costs of succession wherever possible, and the state of barbarism as
one in which the passing of the torch is effected amid bloodshed or
through a simple relation of forces" (Régis Debray).
***
With the exception of a handful of countries, in Sub-Saharan Africa,
contentions, violence and bloodletting always mar the electoral
process. It's a law of political "physics," as predictable as the
freezing of water at 0 degree centigrade.
One has still to see the dawn of the day when an African politico
who's lost a bid make a phone call to a rival and congratulate him
(or her) for a "hard-fought campaign," the oft repeated formula on
election nights in the US.
There are routine accusations of fraud and rigging, even when
impartial international observers vouch for the transparency of polls
(DRC in 2006, or, more recently, Guinea and Côte d'Ivoire)
At times, frauds and more or less insidious "confiscation of power" do
occur that obtain laughable landslides (Burkina Faso, Rwanda). Or
outright bloody inter-ethnic strife (Kenya). And the nullification of
electoral outcomes is also attempted when polls go counter the
anticipation of the powers that be (Kenya, Côte d'Ivoire).
Where democratic alternation seems to take hold, sooner or later the
"new" leaders transmogrify into banana-republic autocrats clinging to
power even by the skin of their teeth (Senegal). And vestigial
opposition leaders transform their political parties into family-run
organizations, complete with monarchical successions (UDPS party in
the DRC).
There are "political leaders" but no "political sensibilities" as one
would encounter them in modern democracies (left, center and right of
the political spectrum) but in their stead you have tribal or regional
or, as witnessed in the DRC during the 2006 elections, linguistic
affinities (or cleavages) and allegiances.
In other words: clientelism, patrimonialism (or a tribe's hope of
sharing the loot of the plundered state) or just sheer "tribal-ness"
as the closed horizon of electoral platforms and expectations.
Small wonder then that politics is a dangerous game in Africa. The
powers that be would certainly kill and maim their political
opponents-- the "Others" or the "Sorcerers" as the soukous singer
Franco Luambo once treated anti-Mobutu politicos in a campaign song
titled "Candidat na biso Mobutu" (Our candidate is Mobutu). Angry and
vicious mobs of the opposition kill too--in the name of the tribal
party. Monetary or tribal gains and interests are pegged into slots
that modern democracies usually allot to patriotism and political
partisanship.
Instead of being staffed by independent experts, national electoral
commissions are dangerous dens where political (or tribal) appointees
squabble and question the motives of their colleagues every step of
the way.
While the "state of law" prevails in modern states, a chronic "state
of barbarism" afflicts Africa. But make no mistake: though African
regimes function as if they were staffed by outlaws, scofflaws, and
cutthroats, they use proficient and meticulous legalese to usurp power
or visit judicial atrocities upon political opponents (Côte d'Ivoire,
Rwanda).
More often than not, African elections are funded by the international
community. That's maybe why Africans don't respect the democratic
electoral process. They don't feel the pinch of the prohibitive "costs
of succession" (Debray). In the DRC, despite millions of dollars
invested in the electoral process and the sacrifice of men and women
working in the peacekeeping force(some of them coming from as far as
Pakistan, India or Guatemala), Congolese opposition parties had the
gall to call the first democratic elections to be held since
independence a "farce" orchestrated by the international community to
keep the incumbent at the helm of the state. In Rwanda donors' monies
are simply "embezzled" with total impunity for the incumbent's
reelection.
This international funding of elections and peacekeeping operations in
turn make short shrift of the much trumpeted sovereignty of African
states...
It seems that the only option the UN has in its intervention toolkit
when confronted anywhere with an internal armed conflict is "dialogue"
at all costs--and this form of intervention is often necessary given
the heavy civilian "collateral damage" that inaction might cause.
Africa therefore becomes the only place on earth where armed rebels
are recycled into the legitimate established national armies (DRC,
Côte d'Ivoire).
And this UN dialogue fixation transforms parts of some countries into
very dangerous inhabitable non-state territories: eastern DRC; or the
"Mason-Dixon Line" of sorts splitting Côte d'Ivoire in half: the south
of the country vs the rebel-held part in the north where armed rebels
who still control that side of the country's territory actually
terrorized pro-Ggagbo voters and observers at polling stations.
Has the UN ever suggested to Colombia and Peru to integrate into their
national armies and political class the FARC or the Sentero Luminoso
rebels and their leaders? Has the UN ever pressed China to integrate
the Dalai Lama and the millions of dollar disenfranchised Tibetans
into its political game? Côte d'Ivoire is in Africa, after all, where
anything goes...
We are now witnessing in Côte d'Ivoire the surreal situation where the
head of the UN peacekeeping mission single-handedly assumes the right
to "certify" electoral results, thereby contradicting and
de-legitimizing not only the earlier finding of the Constitutional
Council--which is supposed to be the final authority in these
matters--but the whole Ivorian state as well (arguably a situation
worse than power vacuum).
Then again, as Marshall Sahlins had it, "usurpation itself is the
principle of legitimacy." In Côte d'Ivoire, we have at this moment two
ongoing competing usurpations (and legitimacies): by Laurent Gbagbo
and by the UN (or the coterie of superpowers constituting the Security
Council within the UN--a highly undemocratic club). And only time
would tell whichever of both legitimacies would prevail.
At the same time, foreign countries (like the US, France, etc) take
upon themselves to congratulate and anoint one of the candidates in a
contested election. As one Ivoirian official remarked, this could have
amounted to an African government declaring Al Gore or George Bush the
winner in 2000!
The international community is setting up in Côte d'Ivoire a
dangerous precedent that might further undermine the legitimacy of
African states, a situation where political legitimacy would stem not
from within but from without--the "government in exile" being the
extreme consequence of this kind of reasoning.
Are Congolese supposed to take seriously the US outrage at the
situation in Côte d'Ivoire when they still remember that the first
democratically elected Prime Minister of independent Congo was hounded
and assassinated by the US and its Cold War allies as Mobutu was being
propped up by them? Realpolitik amnesia?
Fifty years after their nominal independence, African countries are
therefore pathetically weak and continue to wallow in a state of
barbarity with apparently no end in sight.
Let's change gear and talk about China which I mentioned above...
Am I going to take Debray's aphorism at face value and claim that
China lives in a "state of barbarism" just because succession is done
"through a simple relation of forces" within the Communist Party?
In point of fact, Debray's aphorism is just what an aphorism is, "a
terse formulation of a sentiment." An undemonstrative quip.
To explain the African (or Ivorian) electoral oddity, where every 4 or
5 years there's ritual bloodletting over elections, I'd rather rely on
the well-documented thesis of Fareed Zakaria in "The Future of
Freedom: Illiberal democracy at Home and Abroad": You don't first
build democracies, then expect economic growth and sustainable
institutions to follow suit. It's the other way around. In fact, it
was under the "illiberal" regime of President Houphouët Boigny that
Côte d'Ivoire saw a steady economic growth unparalleled in the region.
After independence, African elites, propped up by narrow Western
interests, wasted precious time instead of building their countries'
economies. Democracy is a luxury "residents of the republic" can
afford only when they've forgotten the lexicon, reflexes, and behavior
of basic needs.
The French filmmaker Jean-Luc Godard once quipped that Africa always
apes Europe (or the West) too little too late. African democratic
fever is definitely one of those nonsensical imitations Godard had in
mind.
Maybe what Africa needs right now is to see the emergence of more
leaders of the likes of Kagame and Museveni, then worry about
political democracy afterwards... though this would be music in the
ears of aphorists and essentialists: "See? Africans are barbarians who
aren't yet ready for democracy!"
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