Umbrella for Democratic Change (UDC) supporters cheer on the streets of Gaborone in November as President Mokgweetsi Masisi's party suffered a crushing defeat in the general election. (Photo by MONIRUL BHUIYAN/AFP via Getty Images)
Southern Africa's once-dominant Liberation Party faces a disastrous year in 2024.
Just last week, the Botswana Democratic Party (BDP) suffered an embarrassing defeat in a landslide at the polls.
This is the first transfer of party power in the country's post-independence history.
The political shake-up comes after South Africa's historic elections in which the African National Congress received less than 50% of the vote for the first time since the end of apartheid in 1994.
That's not all.
The fate of Mozambique's ruling party, Frelimo, remains uncertain after October's general elections.
Frelimo appears to have heavily manipulated the polls, as support for opposition candidate Venancio Mondlane was so high that the country's Catholic bishops challenged the credibility of the official results, which gave the ruling party candidate a significant majority.
Opposition supporters continue to demand that the government leave power, and Frelimo may be forced to do so in the future despite the violent crackdown on these protests.
Even if it survived, its legitimacy and authority may have suffered a fatal blow.
Fading memories, new concerns
This wave of resistance to Liberation Party rule was dramatic, but not unexpected. They've been getting a ton of help for a while now.
The BDP, for example, has not consistently won a majority of votes, but since Botswana does not have a proportional electoral system, it will still regularly win a majority of parliamentary seats.
The collapse of independent parties in countries such as Benin, Kenya, and Zambia points to at least three factors that critically weakened their hold on power: generational change, economic stagnation, and internal divisions.
Decades after independence, a younger population and a fading memory of the anti-colonial struggle meant that leaders could no longer rely on their status as “founding fathers” for legitimacy.
This has put an even brighter spotlight on the troubled economic performance of governments. Political control of the government fostered corruption and inefficiency, exacerbating the challenges created by a ruthless and often unfair international financial system.
These failures amplified personal conflicts, ethnic tensions, and ideological disagreements within the ruling party, which were avoided by the party in power as the broader church was united above all by opposition to colonial rule. I couldn't.
The more people who quit the government or are expelled, the larger the “waiting opposition'' will become.
By the early 1980s, most nationalist parties on the continent held power, supported by one-party national political systems, and did not have to participate in competitive elections.
When it was removed in the early 1990s, they were left living on borrowed time.
Countries where governments and leaders were more focused on national interests and respectful of the will of the people, such as Benin and Zambia, rapidly lost multiparty elections.
election manipulation
Ruling parties have held out only when leaders systematically manipulate elections and use violence to intimidate and divide opponents, as in Kenya and Togo.
The same is true today.
The popularity of the ANC, BDP and Frelimo has been undermined by economic decline.
Botswana's economy is expected to grow by just 1% this year due to a sharp downturn in the global diamond market, meaning its 28% unemployment rate could rise.
The public is already concerned about corruption and attributes these problems to government failures rather than global trends.
Afrobarometer's recent report revealed that the number of citizens who believe “the president and officials in his office” are corrupt has soared across the continent.
In Botswana, the main concern is nepotism after a major contract was signed with a company owned by outgoing president Mokgweetsi Masisi's sister.
In Mozambique and South Africa, concerns about expropriation are even more heightened, and state capacity is increasingly undermined by the exigencies of entrenched kleptocracies.
Internal divisions also continue to have a negative impact, reducing the support base of today's ruling party.
The new political vehicle built around former ANC members Jacob Zuma and Julius Malema, which won 24% of the national vote in the 2024 general election, was mobilized behind his government. That would have given Cyril Ramaphosa a landslide victory.
The BDP was similarly hit by the conflict between President Masisi and his predecessor, Ian Khama, son of the nation's founding father Sir Seretse Khama, who left the party and subsequently denounced it.
These public altercations not only strengthen the opposition but also undermine the government's claim that it has a right to hold power because it embodies the values and traditions of the liberation and independence movement. It is.
How these trends play out varies, but their cumulative effect has undermined the ability of nearly all independence and liberation parties to remain in power democratically.
The reason that ruling parties in Mozambique, Tanzania and Zimbabwe have not lost as much vote share as in Botswana and South Africa is not because they performed much better, but because they used greater intimidation and repression to manipulate election results. .
All eyes will now be on Namibia, where voting will take place on November 27th.
A weak economy, rising unemployment and corruption allegations have undermined support for Swapo's government. If free and fair elections are granted, a new Liberation Party may lick its wounds again towards the end of 2024.
Nick Cheeseman is Director of the Center for Elections, Democracy, Accountability and Representation (CEDAR) at the University of Birmingham.
This article was first published continentA weekly pan-African newspaper produced in partnership with . email and guardian. Designed to be read and shared on WhatsApp. Download your free copy here.
