TIME EUROPE
July 10, 2000 VOL. 156 NO. 2
Candles in the Wind
Democracy is still the exception rather than the rule in Africa — but there are glimmers of light
By SIMON ROBINSON Nairobi
Veteran Senegalese opposition leader Abdoulaye Wade had failed four times to be elected President. But earlier this year the feisty, dogged politician gathered his energy for a final run, rallying supporters with cries of "Sopi!" (the Wolof word for change). This time Wade, 74, was victorious, defeating Abdou Diouf, who had ruled the peanut-growing West African nation for two decades. Some commentators seized upon the peaceful transition as evidence of Africa's maturing democratic tradition. But while Senegal's success story is worth celebrating it remains an exception. Most African countries continue to struggle with even the most basic democratic principles.
The number of countries allowing multiparty parliamentary or presidential elections has risen from three in 1989 to 42 today, but more elections have not automatically led to greater democracy. All too often polls are called by chance — the death of a military leader, another coup — rather than by democratic pattern. In many countries ballot-box stuffing and voter intimidation remain common, while in countries such as Gabon, Kenya, and Togo, leaders known as Big Men stayed in power by merely tweaking their old-style regimes. "Democracy is still very much about power and about competing élites," says John Githongo, head of the Kenyan chapter of Berlin-based anti-corruption group Transparency International.
One reason for the slow pace of change is that Western-style democracy is still very new to Africa. Traditional systems of rule, which often included a tribal or village leader and a council of elders, rarely survived colonialism. Instead, newly inde-pendent states inherited Western-style democracy even though they lacked — and often continue to lack — essential democratic building blocks like a strong middle class and a sense of shared values. "We have the constitution and the laws of a state but we don't have the values and foundation of a nation," says Ken-yan public policy analyst Sam Mwale. "So government becomes an exercise in grabbing power to control the state, not of running the state on behalf of the people of a nation."
Where democracy has gained a foothold, voters are often frustrated by the results. Just over a year after Nigerians celebrated the end of 15 years of military rule, Africa's most populous nation is shackled by ethnic and religious violence and an economy stuck in first gear. "When we got democracy everything was meant to change," says Lagos street stall owner Benjamin Joseph, 36. "But it's just more of the same." It doesn't help that former military leader and now democratic President Olusegun Obasanjo seems to favor rule by decree. "The problem is not democracy itself but that those people who are supposed to implement it don't even know the basic rules," says Abdul Oroh, executive director of Nigeria's Civil Liberties Organisation.
Some leaders, most notably President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda, maintain that their countries are still not ready for multiparty democracy and that it must develop as social and economic conditions allow. Museveni's no-party "movement" system of government, which has overseen a remarkable turnaround in Uganda's fortunes since the bloody days of Idi Amin and Milton Obote, was voted on at a referendum last week. Although Western groups such as Human Rights Watch have criticized the current system as repressive, Ugandans are likely to favor it over the multiparty alternative: the no-party system has restored peace and stability and, paradoxically, helped create one of Africa's most lively and competent parliaments. In any case, the multiparty supporters boycotted the vote.
Still, the Ugandan model relies to a large extent on its philosopher-leader and it may not survive his eventual departure. In other countries, practicalities are forcing change. The amount of development aid to Africa has plummeted over the past decade, forcing governments to seek private investment. "You have to reach a minimum standard to attract that," says Geoffrey Bergen, resident representative for the World Bank in Niger, where yet another military coup last year led, unexpectedly, to free and fair elections. "The political élite are slowly realizing that the rules of the game have changed."
Perhaps. In the following articles, Time takes a look at two African democracies — one struggling, one quite successful.
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July 10, 2000
COVER
Run, Chicken Run!
The inmates of Hut 17 are planning a great escape. Viewers will get one in this high, wild and hen-some stop-motion adventure
EUROPE
Are We All Agreed Then?
French President Jacques Chirac chooses the Reichstag to deliver one of the strongest calls yet for an avant-garde core group in the E.U.
Anger Unleashed
A schoolyard mauling stuns Germany into action
Second-Class Kids
Romas in the Czech Republic go to court alleging bias against them in the school system
Greece Hits the Wall
Organizers of the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens scramble to recover from their painfully slow start
State of Expectation
Armenians think they may — at last — be on the winning side of history
Democracy Is a Family Affair
Despite the latest French carping, freedom needs a helping hand
AFRICA
Candles in the Wind
Democracy is still the exception rather than the rule in Africa — but there are glimmers of light
Mugabe Feels The Chill
Despite a campaign marked by violence and intimidation, Zimbabweans dare to speak up
A System of Government As Old as the Desert Sands
Talking it up in Botswana
BUSINESS
Funds in the Sun
Tax havens are coming under increasing pressure to clean up money laundering
A New Credit-Card Scam
The latest handheld "skimmers" let crooks use your charge card even as you return it to your wallet
MP3s for the Masses
Having faced down upstart Internet challengers, the record industry gears up for digital distribution
ENVIRONMENT
The Wild Side of Town
Transformed into Europe's biggest urban wetland center, a derelict London site quacks and buzzes with life, luring humans
THE ARTS
The Art of Sexual Vérité
With her shockingly explicit films, French director Catherine Breillat ignites a debate over pornography
Erudite Everyman
Author and literary critic Marcel Reich-Ranicki manages to get German TV viewers enthralled about books
Truth Sadder Than Fiction
An Aboriginal play about the "stolen generation" lays bare a shameful chapter of Australian history
DEPARTMENTS
Olympic Monitor
World Watch
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