Sovereignty and Credibility of Elections in Africa -“Compromise Democracy”

The last elections in Nigeria, Kenya and Zimbabwe have all raised serious questions as to the credibility of elections in Africa. The December 2000 elections in Ghana were rather very peaceful and were acclaimed to have been free and fair. The incumbent political party of the day lost that election and contrary to some speculation, the handing over of power was very peaceful. Even in Ghana, although the 2004 elections passed off peacefully, there were complaints by the opposition that the elections were rigged. It would appear that in spite of the presence of election monitors during elections in Africa, a trend is evolving to the effect that one of the parties usually the opposition, avers that the election monitoring is not effective or that even where the election monitors report serious anomalies their reports have no effect. This is also nurturing a tendency of self help and "Machoism".
In a multi-party political system, the credibility of elections is paramount to peaceful democratic governance and existence. The protests by the opposition in Nigeria during the last elections followed the due process of law. It is however unclear if the case could ab initio have been expected to result in a reversal of the swearing in of the government assuming that the opposition won its case. Without even examining the chances of having any such case heard and decided on its merits, suffice it to say that the Nigerian situation luckily did not end up in widespread violence.
Unfortunately, in the cases of Kenya and Zimbabwe the situation did not only result in violence and loss of lives but the evolution of a new form of compromise “democratic” governance such as we have already seen is operating in Kenya today and could operate in another form in Zimbabwe. One wonders if this form of new specie of “democracy” is not a precedent that could have serious ramifications for peaceful elections on the continent in the future. The international community appears to be helpless in its conflict with sovereignty in ensuring that elections in Africa are effectively monitored and their credulity established with sanctions for non-compliance. The violence that follows such elections appears to create an easier to mange engagement in spite of the loss of lives. Ghana is holding its elections in December and prays that the monitoring of the elections be enhanced with the assistance of the international community including the UN so as to establish their credibility beyond any doubt that could result in violence. Such pre-emptive action would eventually cost the UN less than a Peace Support Operation. The leader of the opposition has not missed words in declaring that his party would not accept a situation similar to what happened in 2004. Already the notion of a Kenya type “Compromise Democracy” could be a motivation to both parties of a worst case scenario if the associated violence could be avoided in the event the opposition considers the elections not to be free and fair or the incumbent rigs the elections. Would Ghana follow Kenya or remain West African by following Nigeria and its own 2004 precedent?