Many African nations have struggled to hold fair elections. In 2007, Kenya experienced violence and protests after a presidential election. Why did many Kenyans protest this election's results?
Answers
Answer:
They protested the elections because one person was ahead of all the people in the voting, Odinga. As it got closer to election day, Kibaki (former president) seemed to get closer to Odinga. The Electoral Commission of Kenya said he didn't know who won the election, but a few days later, in private, he declared Kibaki as president, which led people to accuse Kibaki of "stealing the election", which caused people to turn violent. A lot of people had voted for Odinga.
Explanation:
Explanation:
Counting votes after the 2006 election in the Democratic Republic of the Congo: While some post-war elections help entrench democracy, others may mark a continuation of "war by other means."
Photograph: UN Photo / Kevin Jordan
Until two decades ago football games were arguably the most heated contests in most of Africa, sometimes stirring disputes for months. Then came the era of competitive elections. From the beginning, the electoral game topped the charts. And much like football amateurs would tell you about the many games they watch, some elections deserve good grades, others merit bad ones, most lie in the middle. Twenty years into the continent's era of multiparty elections, with around 60 legislative, presidential and other contests taking place in Africa this year alone, such diverse trends persist.
In March Benin held its fifth round of competitive national elections since 1991. The incumbent president, Yayi Boni, won a second term in office and his party maintained its dominance in parliament. Despite claims of vote-rigging by some opposition leaders, observers say the race was fair. Much as in Ghana, Mali, Senegal, Mauritius, Botswana and South Africa, elections in the tiny West African nation, once prone to military coups, have come to embody the best trend on the continent.
These countries have many things in common, including an active civil society, a vibrant and free press, an independent electoral body, a competitive political landscape and a widely shared respect for the rule of law (see box below). Rarely do violent protests precede or follow the proclamation of election results. Peaceful handovers of power following an opposition victory are not uncommon. "These political systems are a result of a long and negotiated compromise among the elites," observes Achille Mbembe, a political scientist at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa.
Perpetuating strongmen
Other elections, however, point to a different trend. True to the words of a former president of the Republic of Congo, Pascal Lissouba, who once professed that "one does not organize elections to end up on the losing side," such contests are mainly window-dressing exercises aimed at legitimizing the status quo. They often occur in countries where the same leaders have been in power for a decade or more. Just months ago, before popular uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt ousted strongmen from office, most elections in North Africa belonged in this category.