By :- Tegenaw Goshu
“The African Union Organizes the 6th Annual Continental Forum of
Election Management Bodies’?”
This is the title
of a report I read on Satenaw website (English). The report reports that the
Department of Political Affairs of the African Union “organizes the 6th Annual
Continental Forum of Election Management Bodies November 28 and 29 in Nairobi,
Kenya.” It sounds great as far as the general perception of making
elections as democratic and participatory as they should be is concerned. The
report reminds us about the importance of the Forum by saying that it is “to advance democratic and participatory governance in Africa”.
I would like to argue that this
continental body that was established in 1963 (56 years ago) with the
name OAU (Organization of African Unity) has made a remarkable success
story with regard to its most important objective and role of dealing
with the challenges of decolonization , enabling the newly independent
countries to be viable , providing those people who were struggling
to become independent and those who were languishing under a very inhuman
political systems such as apartheid or the brutal rule of white supremacy
with necessary support.
The problem arises
when we try to look into the very question of what happened after
decolonization or political independence. Did those politicians who
claimed themselves as leaders of liberation keep the promise and hope they
preached, or did they become brutal and cynical masters of their own people?Sadly enough, the truth was and is
the later. Yes, they succeeded in getting the objectives I mentioned above
(decolonization and political independence) accomplished. Unfortunately enough,
they couldn’t make the continental body (OAU or the present AU) an instrument
for the prevalence and development of democratic political culture which is
said to be the second most important chapter of the political history of the
continent. They rather used it as a club to deal with their own agenda and
interests of how to rule and how to reconcile their differences and conflicts
of interest in order to avoid public resistance and uprising against their
undemocratic and illegitimate political power. They used the body as the forum
to stand together and condemn any resistance movement of the people which they
believed to be a threat to their limitless and abusive political power.
This very ugly and cynical way of doing politics has continued in a more
systematic and deceitful manner throughout the history of the continental body
OAU and now AU.
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