Presidential transitions and political accountability

By: Roger Southall, Distinguished Research Fellow, Human Sciences Research Council, South Africa.

In established liberal democracies, heads of government retire from office, either because they have reached a constitutional limit, or for personal or political reasons (such as loss of health or party support), or because they have lost an election. Thereafter, where they do not remain politically prominent, they customarily fade into the background, normally to enjoy an honorific retirement in which many of them engage in remunerative reminiscence. In contrast, during the first decades of independence, few African presidents chose to retire gracefully, with those who survived the perils of assassination attempts or military coups entrenching themselves in office by authoritarian, often murderous, means. However, when from the end of the Cold War, Africa was swept by a wave of popular revolt against personalized dictatorships, the idea that heads of government should henceforth only be allowed to serve for limited terms became widely accepted as part of the overall package of a return to multi-party democracy. Consequently, whereas just eight African presidents retired voluntarily and just one stood down after losing an election during the period 1960–89, the corresponding figures were 17 and 15 from 1990 to 2004.

State control and personal wealth
African presidents have been reluctant to retire because, typically, to leave office means losing not just power but access to wealth. Most African economies are still constructed around the export of a few commodities, taxation and regulation of which – given the lack of a substantial private manufacturing sector – provides, alongside foreign loans and aid, the major revenues for the state. Control over such a state is so highly prized because it allows control over the distribution of scarce resources. This in turn provides the basis for African politics to become centred around patronage systems, headed by 'Big Men'. Further, if loss of office means loss of wealth, logic dictates that opponents must if necessary be eliminated or locked up, and public resources diverted into private retirement accounts held by grateful foreign banks which coyly preserve the anonymity of their clients.

In these circumstances, Africa’s now numerous democracy movements have understandably demanded constraints on presidential powers, including the imposition of term limits. Nor is it surprising that they have called for dictators to be rendered accountable. However, such demands have rendered incumbent presidents even more reluctant to leave office, with the consequence that many democratic transitions have entailed long drawn out confrontations between potential winners and losers – and in many cases, accountability falls victim to the need for political change and stability.

Possible roles for former presidents
Prominent Africanist, Professor Ali Mazrui, has suggested that presidents can be coaxed into leaving office by provision being made for them to assume well-funded and prestigious, international positions. This idea has been taken up by the African Union, which is increasingly appointing former presidents to serve as mediators in conflicts between or within member countries, while the recently established African Statesman Initiative envisages former presidents serving as a sort of continental Council of Elders. However, the idea of former poacher turning gamekeeper, of a dictator like Robert Mugabe transmuting into a convincing guardian of democracy, is clearly one fraught with absurdities and complications. In practice, therefore, any role for former presidents appears to be shaped by three factors.

First, the role of former leaders in liberal democracies is largely governed by the differences between presidential and parliamentary systems: in the former, ex-presidents tend to stand back from partisan politics whereas, in the latter, ex-prime ministers may remain politically active, often with the objective of regaining power. In Africa, in contrast, the distinction between presidential and parliamentary systems has become blurred (as in most Anglophone countries, where presidential elections have been grafted onto inherited Westminster-style parliamentary systems). This hybridity dictates that whereas new power-holders incline to the view that former presidents should withdraw from politics, the latter may prefer to exercise the political latitude allowed to prime ministers in parliamentary systems. Hence Kenneth Kaunda’s decision to remain active as an opposition leader after he lost office in 1990 led to his being hounded by his successor, Frederick Chiluba, until he eventually quit the political arena. Meanwhile, attempts by former presidents to protect their influence by remaining as leaders of a ruling party, as in Chiluba's Zambia and contemporary Malawi and Namibia, often lead to conflict with the new incumbent president – something of which President Thabo Mbeki might wish to take note.

Second, the role allotted to, or assumed by, former presidents in Africa reflects not only the nature of their regimes, but also the manner of their leaving office. Presidents who vacate office voluntarily, and who do so basking in national or international prestige (personified by South Africa’s Nelson Mandela and Tanzania’s Julius Nyerere), and who presided over systems recognized as relatively benign, are enabled to pursue a constructive domestic or international role in their retirement. In contrast, those who have presided over tyrannical regimes, and who were either ejected or squeezed from office, are likely to be hemmed in politically by formal or informal restrictions imposed by a transition to a new, formally democratic, order.

Third, prescription of former presidential roles is likely to constitute a key aspect of any 'difficult transition'. In such transitions there is almost always a pronounced need to balance the demands of justice against the requirements of political stability. Whatever the desirability of subjecting brutal and corrupt dictators to criminal proceedings, the quickest and surest way to peace and stability may lie along the road, if not of forgiveness, then of bargained protection for the tyrant, whether in the form of exile, amnesty, guaranteed security, and pensioned retirement, or any combination of these. However much it galls democrats that a Daniel Arap Moi or Charles Taylor should escape justice for brutal and avaricious sins, the fact remains that they retain a potential capacity to reduce their countries to mayhem.

The demand for political accountability is central to Africa’s democratization process. Unfortunately, the reality is that circumstances often dictate that democratization becomes a distasteful balancing act.