When juntas call democracy “colonialism,” it isn’t theory, it is a tactic to launder failure into pride.
Across the Sahel-to-Atlantic belt, so called strongmen are perfecting the same script: denounce “Western models,” stage plebiscites, criminalize dissent, and claim popular will.
In Guinea, Mamadi Doumbouya told the UN that democracy was “imposed,” then produced an 89% referendum to clear his own path, while activists like Foniké Menguè and Mamadou Billo Bah disappeared from public life.
In Cameroon, 92-year-old Paul Biya eyes an eighth term; in Côte d’Ivoire, Alassane Ouattara pursues a fourth amid the exclusion of key opponents.
These are not adaptations of democracy, they are its substitution by ritual.
The common thread is narrative warfare: “democracy = colonizer” becomes a shield for insecurity, corruption, and shrinking civic space. As Ousmane Ndiaye argues in his book “L’Afrique contre la démocratie – mythes, déni et péril”, the anti-democratic backlash often cloaks itself in anti-colonial rhetoric to delegitimize pluralism.
The rhetoric collapses against history. Africans did not wait for Europe to invent democratic practice, the Lébou Republic near today’s Dakar maintained elected assemblies in the 18th–19th centuries.
In Botswana, the pre-colonial Tswana kgotla, the chief-led village assembly where communities debate and decide public matters, has blended with modern institutions. This fusion has underpinned the country’s record since 1966, the year of independence from Britain, of multi-party competition, free and fair elections, a free press, and comparatively strong rights.
And contemporary citizens, from Lomé to N’Djamena, have repeatedly demanded equal choice and peaceful alternation.
However, democracy didn’t need to be born here to belong here. As a system of equal voice and accountable power, it travels well: its value is universal, not proprietary, and whether adopted, adapted, or even once imposed, it remains the strongest safeguard of human dignity.
