Africa: Why we must fight for strong institutions:

Strong and independent institutions are the cornerstone of any democracy. Aspiring democracies in Africa must therefore endeavor to nurture a culture of institutionalism by investing and jealously defending strong and credible institutions and steering free from personality cults and deceptive charismatic autocrats. 

The era of African strongmen and despots seem to be in the sunset, but this may not be happening as fast as we would like. A new marque of leaders adept at using charisma, personality cults and tribal arithmetic to water down institutions is on the steep ascent. Even though strong democratic frameworks may already exist; there has been limited political will by the leadership to realize full implementation.

 The last decade or so has seen many African countries commendably transition towards multiparty democracy and open up democratic space, however the excursion towards institution building has not been as fast. 

Many African countries have threatened to roll back these gains by the subtle emergence charismatic and manipulative leaders who have used their popularity and personality to weaken institutions and undermine opposition in a bid to avoid any dissenting voices or infelicity with their regimes. Unfortunately; in many cases they have had a generous following of misguided supporters or tribesmen; who they have used to gain legitimacy, sustenance and a soft landing.

L’État cest moi…I am the state:

These are the famous words of a French monarch Louis XIV of France and these words in the simplest translation mean, “The state is me” or “I am the state”.

By saying this, the monarch was making himself the absolute personification of France as the supreme decision maker with nobody to challenge his sovereign authority. He was implying that he was everything in France. He was every institution: the legislature, the judiciary, the enforcement and the sovereign executive. 

This is precisely the Kind of thinking that the French sort to disband with the French revolution that subsequently deposed the monarchy and instituted “The Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen”. 

There is almost a direct correlation between autocratic rule and revolutions or coup d’états. And there are stark examples in Africa. There is need therefore for Africa to rise above autocratic and tyrannical rule and continue the march towards the building of strong and independent institutions; if it is to catch up with the rest of the world.

Among the institutions most affected are the election bodies, the judiciary, the opposition, Civil rights groups, the police and the media. It is rare to find free, fair and credible electoral bodies in Africa.

How can you lose an election that you have organized? How can you lose an election which you have single handedly selected the commissioners who then owe allegiance to you and know they can’t bite the hand that feeds them?

And even if your opponents are dissatisfied with the election process and the outcomes, where do they go next to seek redress? To the same judiciary which you have single handedly picked your stooges and cronies?

And suppose your opponents decide to seek their democratic rights by marching in the streets to protest the compromised institutions; you will be waiting for them with the police who owe allegiance to you and are there to do your bidding.

Many African countries are awash with complains of intimidation of the opposition. In any multiparty democracy, the opposition must be free to carry out its mandate which remains crucial in the preservation of democracy. Any government must be closely watched and kept on toes and reminded of its mandate to the people.

The opposition, the media and civil rights movements must therefore be given democratic space to act as a watchdog for the people. Any government that is oversensitive to criticism and dissenting views and seeks to manipulate, obfuscate or intimidate these institutions which are valuable for the conservancy of democracy should be considered an enemy of the people.

It has been a long and painful march towards Africa’s democratic transition. Africa must therefore stand its ground and resist without temerity any regimes that seek to derail or rollback our painfully acquired freedoms and rights. We must not accept to be ethnically or otherwise bifurcated by leaders who seek not what is best for us but rather what is best for them. We must defend our liberties and continue to build strong institutions for posterity.

Tribalism in Africa: Why our leaders cannot be brought to accountability

Africa’s progress towards true democratization has indeed been a slow and agonizing excursion. Tyrants and autocratic leaders like Idi Amin of Uganda, Sekou Toure of Guinea, Sani Abacha of Nigeria, Moubutu Sesseseko of Zaire who once presided over their nations with iron fists are long gone and seemingly curtains have closed on the age of African strongmen.  However a new breed of leaders adept at mobilizing tribal numbers and manipulating ethnic emotions has emerged and this severely threatens to roll back the democratic gains that Africa has realized in the last few decades. Tribalism is quickly finding its way to the top of the list of the maladies that plague Africa. Tyranny and authoritarian rule have been replaced by tribal politics as the biggest threat to Africa’s democratic transition.

In many African countries, tribalism has consumed the social fabric and become the center stage of all social, political and economic processes. In Kenya for instance, tribe has become the beacon behind which people rally, and in many cases a person’s surname determines his political opinion. Kenya’s post-election violence in the follow up of the disputed 2007 elections demonstrated how quickly tribal politics can degenerate into violence, and bring a country to the brink of anarchy. But what exactly is tribalism? How is it instituted in African politics and who benefits from it?

Tribalism is a state whereby loyalty to one’s tribe supersedes loyalty to the nation and by extension governs a person’s social, political and economic perceptions. Tribalism becomes institutionalized when it is practiced as government policy and the state uses tribe as a major dynamic in governance. In pre-colonial Africa; what we today consider as tribes were in real sense; nations.  In some cases, these nations were in a state of perennial conflict with one another. The colonizers took advantage of this rivalry between nations and instituted a policy of divide and rule to ensure that the task of colonization was easy. African borders were drawn; not informed by any sort of anthropological or cultural considerations but rather by the economic desires of the colonizers and the political rivalries between competing colonial powers. Needless to say that these artificial and arbitrary borders brought together communities that found it difficult to co-exist.

The founding fathers of Africa had a challenging task of forging nationhood by bringing rival nations together into single nation. This was a grim task, but certainly not insurmountable as countries like Tanzania and Botswana have demonstrated. However the same can hardly be said of many other nations in Africa. In Kenya for instance tribalism has hindered democracy to a prodigious extent. Political parties are not formed based on any ideological considerations but rather on tribal mathematics and ethnic loyalty. Tribal numbers have become the standard for political competition and leaders have exploited this for personal interests and material gains.

In turn, it has become a difficult task to bring these leaders to accountability, because they quickly recede into their cocoons and foster a siege mentality that turns any form of criticism into a crucifixion of their entire community when hard questions are asked. Tribalism as a political consideration does not advance any democratic ideals and thus; using it as a basis for political competition negates the progress towards true democratization. Somali is a stark reminder of what is possible when tribal or clan loyalty supersedes national identity. Africa must wake up and realize that tribalism is retrogressive and only serves to serve the parochial interests of a few individuals. It weakens institutions and promotes an environment of cronyism and patronage which ensures that accountability cannot be asked of our leaders who continue to act with utmost cupidity.

Africa: A failure of leadership and governance; with Kenya as a case in point:

The period between 1960 and just about 1973 is fondly remembered by many as ‘the sixties’. The world was changing swiftly and there were numerous turning points in political, social, cultural and technological circles. It was like a new awakening; an ushering in of a new world order. To many this is known as the era of the shift from a preceding order to a novel one that encouraged individual freedom, liberty and the pursuit of new ideals. It became known as an era of nationalism. A new consciousness was sweeping across the globe, and more and more people were beginning to agitate for the end of the old rigid dispensation and the ushering of a new way of thinking. In the United States, the black civil rights movement was at full momentum, just as well as the Vietnam anti-war protests. In Asia the Arab Israeli conflict was raging and in China the Chinese people were undergoing a cultural revolution. The world was at crossroads, and the conservative and inflexible ways of the past could no longer hold back the sweeping new spirit.

The advent of the sixties was a monumental era for Africa as well. The malevolent institution of colonialism which had for centuries shackled and bled the children of Africa was rapidly disintegrating in the wake of African nationalism and international pressure. Many African states were gaining or were at the advanced stages of gaining their independence. As many as 32 African countries actually gained their independence in the period between 1960 and 1968 and this includes our own beloved Kenya. Anybody who was alive then would have thought that Africa’s moment had finally arrived. With the vast wealth of the continent, the robust growing population and the enthusiasm of the African people, this was like a rebirth; the beginning of a new age of prosperity.

But such enthusiasm and optimism were short lived, as the cruel hand of reality soon reared its ugly face. The aspirations of the people quickly diminished, as within just a decade; many of the infant nations had degenerated into civil strife, chaos, poverty and anarchy. Coup d’état after coup d’état brought many African countries on their knees. And in no time Africa was lagging behind the rest of the world in their Human Development Index. In just about a decade, Africa had degenerated from the dark horse, to the black sheep of the world.

So, what exactly had happened to dampen the enthusiasm and the aspiration of the African people? What had subverted the future that that we had bitterly and painfully crusaded for? What had plagued our dream of self governance and our dreams of prosperity and wealth? Of course several schools of thought exist in the attempt to explain how a continent that was beaming with so much hope and optimism would come to paint such a less than enchanting picture. One school argues that the wave of nationalism that had swept over the world was deceptive and that most African nations were not ready to be independent and self governing. This thought goes further to say that most countries had rushed their independence and did not have the institutions, the knowhow or the infrastructure to handle this new dispensation. The other school of thought argues that independence for African countries was a poisoned chalice and that the colonial powers were simply not going to give up their cheap sources of raw materials, labor and dumping markets without a fight. This school of thought goes on further to pronounce that the colonial powers intentionally rocked the boat to ensure that chaos ensued in their former colonies so that they could continue to plunder resources in the consequent chaos. France has been pointed as the biggest culprit in this quarter.

Whereas both the two arguments above have credence, particularly the latter, Colonialism and Neocolonialism cannot truly justify why even after decades of self governance Africa’s problems still persists. The effect of colonization and imperialism on the African psyche cannot be wished away; neither can the unfair trade practices and the debts that bedevil Africa, but it is ripe time that that we as Africans looked beyond the perennial blame game and gaze at the person in the mirror. Many African countries recently turned 50, and some may argue that 50 years is more than ample time for a nation to get its house in order. So then; what exactly is Africa’s problem? The late internationally acknowledged writer Chinua Achebe never minced his words when asked about what he thought was really plaguing Africa. He passed a verdict of ‘guilty’ on African leadership. Of his country Nigeria he said, “The trouble with Nigeria is simply and squarely a failure of leadership. There is nothing basically wrong with the Nigerian character. There is nothing wrong with Nigerian land or climate or water or air or anything else. The Nigerian problem is the unwillingness or inability of its leaders to rise to the responsibility; to the challenge of personal examples which are the hallmarks of true leadership” The internationally acclaimed writer emphatically put the blame on African leadership, in a bid to decipher why we as Africans find ourselves in this undignified position.

It is clear that as Africans our leaders have miserably failed us. Nigeria’s problems as articulated by Chinua Achebe are no different from Kenya’s problems, nor Ivory Coasts’ problems nor any other African countries’ problems. It all stems from poor leadership and bad governance. As Africa our leadership has simply and inexcusably failed us right from our founding fathers, and I will use my country Kenya to illustrate this point. For a post-colonial African nation to take off economically and socially number of factors had to be incumbent. The first one was the proper mobilization of the nation’s resources, both physical and human. To most African countries, land was the biggest factor of production, and so a competent post-colonial land policy was of the essence, but needless to say, most founding fathers blundered with their preliminary land policies. Most continued with the colonial land policies and involved corruption, tribalism and nepotism in land allocation. Many African people were left landless and thus impoverished and unable to participate in production and wealth generation which would have set precedence for industrialization. A lot of land fell in the wrong hands of either people who were no able to utilize or those who had no interest in utilizing it, leaving large tracts of productive land idle. This was one of the failures, for instance of our very own Mzee Jomo Kenyatta. Post-colonial governments also required that the wave of nationalism that had agitated for freedom be used to mobilize the different people from different subcultures into forging nationhood, but most African leaders failed miserably in this area either by commission or omission. It is no wonder that today, most of our problems can be traced to tribalism, clanism and failure of a common national identity in most African countries.

I will use my own country Kenya to extrapolate some of the problems that belabor our African nations today to the extent that our human development index remains where it is, a stark contradiction to the Asian giants with whom we were once at par. A recent study by the research company Ipsos Synovate concluded that Kenyans themselves know exactly what is wrong with their country. 22% of the Kenyans interviewed attributed Kenya’s predicament to poor governance, while 20% thought corruption was Kenya’s biggest problem, needless to say that corruption simply reflects on the governance. 14% thought it was government neglect, while 11% attributed it to insecurity and 6% to tribalism. It is clear that we all know that our own problems stems from those we entrust to lead us.

Our leadership simply has not got it right. At independence, Kenya’s economy was at par with that of South Korea. Today, South Korea’s GDP is almost forty times that of Kenya. This is obviously nothing to be proud of. So, where did the rain start beating us? They say that any course starts and ends with the leadership. The leadership is supposed to set the priorities right for developmental take off, but most post-colonial governments including that of Kenya failed miserably in this endeavor. Lack of investment in infrastructure from successive regimes in Kenya made sure that the country could not attract investment. Most of the money required to build the basic infrastructure that would make it easy for the country to do business ended up in private hands. Corruption and mismanagement meant that most capital projects were compromised or altogether ignored. Wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, while the masses lacked the basic infrastructure to generate wealth and build a robust economy. Another basic failure of successive governments was the lack of adequate investment in the education sector. To become competitive and to meet the demands of a rapidly growing economy, technical expertise was of the essence. Lack of proper investment in education ensured that skilled labor was not readily available, and neither was a breed of technocrats and scholars who could steer innovation.

Another glaring failure of these governments was the failure to unite. Many African founders including our very own Jomo Kenyatta adopted divisive systems of government based on ethnic divisions as a way of keeping a foothold on their autocratic regimes. Many regions or communities were marginalized or left out of development. Even though Kenya might have survived the political strife that characterized the sixties and seventies because of this kind of leadership, many other African states were not as fortunate. Coup d’états, civil wars, secession and subsequently anarchy were among the results of these poor government policies. This was of course exacerbated by the opportunistic Western nations that were always waiting in the periphery to capitalize on the resultant chaos to plunder resources. Political unrest in most African states has been driven by the need by these autocratic regimes to have control of power. This takes emphasis away from institutionalism and subsequently leads to failed states since many of the excluded groups take advantage of these institutional failures to secede or topple the governments.

It is always said that it is easier to state the problem than to provide the solutions. So what is Africa’s way forward in a nutshell? Simple: Africa needs a new breed of leaders to steer the continent into future prosperity. Africa requires leaders who are dedicated to good governance, inclusion and true democratic principles. This of course, might sound like a song that has been played before. In the 80s and 90s a new breed of leaders seemed to be on the rise and once again optimism in a new Africa was cautiously renewed. Many Sub-Saharan countries were breaking down their corrupt and autocratic regimes and participating in multiparty elections. It was almost like a new African renaissance. Such leaders as Yoweri Museveni of Uganda, Jerry Rawlins of Ghana, Paul Kagame of Rwanda et al were seen as a new brand of visionary leaders who could be entrusted to steer the continent into the future. But just like the optimism that had characterized the initial post-colonial governments, this optimism quickly faded. The ‘big man’ syndrome persisted and so did the poor governance, the corruption, the divisive leadership and the tendency to cling to power at any cost.

In conclusion, Africa can only salvage itself by acquiring a new brand of leaders. Economic development does not just happen. It is steered by good policies, good governance and political will. The new breed of aspiring African leaders must approach leadership with a vision of serving the people and not just for private gain and enrichment. They must be committed to good governance, proper policing and fiscal management which are fundamental to renewing Africa fortunes. Africa needs leaders who can deliver tangible results to the people and not just sheer rhetoric; otherwise we will continue being the talk of the world in the same negative light that we find ourselves today.