Opinion
Analyzing the co-relation of the rise of Africa and the continents’ increasing embrace of democracy
Sudanese telecoms entrepreneur Mo Ibrahim, who has created a US$5 million annual prize to reward good governance in Africa, points to the record 86 percent Kenya election turnout as a sign Africans are embracing electoral democracy as a viable force. This contrasts with low turnouts in older western democracies.
Tipping the balance towards improving governance, Ibrahim said, was a critical mass of Africa’s young population who were better educated and better informed than their parents.
“They ask ‘Why are we like this? Why aren’t we like the Europeans and Americans, why not like China?’,” he added.
Standard Bank’s Freemantle said this increasingly vocal “voice and agency of the people” was being strengthened by growing urbanization and access to technology across Africa.
“These dynamics for me are all suggesting that political systems are having to be more nimble and relevant,” he said.
Beware Exclusion
But Africa’s burgeoning growth, swelling population and blossoming wealth – for some – has a potential weakness in the widening inequality gap in African societies today.
If the continent’s fast-growing young urbanized populations feel excluded from the material benefits of an economically rising Africa, or if these spoils are appropriated by ruling elites, then this risks touching off the same kind of social explosion that caused the “Arab Spring” in North Africa.
