Answer to the crisis of democracy, the African state is in Arusha. Will the region take it?

There were other African elections that went wrong. There were many of them. In the last 20 years, there have been over 410 elections in Africa.

Most of them were contested, with the losing parties – sometimes including the governing parties – dismissing them as stolen. More than 100 of them ended in war, violent protests or widespread repression.

Ethiopia’s 2005 election saw massive protests and a crackdown after opposition parties alleged widespread fraud. At least 200 people were killed and about 760 people were also injured.

An even more deadly outcome happened in Kenya in 2007-2008. Post-election violence erupted after the December 2007 presidential election, after Mwai Kibaki was declared the winner amid allegations of vote-rigging by opposition leader Raila Odinga. Almost 1,400 people were killed and 600,000 were displaced.

In Côte d’Ivoire, in 2010, the contested presidential election between incumbent Laurent Gbagbo and Alassane Ouattara led to civil conflict. More than 3,000 people died and Gbagbo was eventually arrested and handed over to the International Criminal Court. Ouattara became president, but the conflict severely destabilized the country.

The 2001 Ugandan elections were dismissed as tainted by the opposition and were characterized by assassinations and arrests of the opposition.

In a security crackdown on the opposition before and after the January 2021 elections, up to 88 people are estimated to have been killed. Hundreds of people were arrested and several were tried before a military tribunal.

Only about 15 percent of African elections in the past two decades have ended happily, with the loser giving in graciously and the winner not retaliating against the losers.

The cost has been huge, with the Kenyan crisis of 2007/2008, for example, estimated to have taken a $3.7 billion hit to the economy due to violence, displacement and business disruption.

While a few countries have strengthened democratic processes, these problems, combined with the gross incompetence and corruption of several elected leaders and regimes, have shaken confidence in elective government.

They have led to disenchantment with both Western-style multiparty democracy and its African varieties, which proponents argue are “better suited to the continent’s unique conditions”.

In desperation, there were calls for an end to winner-take-all and first-past-the-post politics. Some have called for something close to Lebanon’s confessional system of government, in which political power and state positions are allocated according to the religious affiliation of the population.

The Lebanese Presidency is reserved for a Maronite Christian, the Prime Minister for a Sunni Muslim, the Speaker of the Parliament for a Shia Muslim, and the Vice President and Deputy Prime Minister are mostly Greek Orthodox Christians.

To get there, however, they have to go through elections. Voters choose candidates for parliament regardless of the religion of the voter or the candidate, but candidates run for seats allocated to specific sects.

This, however, has led to political alliances between religions, entrenched sectarian identity, entrenched corruption and worsened the problem it is trying to solve.

Among the reasons many want it reformed is that it is based on the 1932 census, when Christians were the majority in Lebanon.

Today Muslims are on a journey. However, many Christians, not wanting to lose, oppose the reforms. It is easy to see how it would be a disaster in most of Africa.

Some African thinkers look to Bosnia and Herzegovina, which is doing better. It has a tripartite presidency, which was created by the agreement that ended the Bosnian war in 1995.

The Presidency consists of three members: one representing the Bosnian (Muslim) population; one representing the Croatian population; and one representing the Serbian population.

The presidency rotates every eight months among the three members, and each of them has veto power. However, the system has reinforced ethnic divisions and, least surprisingly, is hopelessly inefficient and generating political gridlock. In addition, it still requires elections.

However, it brought stability to Bosnia and Herzegovina. In December 2022, the European Council granted Bosnia and Herzegovina candidate status.

It now waits in line for full admission along with Albania, Georgia, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia, Turkey and Ukraine. Bosnia and Herzegovina will also join NATO within a few years.

Here lies an important ingredient. Regional organizations such as the East African Community and the Southern African Development Community (SADC) could be developed into robust supranational organizations such as the EU.

Then it could work if countries adopt the Bosnia and Herzegovina model, as the supranational organization would run larger government issues such as defense, international affairs and finance (common currency).

Once you take issues like those out of the national space of the states, you lower the political stakes associated with the need to capture power in elections and the incentives for politicians to kill the opposition in their quest for the State House.

East Africa has an answer to the crisis of democracy and the African state in Arusha. But, like the proverbial cow that was led to the well, will it drink the water?

Charles Onyango-Obbo is a journalist, writer and curator of the “Wall of Great Africans”. Twitter @cobbo3