Africa has over 50 states with enduring governments. These governments must ensure an atmosphere where people are provided motivations and incentives for self-sustenance and productivity.
In turn, the people of the right age are allowed to vote, i.e. are allowed to exercise free-will to choose a leader of their liking. The people who are vying to be leaders are given opportunity to present ideas, plans and roadmaps of how they intend to conduct themselves once chosen as leaders as well as deliver on what their manifestos promise.
In a multi-party democracy, parties have opportunity to establish structures through which they provide services, act as oversight, get feedback as well as complement development agendas and policies of government. Three important aspects stand out highly in a democracy: governance; due diligence; and exercise of fairness. Africa is a diverse continent and it is on this continent that one is able to see a composite of democracies.
Three important aspects stand out highly in a democracy: governance; due diligence; and exercise of fairness.
The pre-1990 incumbent leaders ( like Paul Biya of Cameroon, Salva Kir Mayardit of South Sudan, Omar al Bashir of Sudan, Pierre Nkurunziza of Burundi and Robert Gabriel Mugabe of Zimbabwe) remain in power, despite efforts by the opposition to unseat them.
Africa has gone through phases of democratic whirlwind:
Between 1930-2010, Africa is provided to the world a brand of pro-democracy grassroot organizations in which dissention, self determination, armed struggle and restoring dignity were the main reasons for doing away with colonialism and apartheid.
The next phase of struggle was led by Africa's homegrown revolutionaries who sought to oust long-serving authoritarian regimes that had served since around 1960 in many countries in Africa.
After the 1990s, significant steps to institute transition to democratic governance in Africa were established. Robert Mugabe, Yoweri Kaguta Museveni, Paul Kagame and Joseph Kabila are sitting presidents who succeeded predecessors who were ousted by the barrel of the gun.
In other situations, countries like Nigeria Egypt, Tunisia, Mali, which had made significant progress toward deepening and institutionalizing democracy, are facing a regression, first, by the continued civil unrest, strife, and threats of cessation or occupations in different regions by groups of separatist rebels, and second, by a military coup that still cause problems in dispensing democracy.
Uganda has just had its Presidential elections of February 18th 2016. However, by the time we went to press the opposition was contesting the results and government was still holding the main opposition contender under house arrest. In this situation, he (Dr. Besigye Kifefe) has not yet presented his case in courts of law yet the 10-day period in which this is supposed to be done is running out.
The African Union and ECOWAS is sending soldiers to intervene in areas such as Somalia and Guinea-Bissau, to support government institutions and proceeded to engage in activities that seriously promote the rule of law.
Meanwhile, violent mobilization by ethnic and religious groups continue to negatively impact governance in Burundi, South Sudan, Nigeria, Central African Republic, Kenya, Uganda, and Madagascar. This threatens to spill over into other next-door countries such as Tanzania ( a bastion of democracy structures compared to many other African countries).
The failure of national institutions to grant adequate protection to individual liberties and lavish extravagancy continues to plague countries such as Cote d'Ivoire, Nigeria, Egypt, Kenya, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Burundi, South Sudan and The Gambia, where U.N reports also talk of arbitrary arrests taking place unabated. South Africa has experiences of civil unrest ranging from acts of xenophobia to police last year using deadly force against protesting miners who were exercising their rights to express discontent in form of matches.
Contributed by research team in Africa
