In 2024, more than 60 countries held or will hold elections at different levels of government. The contests aren’t only be about who gets elected, but also about the very meaning of democracies, with a struggle for political and narrative power among multiple actors, including populists, who have weaponized democratic ideals and practices to erode democracy from within. It is therefore a decisive year that challenges the progressive camp to mobilize majorities to defend democracy and human rights.
Given this intense electoral cycle, we restarted the Pending and Emerging Debates Forum, a joint regional initiative of Sexuality Policy Watch (SPW), Akahatá, Promsex, Puentes, and Synergia, and convened a series of debates throughout 2024. Our expectation is that these conversations can contribute to help activists and researchers working in the field of gender, sexuality, and human rights to better situate their actions and projects in what is, without a doubt, a complex and very uncertain situation.
This cycle of debates on this “mega-electoral” year began on May 7 with an electoral panorama of Latin America, whose report written by Mariana Carbajal is available on our website. On June 4, we presented a discussion on the pre-electoral scenario in the United States, whose report, written by Argentine journalist Juan Elman, is now available on our website.
On September 3, we hosted a third debate, this time on electoral developments in sub-Saharan Africa. The report, written by Françoise Girard, is below.
Elections and Coups in sub-Saharan Africa: Preliminary Considerations and Challenges
The debate on electoral and governing dynamics in sub-Saharan Africa was facilitated by Hakima Abbas and featured Awa Fall Diop (Senegal), Dr. Zeinabou Hadari (Niger), and Sibongile Ndashe (South Africa), with Thula Pires and Stefano Fabeni as discussants.
Sonia Corrêa opened the session by noting that Sexuality Policy Watch has had a longstanding relationship with many activists in Africa, but that these ties had become looser recently. This debate is an opportunity to begin to reconnect with African feminist activists, academics and writers to discuss some of the electoral and governing challenges faced by the sub-continent. In particular, Corrêa thanked Stefano Fabeni and Hakima Abbas for their critical help in preparing this third debate. Corrêa underlined the fact that this session only presented three country situations, and wasn’t therefore claiming to represent the reality of an entire continent.
Hakima Abbas opened by noting that 2024 has been a very eventful year for democracies in Africa, with several monumental elections and several coups d’état. She invited the panelists to explore the meaning of these changes in government in a pan-African, feminist context, but also in a global context.
Abbas also underlined the importance of Zeinabou Hadari’s participation, given the impact of the coup in Niger on the Sahel and the global context as a whole. African feminists have grappled with these recent coups in the Sahel and many have wondered what they portend: are they anti-imperialist, as some had hoped? Or something altogether different? What do they mean for ongoing liberation struggles on the continent? Abbas noted that, as a pan-African feminist, she doesn’t believe that the colonial states Africa has inherited can, or will be, the political vehicles by which African liberation is achieved. She therefore invited the panelists to discuss not only democracy within state structures, but also opportunities for building popular democratic power “from below” as avenues for liberation—”democracy despite of the state.”
Sibongile Ndashe on the May 2024 election in South Africa
Ndashe discussed this year’s momentous May elections in South Africa, the first democratic election in the country in which the historical liberation party, the ANC (African National Congress), didn’t win an outright majority, with many other parties taking seats in Parliament. As such, this election is interesting in its own right, and has resonance across the continent.
Three months after the election, Ndashe noted, the situation was “shocking, but not shocking.” This is so because the South African electoral system as it currently stands is characterized by low accountability to constituents, since political parties are the ones to choose the lists of deputies. “We knew this was going to be challenging, since under our system, representatives don’t owe allegiance to the voters.” This challenge has been compounded by the ANC’s own lack of accountability, its irresponsibility over three decades and its inability to self-correct and stop corruption scandals. “It’s been a real struggle to transform a liberation movement into a political party that is able to govern.”
This was demonstrated, Ndashe added, by the collapse of a number of para-statal organizations during the sixth administration (2019-2024), which was headed by President Cyril Ramaphosa, and led, among other things, to serious and interminable power cuts across the country. “This was the first time most people of my generation were in the ‘dark’ like this.” This election was in some ways “a search for light, a cleansing process from the humiliation, a reclaiming of the freedom that was stolen from us.”
Coming out of the elections, the ANC is still the majority party in Parliament with 159 seats (out of 400), but it won only 40% of the vote, and only has a 72-seat advantage over the next biggest party, the Democratic Alliance. On the positive side, Ndashe said, the ANC was forced to acknowledge the displeasure of voters and has had to compromise and negotiate with other parties, which is something of a novelty for the ANC. They also didn’t try to deny or to contest the results. The ANC’s solution to this loss of support was to create a “national unity” government, which brought in the Democratic Alliance (DA—largely favored by white South Africans), the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP—with a stronghold in KwaZulu-Natal) and the Patriotic Alliance (PA—an emerging and frightening nationalistic, xenophobic, anti-migrant and Zionist party). Though Cyril Ramaphosa was reelected as President, these forces are very far apart in terms of policy, which in Ndashe’s view, will not be conducive to advancing reforms. There is at present no clear mandate for this government.
The negotiations to form the government were protracted, tense and involved a lot of jostling: Who keeps security, finance? If the ANC has 40% of the vote, is it entitled to 40% of the Cabinet positions? In the end, the ANC kept key ministries such as defense, finance and foreign affairs. It was distressing to see some of the actors involved in the “state capture” corruption scandal of the Zuma era being recycled into government. “When you have such a reduced majority, why are you still failing to fill seats with competent people who have good politics and are able to really advance us?”.
The Democratic Alliance, with a little over 21% of the vote and 87 seats, is now in charge of the important ministries of Agriculture, Basic Education, Prisons and Home Affairs. The right-wing Patriotic Alliance with 2% of the vote and 9 seats in Parliament, was put in charge of Arts, Sports and Culture. The third party in Parliament is an ANC splinter, uMkhonto weSizwe (MK), which was founded just before the election by former President Jacob Zuma. Ndashe noted that the ANC has splintered in previous elections, for example, when the EFF (Economic Freedom Forum—now the 4th group in Parliament) emerged and took some of the ANC’s voters with it. In fact, each time a splinter is created, it carves out a portion of the ANC’s voters. It’s not clear what this latest ANC splinter represented by MK stands for, except for wanting power, said Ndashe. Some of the former “state captors” have joined it. And it is important to note that the splinter parties, the MK and EFF, were kept out of the current “National Unity” government.
Ndashe isn’t sure whether this can be considered a true government of national unity, or simply an ANC device to stay in power. The government’s prospects remain unclear. The prominence of the Democratic Alliance (DA) in this new government is also a blow to the ANC’s already checkered image, and allowed some local commentators to claim that “a white boss” [the head of the DA, John Steenhuisen, who is the Minister of Agriculture] was needed in the government to put things in order. “It’s not so much a triumphant return of white rule, it’s basically people saying: ‘we have begged you [the ANC], over and over, but this is what we keep getting from you.’ Paradoxically,” said Ndashe, “there is some kind of excitement or hope that perhaps all those people who don’t share the same ideology will start fighting for South Africa, because they are not there to defend each other. We are hoping for accountability as a result.” Ramaphosa himself was tied to a scandal involving more than $500,000 in cash stolen from his home a few years ago. Will this new government hold him accountable for what appears to be illegal conduct? Or will the government continue to protect the powerful and allow impunity?
Asked whether the ANC’s strong support for the Palestinian people would continue in this seventh administration given the presence of Zionist forces in the government, Ndashe observed that, while many South Africans were proud of the ANC’s stand on Gaza at the International Court of Justice, this had not translated into support at the ballot box in this election. Voters are increasingly skeptical of international ventures, such as the BRICS economic alliance (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa). The message this election sent was: “stay home and focus on the domestic situation.” It’s not clear whether the strong support for Gaza and Palestine will continue given that a vote of no confidence could easily topple Ramaphosa.
Ndashe underlined another critical aspect of policy in the last two administrations: the concerted effort to privatize para-statal (public) companies, with some in fact successfully dismantled, such as South African Airways. The modus operandi of this policy has been to begin stealing from these para-statals, and when they are destroyed, to call for their privatization. The ANC made that process all too easy, said Ndashe. Eskom (electricity) and Prasa (railways) are in the crosshairs currently. Another hot issue in the South African landscape is the question of land reform. The three avenues that had been identified in the 1990s to bring land justice: restitution of seized lands, tenure reform and protection of tenants against eviction, and land redistribution, are all currently bogged down. With the DA in government — which represents many powerful white landowners—Ndashe predicts that this agenda will not move forward.
Awa Fall Diop on the March 2024 elections in Senegal
Before giving the floor to Fall Diop, Abbas noted that this year’s hotly contested elections in Senegal captured the imagination of many on the continent. She asked Fall Diop whether she felt the new government was truly a “ray of youthful hope,” even though women’s rights and their control over their bodies were hotly debated during the electoral campaign and continue to be. Fall Diop noted that the March 2024 elections in Senegal were preceded by three years of extreme political violence resulting in deaths and arson, without anyone being held responsible. During this period of violence, the President elected in 2024 — Bassirou Diomaye Faye — and his Prime Minister, Ousmane Sonko, were thrown in prison, and were still there at the time the electoral law required the campaign to begin. At that point, there was an overt attempt by incumbent president Macky Sall to suspend the electoral process, followed by huge protests that were quite heavily repressed. The Constitutional Court intervened and held the suspension of the elections unconstitutional. That is when negotiations were held to release Diomaye Faye and Sonko and allow them to run for office. “What exact ‘deal’ was struck remains unclear,” noted Fall Diop.
Interestingly, however, after the Court decision the elections proceeded on a “fast track” basis, and not according to the normal electoral calendar. There was some violence during the campaign but since the results weren’t contested, unlike in past elections, the violence stopped after the election. Diomaye Faye was elected with 54% of the vote in the first round, something unheard of in Senegal. The country faces a totally new scenario, with the previous opposition in power, and Sonko, the man who would have normally been elected President, becoming Prime Minister, while his ally, Diomaye, became President.
“This feels like a ‘two-headed’ government,” said Fall Diop, with Sonko acting like a President and reminding Diomaye that he owes him his position. It’s a complex situation and the relationship between Sonko and Diomaye isn’t crystal clear. Fall Diop remarked that, whenever a decision is taken, no one knows for sure whether this was a decision the Prime Minister took, or it was the President who made the call. This “two-headed government” acts as a kind of screen between the population and the governing bodies. Moreover, Fall Diop added, while the the Diomaye/Sonko party makes up the government/Cabinet, Parliament is still controlled by Macky Sall’s party. The Diomaye government would of course like to have a Parliament that passes all the laws the government puts forward, and doesn’t like this “balance of power” situation. Questions as being raised. Will the government dissolve the National Assembly and call legislative elections? Will the National Assembly present a motion of censure against the government, thereby ending its brief tenure?
Importantly, Senegal’s governing bodies were inherited from colonialism and modeled on French institutions; they were not designed by Senegal’s people, noted Fall Diop. The current government has identified this as a problem and asked the National Assembly to pass laws to abolish certain governing bodies, for example the Economic, Social and Environmental Council, and the High Council for Local Governments. The National Assembly has refused to do so. During the National Assembly debates on these bills, a large number of observers attended the hearings and were often heard to chant Sonko’s name, not the name of the President. “This is extraordinary in Senegal,” explained Fall Diop, and she felt that a confrontation between the two leaders is brewing.
A main concern of Fall Diop’s is that the government was elected on a populist program, with many unrealistic promises about jobs and education (for example, replacing French with English as the second language of education, but without a plan to address the dire state of Wolof, the national language). “It’s rapidly becoming clear many of these promises won’t be realized,” she added. Another point of contention is the participation of women in government. Out of 25 Cabinet members, only four are women—a significant regression from the previous administrations of Wade and Sall. Women’s organizations are protesting and mobilizing against this blatant gender imbalance.
Even more worrying, the Ministry for Women and Gender, in place over several previous governments, has now been recast as the Ministry for the Family and Welfare, with women subsumed inside “the family.” Fall Diop noted that “feminist activists are worried that this suggests a plan to pressure women—in a not-too-distant future—to stop working outside the home and focus on domestic duties. The government could also start giving awards to women who have many children, to promote higher fertility.” This potential development is compounded by the growing political presence and activity of groups, especially religious ones, who oppose women’s rights. They became especially active when feminist groups were protesting the low number of government Ministers, and went on TV and radio to argue that a woman’s place is in the home, not in public life.
Abbas remarked how the two first presentations highlighted the way certain relevant social issues are used by African governments to stoke fear and hatred and gain and maintain power: race and immigration status most prominently in South Africa, and gender and sexuality in Senegal. Abbas pointed out that this is also done by other governments across the continent: in Tunisia, the question of race/ethnicity has been weaponized in a similar way, while in Uganda the hot and highly explosive topic is LGBTIQ rights. And, Abbas added it is important to understand that these troubling issues don’t emerge in a vacuum, but rather are connected to global debates and struggles.
Zeinabou Hadari on the 2023 coup d’état in Niger
In introducing Hadari, Abbas noted that, by contrast, Niger did not have an election this year, but rather a military coup in 2023, which followed two other military upheavals in Mali and Burkina Faso over the last three years. This series of coups has shifted in a dramatic fashion the geo-politics of the Sahel, and West Africa more broadly speaking. Given this evolving and troubling scenario, Abbas asked Hadari what are the current concerns, hopes and aspirations of the people of Niger, including feminists.
Hadari remarked it is very important to take into account the fact that the population of the Sahel overall is very young, with over 50% under 18. The coup leaders’ rhetoric is appealing to them, with its calls for economic sovereignty, control of national resources, improved security, social and economic justice, employment opportunities for youth, good governance, and freedom of assembly and of protest. Enmity towards France is another major factor to take into account, with people demanding a shift in transnational alliances and partnerships. In a nutshell, the people of the region want Africans be in charge of African affairs.
Unfortunately, however, serious concerns have emerged across these three countries. The promises made by the military rulers are not panning out. Insecurity is still an issue, and there are frequent attacks against civilians. Terrorist threats are markedly on the increase, as is generalized social violence. Food insecurity is worse, and there are fewer jobs than before. Nothing has been done to mitigate the climate crisis, and floods, which are getting worse, are not contained, resulting in dramatic population displacement. Governments aren’t able to deliver the necessary services. The human rights situation is also deteriorating, prison conditions are harsh, and arbitrary arrests and even killings of political opponents, as in Burkina Faso, are on the rise. The judiciary is not independent and media freedoms have been curtailed.
Nevertheless, Hadari said, “most people continue to want these military leaders to stay in power, and are not interested in returning to ‘democratic processes.’” And in fact, Niger has prohibited political parties outright. These developments call into question the future of democratic institutions and conditions in the region.
The coup leaders have shifted their geo-political alliances quite dramatically, leaving the G5 Sahel—the organization for regional cooperation in development and security matters in West Africa—as well as ECOWAS. In the summer of 2024, Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger created their own Alliance of Sahel states to fight terrorism, to provide each other mutual assistance if any of them comes under attack—but also, implicitly, to prevent ECOWAS from intervening militarily in Niger. They have also informally aligned with Russia. “It’s a context of dramatic change, and a huge shock,” explained Hadari. Precise information on the political dynamics is hard to obtain, and freedom of movement is increasingly limited.
In a final comment, Abbas underlined the relevance of the connection made by Hadari between the climate crisis and insecurity in the region. She also insisted on the critical importance of acknowledging how the current scenario and prospects for self-determination and democracy cannot be delinked from the deep and longstanding exploitation of African resources—land but also bodies.
Discussion
Stefano Fabeni started by noting that South Africa for many years was as leading voice in the Regional Human Rights System. But this has quite drastically changed in the last decade, with this shift leaving the space open to autocratic governments hostile to human rights—such as Rwanda, Egypt, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Uganda—to gain power and control over the system. He asked Ndashe whether she saw other states stepping forward to redress the situation—including on LGBTQI+ rights—and/or could South Africa revive its leadership?
In response, Ndashe bemoaned South Africa’s abdication of its role as a moral compass and an ally for civil society at the African Union. She said she did not expect South Africa to come back to its previous leading role in human rights accountability mechanisms. In her view, ANC governments want to stay away from “controversial issues” in human rights, apparently preferring to focus on economic development, including via the BRICS. As a result, African human rights mechanisms “are being dismantled in front of our eyes.” Ndashe pinpointed as a decisive moment in this unraveling the huge upheaval at the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights in 2015, when the Coalition of African Lesbians (CAL) obtained non-governmental observer status [it was revoked in 2018]. After that, South Africa stopped pushing for LGBTQI+ rights at the African level, because the government concluded that “there is no African consensus on this.” It is committed to sustain and expand domestic protections for LGBTQI+ persons at home, but will no longer speak up on these matters at the African Union.
By contrast, as is well known, South Africa brought the lawsuit against Israel at the International Court of Justice and ICC. South Africa is motivated to engage so strongly on the genocide in Gaza, Ndashe noted, because for South Africa, fighting apartheid and colonial occupation are signature issues. Palestine and the genocide are concerns South Africa will continue to speak up about and be committed to.
Yet it is also important to recall that, as recently as 2023, President Ramaphosa (unsuccessfully) tried to pull South Africa out of the International Criminal Court (ICC), calling it a “racist court” that doesn’t hold leaders in the global North accountable for their crimes. While acknowledging that this is valid critique, Ndashe argued that South Africa would have more standing to make that argument if it was actively working to strengthen other human rights accountability mechanisms, which it is not doing. Ultimately, “a broken clock will still ring twice a day,” concluded Ndashe, and when it comes to international accountability mechanisms for human rights, “South Africa will just ring at Palestine o’clock.”
In her comments, Thula Pires pulled on a different thread by pointing out the great importance of Latin American dialogue with the African experience. This is so because in the Latin American and Caribbean region, struggles to increase the participation and power of Afro-descendent people in government and to address anti-Black discrimination have been sustained for quite a long time, but have not been very successful, whether in Brazil, Bolivia, Ecuador or Colombia. Against this backdrop, the failures of successive Black-led governments in South Africa and the ANC’s losses, described by Ndashe, may have a particularly negative impact across Latin America and the Caribbean, because racist forces would only be too happy to point to these examples to claim that governments ruled by Black people “don’t work.”
Reflecting on how, as described by Hadari, military leaders in the Sahel present themselves as the true voice of the people, Pires underlined the need to deconstruct the veneer of democracy they use in their discourse. She saw similarities with the veneer of “anti-corruption” and “women’s rights”—including in the discourse of prominent ultra-conservative female politicians—that former President Bolsonaro deployed to bolster his far-right, corrupt, patriarchal ideology and modes of governing. Finally, she wondered how Black diasporas should respond to the use of “pan-Africanist, anti-imperialist, anti-colonial” language by these military leaders, when the reality is increased violence and human rights violations.
Abbas reflected on the fact that, 60 years post-independence, hopes for African liberation have not been realized. Instead, the exploitation and expropriation of Africa’s resources, land and people continue unabated, and fascism and fundamentalism in African countries are also on the rise, with attacks on women and LGBTQI people by these forces increasing. These political dynamics overlap the climate crisis, increased securitization and growing militarization, with each of these trends intensifying the other. Sahel military leaders have been keen to use powerful symbols of “liberation”, such as the beret and fatigues of revolutionary hero Thomas Sankara, even as they attack LGBTQ persons and rely on fundamentalist discourses against women´s rights. In the Sahel, she wondered, the shift away from old colonial powers like France may mean a turn towards a new form of colonialism by Russia, and to some extent, China. Abbas noted that we shouldn’t be surprised to see these foreign powers use their presence on the continent to wage proxy wars, as happened in the past and is currently happening in Sudan. Following these comments, questions were raised by participants in the webinar who mostly wanted to hear whether African feminist and grassroots movements have been able to counter some of this populism and nationalism and offer a different, more radical, participatory vision for Africa.
In her response, Fall Diop underlined that, whether in Senegal or the Sahel more broadly, recent political events are deeply rooted in a rejection of France’s role and interference in the affairs of these countries and a denunciation of colonialism. But, in her view, the results are not what was hoped for. In Mali this year, Fall Diop could tell that France had retreated, but she was stunned by the massive presence of Russians. “Is the Sahel just exchanging one Northern colonialism for another?” she wondered. Fall Diop recounted a telling anecdote: when she requested a traditional West African shea butter massage at her hotel in Mali, she was surprised when a Russian masseuse was assigned to her.
Fall Diop also noted that former President Macky Sall’s close French connections were one of the triggers of the recent protest movements in Senegal. In particular, Senegal’s continued dependence on the CFA franc (the regional currency controlled by France) has been widely contested. Yet, the reality is that the new Senegalese government doesn’t have a clear strategy to get out of the CFA zone, and the economic relations with France have not so far changed. Fall Diop wondered aloud whether these were only empty or unrealistic promises. Reflecting on the aspirations of African feminisms, Fall Diop said she believes that feminists strive for an Africa that is ruled by its people without foreign interference, yet with strong connections across the globe. She also said that, in that respect, it would be worth reviving the founding documents of the African Union as a guide towards a pan-African, anti-colonial future.
Finally, Fall Diop noted how the issue of “sexual diversity” had played out during the 2023 legislative campaign, with current Prime Minister Sonko accusing Macky Sall’s party of promoting LGBTQ rights. Fall Diop had therefore expected that after being elected in 2024, Diomaye and Sonko would quickly seek to further criminalize homosexuality, along the lines of what is happening in Burkina Faso. But to her surprise, that didn’t happen. In fact, during the recent visit of left-wing French politician Jean Luc Mélenchon, Sonko declared that homosexuality was “not accepted, but tolerated” in Senegal; what this will mean in political terms over the next few months will need to be monitored. On the other hand, Fall Diop remained deeply worried about Sonko’s plans regarding women’s paid employment and their bodily autonomy, sexuality and fertility.
Asked whether CSOs could combat human rights violations in the Sahel, Hadari replied that CSOs in Niger, if they want to avoid being labeled as spies or foreign agents, now have to implement public policies and must report to the government on their activities. Their freedom of expression and movement is highly restricted, and they have to profess their loyalty to the military government. Civil society leaders, especially feminists, are considered very suspicious.
Regarding Pires’ comment about the use of “anti-corruption” as a rhetoric device to usher in military regimes, Hadari felt that Africa has a lot to learn from Latin America’s experience regarding the culture of coups and the militarization of power. The deployment of slogans about expelling France while unconditionally welcoming Russia shows that their politics are not exactly about “Africa for Africans”, but rather a mere “rhetoric of revolution”.
Hadari commented on the situation of sexual and reproductive rights in the Sahel more broadly, which in her view, is dire. The regimes are further criminalizing LGBTQ conduct by hardening the punishments already enshrined in penal codes. CSOs working on sexual and reproductive health and rights are under fierce attack, and have been told by the government to stop their work. A full ban on their activity hovers over the horizon.
Ndashe reflected on the fact that South African politics cannot be detached from the legacies of it being one of the last countries to emerge from formalized colonial rule. Many people currently active spent their youth fighting for Black liberation and for a different world. So when the ANC’s coalition government with the DA and the Patriotic Alliance came as a real shock. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that those who fought for liberation were devastated. Questions were raised as to why “the ANC couldn’t make it work with Zuma’s party (the MK), and the EFF?” The DA’s slogan “Save South Africa!” was also deeply hurtful. Yet holding on to the idea of a capable Black government became harder and harder, and even humiliating. People were openly asking: “What must the ANC do to us before we move on?” As a result, many Black voters resigned themselves to voting for the EFF or MK, thus denying the ANC its majority.
Regarding specifically gender and the role of women in the current South African government, a number of Black women have held and continue to hold key roles, for example the Ministers of Justice and Defense in the current administration. But Ndashe considers it necessary to ask what this means exactly. For example, the Minister of Justice has just become embroiled in another corruption scandal. Even after being punished by its voters, the ANC has still not been able to prevent the rise of these kinds of leaders – be they men or women. Ndashe concluded by noting how painful these developments continue to be.
To close the debates, Abbas thanked the panelists and discussants, and called for a further discussion to flesh out a radical vision for Black, feminist democracies in Africa. Corrêa also thanked the panelists and discussants for an exceptional discussion. She regretted that so many important political situations, such as that of Sudan, could not be examined in the short timeframe of this panel. She hoped that these conversations will continue, especially to create more spaces for fruitful exchanges between Latin America and the Caribbean and Africa. These two continents have much to share given their connected histories, through slavery and in their more recent experiences of struggles against autocracy and dictatorship within a frame of democracy and commitment to human rights.
