice is worsened by the first past the post electoral system in the
African Commonwealth countries, which strengthens majorities and lessens
opportunities for political debate within and between states. A proportional
representation system, such as in the Republics of South Africa, Namibia
and Mozambique would promote a more multi-party system, reducing high
majorities and allowing minority involvement. Public participation could
also be increased by giving more autonomy to local councils. The predominantly
centralised nature of the Southern African States far worsens the effects
of inefficiency of the administration, fatal economic decisions and corruption.
Flawed Constitutionalism
The well-known doctrine of ‘separation
of powers’ between legislative, executive and judiciary is vital for any
true democracy, but as Dr Chongwe argues, almost all of the African Commonwealth
Countries have an incomplete separation between the executive and legislative
because, apart from the President, members of the executive are also members
of the legislature. Constitutionalism will be inherently flawed without
an overriding respect for its purposes, including respects for the rights
of the people. Because of corruption, nepotism and the high stakes involved
in transferring or maintaining power, the political process is too often
devoid of any of the basic agreement on the nature of politics which is
vital for democratic continuity.
Quasi-Democracy
We often hear of attempts to ‘Africanize’
democracy in Southern Africa. For example, in Ausust 1997 a Zimbabwean
senior minister said that "foreigners masquerading as champions of
democracy in Africa are in fact seeking access to wealth rather than entrenching
human rights". He claimed that democracy had no roots in the history
and experience of local (especially rural) people, except for learned
academics who were imposing an interpretation of the world view among
the people. He said "We can never run a democracy better than the
Americans or the British, just as well they cannot run a chieftainship
like us…So this political adventurism will only encourage dissent and
instability within society..." While it cannot be denied that the
lack of Western democratic tradition makes some of its principles difficult
to understand or implement, these principles are more conducive to protecting
basic human rights than autocratic regimes, and are not supposed to be
in any way ‘culturally relative’.
Policies allowing the establishment
and semi-autonomy of traditional villages to preserve African identity
could reduce alienation of rural people to their government if they fostered
communication, and offered respect the right of their people to basic
freedoms; recognition of differing political opinions, and accountability
and responsibility of their leaders. Without these principles claims to
‘democracy’ would be nothing more than a sham. For example, October 1st
this year supposedly marks the end of military rule in Nigeria. But even
if it does and the President becomes a civilian, this is no guarantee
of democracy, since it is very likely that the military will remain powerful
enough to remove (or accept endless bribes from ) presidents it doesn’t
like, as it did in removing General Babangida.
Conclusion...