Tough challenges ahead of Africa’s 2024 elections

Solly Rakgomo | Monday January 29, 2024 06:00

Two-thirds of these elections are packed into the last quarter of the year. A series of elections in southern Africa, where a single party has long dominated, may see their first transition of power while others may lose their legislative majorities.

This potentially reflects a healthy maturation of multi-partyism while incentivising innovation in these contexts.

Several of the Sahelian countries that suffered coups in recent years are scheduled to have elections this year as part of their agreed upon timetable to transition back to civilian rule. When and how these elections unfold will shape the trajectory of governance in this region and the growing security threat it faces.

Roughly half of the elections are unlikely to be competitive because of heavy-handed management of the electoral process by well-entrenched incumbents. These processes raise questions for the continent of what qualifies as a genuine election -and the legitimacy that emerges from an authentic popular mandate.

Many of these countries must overcome long legacies of direct or indirect military government. These highly controlled electoral settings pose challenges for the respective Regional Economic Communities, the African Union, media, and international democratic actors that must navigate how to differentiate exercises from competitive elections and, in the process, further define electoral norms.

Failure to do so will further lower the bar of expectations.

A common and enduring theme across these countries is a strong desire for citizens to have their voices heard as part of the continent’s aspiration for more responsive, public service-oriented, and democratic governance. It is worthy to take a closer look at those African countries where military junta took over to check on whether the military rulers in those countries will uphold to their promise of returning to civilian rule via democratic elections. Mali and Burkina Faso are the two states under military junta where elections are supposed to be held in 2024. Mali’s military junta has again postponed the holding of elections to restore a civilian democratic government despite repeated assurances that it would do so. The latest broken promise was for it to hold presidential elections on February 4, 2024. This date was glibly postponed indefinitely in September 2023 due to “technical reasons”. Only the most gullible were surprised by the announcement.

The military junta of Colonel Assimi Goïta has made no serious effort to prepare for elections since it overthrew the democratically elected government of Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta in August 2020. Keïta had won a second four-year term in credible elections in 2018 with 67% of the vote. Democratic space has shrunk dramatically under the junta. Political opponents and independent civil society actors are intimidated while journalists are threatened, have their credentials revoked, or are arrested. Media outlets face pressure for “patriotic news” coverage. The Malian junta has been able to control the information space.

The junta engineered a referendum in June 2023 that consolidated power in the presidency and would allow junta leaders to serve in a new government, opening the door for Goïta to maintain his hold on power. This process lacked credibility as it excluded large swaths of the Malian political spectrum and civil society, leading to a boycott of the referendum. The opposition has contested the very premise of an unelected authority having a mandate to make amendments to the Constitution. Estimates are that only 28% of the eligible voters participated. The larger takeaway of the junta’s postponement of the February 2024 polls is the apparent intent to restore military government indefinitely. The military ruled Mali for most of the period from its independence up to the 1991 transition to civilian government leaving a legacy of coups, anaemic economic development, and repression.

In neighbouring Burkina Faso, elections intended to restore a democratic civilian government in July 2024 were deemed “not a priority” and indefinitely postponed by the military junta led by Captain Ibrahim Traoré in September 2023. The democratically elected government of Roch Kaboré was overthrown in January 2022 by a junta led by Colonel Paul-Henri Damiba. In July 2022, the junta agreed to a 24-month transition timetable with the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). Then, in September of that year, the 35-year-old Traoré ousted Damiba and superseded the constitution with a charter giving himself unilateral powers. Despite agreeing to keep the previously negotiated transition timetable, Traoré’s refusal to proceed with the July 2024 transition suggests his intention to retain his hold on power indefinitely.

The junta’s unilateral indefinite postponement of the 2024 election is consistent with the ad hoc nature of Traoré’s rule in Burkina Faso. Laws are arbitrarily applied and decisions taken at the whim of the junta leader. This includes the “voluntary” mobilisation of 50, 000 volunteer protection forces. This mobilisation, authorised under Traoré’s emergency decree, has been increasingly used as a means of forced conscription, targeting journalists, civilian political party members, and civil society critics of the junta. These punitive actions are part of a broader campaign to crack down against the media and peaceful dissent in order to maintain the appearance of popular support for the junta. Media outlets that report on the deteriorating security situation in the country, human rights abuses, or dissent within the military are suspended. This has been accompanied by roaming bands of youth militias organised by the junta to physically intimidate any signs of citizen dissonance.

The effect has been to dramatically constrain what had become one of the most open media environments in West Africa. The Traoré junta’s postponement of a transition to a civilian government has profound national and regional security implications. Domestically, it delays re-establishing a legitimate authority that can mobilise a credible, sustained whole-of-society effort needed to defeat the militant groups. A democratic government would also be in a stronger position to marshal the political, financial, and security support from ECOWAS and international partners that will be needed to defeat an insurgency that has now grown past the capacity of Burkina Faso’s armed forces to confront on its own. The decision, moreover, risks the further escalation of violence in Burkina Faso, directly jeopardising security for its southern neighbours, Benin, Togo, Côte d’Ivoire, and Ghana.