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Momodou
Denmark
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 Posted - 18 Dec 2007 : 22:12:39
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“Democracy in a Republic means the sovereignty of the people”- Halifa
By Fabakary B. Ceesay
Halifa Sallah has said that an open society is built through the transformation of information into knowledge and knowledge into culture. He expressed reservation regarding comments made by a European Parliamentarian and some delegates that democracy is a process which countries in Africa are likely to move towards on a gradual basis. Halifa emphasised that Democracy is a phenomenon that has concrete characteristics which are universal in application.
He indicated that what takes different forms according to the particularity of countries are the mechanisms employed to consolidate democracy. He called on the delegates to distinguish the essence of democracy and the mechanisms designed to consolidate it. He went on to explain what he meant by asserting that democracy
in a sovereign republic means sovereignty of the people; that democracy exists where people control power and where it is exercised by representatives in their interest and through their consent. He said that this truth is universal.
Halifa was addressing a regional conference organised by Open Society Initiative for West Africa, in Dakar, on Monday 3 December. Mr. Sallah also presented a document on ‘The Electoral Landscape in West Africa-Actors and Interactions’.
The following is the introduction to his paper:
1. Introduction
Elections are not simply about political parties and leaders in their principal sense. They are about the exercise of power by the people. Elections are instruments of democratic governance. Hence they should not be ends in themselves but means through which a people exercise direction and control over the affairs of a State. It, therefore, stands to reason that a discourse on the West African electoral landscape should amount to a survey on how the people in West Africa exercise direction and control over the manner of governance of their countries.
Where elections are taking place periodically, one should interrogate who is actually exercising power, how it is exercised and in whose interest. This will determine whether elections are serving the purpose for which they are intended in a democratic society or are mere rituals, which are performed periodically to
enable those who govern to give a cloak of legitimacy to their misrule and pay lip service to government by popular consent.
In short, elections presuppose the ownership of power by the people and accord mandate, consent or authorisation to exercise such power by chosen representatives to promote the common interest. Elections are the fore instruments for the assertion of the sovereignty of the people. It is the instrument of last resort, in a check and balance system, aimed at curbing abuse of authority, lack of accountability, transparency and probity; total disregard for fundamental rights and the rule of law; untrammelled display of absolutism and impunity or putting an end to bad governance or misrule, in a peaceful manner. It is therefore important to underscore that elections occupy a high grade and upper most position in the hierarchy of the instruments of democratic governance. This also underscores the importance of this conference.
Elections and democracy are irretrievably linked. Elections and democracy first emerged during the struggle between rulers for supremacy. It was first used by rulers of antiquity as a tool for expanding the circle of loyalists who would be interested in the consolidation of their power base. This constituted the first
phase in the evolution of Democratic institutions and the electoral processes which underpin their existence.
However the evolution of Electoral systems took a second phase as a by-product of the struggle between rulers and their subjects. This struggle first started in a peaceful manner with the issuing of petitions aimed at the establishment of juridical guards and fences to check or restrain the absolutism and impunity of rulers. These peaceful acts of issuing petitions ultimately led to the violent act of revolutions to overthrow monarchs who paid a deaf ear to the demands of the people and the consolidation of democracy and elections as principles and mechanism for the peaceful administration of states. This paper seeks to show that the evolution of democracy and elections on the West African landscape has followed the same historical trend. It provides epistemological evidence to show how French colonial Governments granted limited franchise and to privileged urban settlements in the colonies with the aim of assimilating the elites in the colonies into their system of governance so as to prolong their colonial domination. It further indicates how the British colonial administration created
consultative mechanisms in the form of executive and legislative councils which had advisory functions to involve local elites living in major urban settlements in the operation of the colonial administration to facilitate reform and make colonialism acceptable. This paper provides evidence to confirm that it was the resistance of the colonial administration to the demands for substantive democratic participation and the application of the elective principle in creating representative institutions in the colonies which gave rise to petitions and revolutions to put an end to colonial rule and thus gave birth to Universal suffrage, Democracy and Republican existence.
The paper will indicate how resistance to the enlargement of the power of the people and the denial of their sovereign right to determine their manner of government, through periodic and genuine elections and democratic participation after formal independence had been granted, gave rise to instability and revolutions.
This paper, therefore, hypothesises that the consolidation of the sovereignty of the people, the creation of the atmosphere for the holding free and fair elections and ensuring the democratic participation in managing the affairs of any state is a barometer for its stability and sustainable development.
Conversely, the negation of the sovereignty of the people; the violation of fundamental rights, the obstruction of free and fair elections and democratic participation is a barometer for instability and revolution. It concludes by providing adequate epistemological evidence to prove that if West Africa seeks to enjoy political stability and sustainable development, its electoral landscape must be enveloped by the canopy of genuine periodic elections which would give rise to the undiluted choice of the people based on unalloyed national interest and must further ensure their full participation in the administrative life of their societies as the depository of the sovereignty of Nations.
Source: Foroyaa Newspaper Burning Issues
Issue No. 147, 14 – 16 December 2007
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