African Governance Report 2005

Democratic politics and practices have taken a significant leap in Africa in the last two decades. Competitive multiply democracy has been enthroned in many African countries. The political space has been gradually liberalised but despite these advances, challenges to political governance remain in many African countries. The democratic process is often fragile, uneven, tenuous and remains week and barely institutionalised. The scope of political representation has widened through various democratic structures that represent the people. Subsequently, many African countries now have a multiparty democracy with varying degrees of stability, acceptance and legitimacy. While a remarkable development that almost all countries in Africa have embarked on the democratic process, conscious efforts are needed to build on emerging structures and processes and to consolidate the modest progress so far into democratic practice. The survey of experts shows progress as the openness of the political system, political party freedom and security, power distribution and independence of the electoral process are the indicators that scored highest in the African Governance Project. Civil society and media independence and judicial and legislative effectiveness, have also scored quite high- with percentages above 53%. However, decentralisation, as a sub-indicator of executive's effectiveness in terms of power distribution, has the lowest score - below 40%. The culture of political authoritarianism manifested in military dictatorships and one-party systems dominant in many African countries has in the last two decades gradually given way to competitive party democratic systems. And most countries have embarked on constitutional reviews to promote a culture of adherence to rule of law, due process and political accountability.