By Sunday Onyemaechi Eze

THE obvious cases of leadership failure, corruption and decay in institutions driving good governance and many other lapses gave rise to the resurgence of coup d’ etat in the West African sub-region. Young military officers in Mali, Guinea, Burkina Faso, Chad and Niger have within a spate of three years overthrown democratically elected governments in their countries. Expectedly, the global school of thought which subscribed to the maxim of “the worst form of democracy is better than the best of military government has risen in condemnation of the coups”. Nations of the world have bought into the concept of representative democracy as the best form of government because it guarantees, among other things, freedom of choice in leadership recruitment. But democracy despite its acclaimed global acceptance as a form of government has failed in Africa. African leaders have in their quest for money, power and filthy lucre redefined and destroyed what is left of democracy. Consequently, there is this anger against majority of the leaders over under-development in their countries and poor performance. The general consensus among most African citizens and indeed the youth is that good governance does not necessarily come with democracy.     

Over the years, African leaders have, in collaboration with their Western friends who assist them ascend to power against the wishes of the people, hidden behind democracy to impoverish their people. They have hidden behind democracy to corruptly enrich themselves, friends and families. Democracy has brought more pain than dividends to Africa. Most, if not all, African countries are endowed with both human and natural resources but how many of these countries can boast of quality healthcare, good roads, potable water, functional industries and educational facilities? They all go cap-in-hands begging for loans to develop their countries, while in connivance  with some countries allow almost free scoop of natural resources, processed and sold in return at exorbitant prices. A concerned West African leader leader, George Weah, the president of Liberia, gave a realistic response to the West African quagmire. He was quoted as saying that: “As long as ECOWAS tolerates institutional coups that allow lifetime presidencies, and fraudulent declaration of election results, manipulation of judicial announcements, there will always be military coups. And we cannot condemn military coups when we do not condemn those who carry out institutional coups. ECOWAS should work for the interest of our people.” The resurgence of coup d’etat in West Africa and its implications to global stability will have far-reaching implications if leadership index remains abysmally low. African leaders should rise up to their responsibilities while their friends in developed nations should impress it on them to do the right things.  

Countries have come to realise that the battle between Russia, America and her allies was ideological and aimed at enhancing global positioning, maintaining grips and dominance for opportunities to exploit natural resources in Africa and other countries. The military industrial complex is also standing by to make a business meat out of the bad situation. Many nations of the world are getting tired of the status and global influence of America and her allies. Countries like South Africa, Rwanda, Uganda, Ghana, and Kenya have at various fora decried the attitude of the West to the well-being of Africa. Russia and or China seems to offer the desired alternative. Russia has taken advantage of the seeming distrust and moved her diplomatic notch a step further in supporting Africa to find out by themselves the secret of their socio-economic setbacks on account of relating with America, Britain and the entire West. The recently concluded Russia – African Summit was the aftermath of a step aimed at consolidating relations in the region.  

At the meeting President Vladimir Putin announced that Russia has forgiven $23 billion in debt owed by African countries. He also forgave $684 million to Somalia. Putin announced this at a meeting in St. Petersburg with African leaders, where he also promised to send free grain to some of the poorest nations. He said Russia wants to boost trade with Africa and support its regional integration. Putin urges Africans to love themselves and protect their God-given resources. You are wealthy and superior to them; don’t let them continue to enslave you and feed from your destiny, he concluded. Plundering of the natural resources buried in African soil and the hypocrisy of the West is one of the banes of Africa’s development. In fact, the threat to African development is African leaders themselves. They lack vision or intentionally refuse to initiate and drive developmental strides. Incidentally, this has led to high level of frustration and lack. The military always capitalise on this obvious frustration to unseat many unpopular governments.

Seeing the handwriting on the wall, ECOWAS leadership recently constituted a committee against coup to insulate bad leaders from military interventions. Those who manipulated the electoral process in Nigeria and other African countries are not different from the coupists of Niger. The opinions of Mike Agwam and Comrade Onyeneke Ndubuisi Benjamin, as seen on their Facebook pages vividly sum up the street feelings of an average African regarding what is going on. Mike Agwam said: “If I am given opportunity to address ECOWAS, I will ask them one question – which African country have they saved from the hand of totalitarian and despotic government? Apart from that, why are the members of ECOWAS more concerned about the well-being of the leaders than the people? The last and crucial question is: what has the ECOWAS done to change the misfortune of the downtrodden as a result of the misrule of their members? Democracy does not promote misrule, democracy promotes good governance; if there is no good governance in democracy the essence of democracy is defeated.”    

The perception of military coups as an aberration does not necessarily amount to the love America and Western countries have for the affected state. What bothers them is the impact of change the new government will have on their strategic interests. Will the new government continue to align with us, redefine diplomatic relations or fall in love with Russia or China? Africa should look inward and identify the kind of government or arrangements that could possibly work for them. The best form of government is that which respects truth, justice, equity, fairness and attends without fail to the overall needs and aspirations of the people. ECOWAS or anybody cannot like Niger more than its people? Whether by coup or ballot papers, bad African leaders should brace up for more drastic changes. Democracy to me is what the people want.  

*Eze, a media and development communication specialist, wrote via  [email protected]