Are Africans natural born dictators?

A look at the long list of African dictators, past and present, led one of my friends to declare that maybe it’s in our genes to resort to dictatorial tendencies every time we find ourselves in power.

This might seem true, if one were to consider the long list of African dictators starting from Mobutu Sese Seko, Idi Amin, Charles Taylor, Sani Abacha, Robert Mugabe, to name but a few.

Of course, a counter-argument would be to produce a balance sheet of an equally long list of European dictators such as Napoleon Bonaparte, Louis Napoleon Bornaparte III, Adolph Hitler, Mussolini, Francisco Franco, Tsar Nicholas and many others. This settles the score, doesn’t it?

To contra-pose African dictators by producing a balance sheet of an equal number of European renegades does not resolve the issue, however. The question looms large; why is it that Africans, despite defeating colonialism, and undemocratic rule, often degenerate into dictatorships of their own kind?

This has to be analysed within the context of the insertion of Africa into the global economy, now no longer as a refreshment station, but as a supposed equal player with its own political leadership, and economic base.

Unfortunately, by the time Africans won independence, colonial masters were not yet satisfied with the amount of loot they had collected from their colonies. They then ensured that they left stooges behind, posing as liberators and post-colonial governments, whom they would pull by the nose. They would then dictate terms to the former colony via the mouth of the appointed stooge.

Zimbabwe is an example of a situation where Britain did all in its power to ensure that Zanu rather than Zapu took over from Smith. To the delight of Western powers, Mugabe (as expected of a stooge) went ahead with structural adjustment programmes, toed the line of the Bretton Woods institutions, and pursued a liberal and later neo-liberal economic system.

He became mean to trade unions, and socialists, while lean to international and domestic capital. He murdered thousands in Matabeleland. He did this with the cheerleading of international capital that by 1994 hailed Zimbabwe as the best economic model in Africa. Then he lost legitimacy. Britain found another stooge to replace him.

There are also worse scenarios, where Western Capital favoured an unelected leader such as Mobutu Sese-Seko rather than the popular, but radical, Patrice Lumumba. True to its deeds, Western capital protected Mobutu with total economic support. Had it not been for a coup d’état, Mobutu would still be with us and there would be no noise about DRC — the attention would be on the fallen son, Robert.

The duty of the stooge has always been to facilitate Western accumulation, even to the detriment of the nation itself. The minute the stooge loses legitimacy and tries to gain back national support by renouncing his handlers, the screws are turned on him and another stooge is found as a replacement. Corruption is not an issue if it is a dictator-stooge that loots a country’s resources!

Western capital did not succeed in imposing its will through the ballot in all African countries so it took a short cut. It overthrew all those who posed a threat to its continued accumulation. This was because some African leaders took over colonised states with good intentions.

Some dreamed of total literacy, while others foresaw economic development, while at the same time vowing to keep international capital at bay. All of those who had such wishes were overthrown by Western funded coup d’états. Lumumba is among them and there are still questions about the death of Samora Machel.

While continuing to be an economically contested terrain by capital, these countries had atrocities — both political and economic — to correct. To make matters worse, most African Nations gained independence during a period where world capitalism had developed to its highest stage — globalisation.

This meant that, while Africans were still grappling with democracy and political independence, they were expected to compete in a global economy, armed with nothing but dependent and miniscule economies, whose resources are not enough to feed the political elite itself.

Under circumstances where the political elite cannot accumulate, without depriving the country’s population, politicians resort to dictatorial tendencies to silence their country’s population.

Naturally, dictatorships start on small issues, from media censorship to open brutality. Then to full-blown massacres. How long will international capital continue producing famine, and then blame the stooge, and replace it with another, so as to gain legitimacy and continued accumulation in Africa?