In the last few years, there has been a spate of military coups in Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Sudan and Guinea. Military rule, long dormant in African politics, is back.

Coup leaders have suppressed protest, gagged the media and spilled much civilian blood in the name of public safety. They claim to be protecting their people from enemies both internal and external – some invented to justify their takeovers and others very real (while military regimes have arguably made violent extremism worse, they did not create it).

The generals fight with one another as much as with their enemies, leading to duelling coups in Burkina Faso and a full-on civil war in Sudan.

In west Africa, soldiers have shaken up the geopolitical order, pushing away France and the United States, while drawing the Russian Federation (or more precisely, Russia-funded mercenaries) closer.

Outside observers, and a fair number of insiders, were blindsided by these events. That’s because military rule, with its drab aesthetics and Cold War trappings, seemed like a relic of the past. Explanations for its return have mostly focused on meddling outsiders, especially Russia. Others emphasise the inherent vice of African states – the weaknesses that were there from the beginning of independence, including poverty and corruption, that made people disenchanted with democracy.

I’m a military historian, and over the last few years I watched with alarm as the history I was writing about military dictatorships in the 1980s became current events. Military rule has deep roots, as my open-access book Soldier’s Paradise: Militarism in Africa After Empire argues. The coups of the last few years are a return to one of independent Africa’s most important political traditions: militarism.

Militarism, or rule by soldiers, is a form of government where military objectives blur into politics, and the values of the armed forces become the values of the state at large.

West Africa’s recent string of coups can only be understood in the long view of postcolonial history. The military regimes of the past were brutally innovative. They made new rules, new institutions and new standards for how people should interact. They promised to make Africa an orderly and prosperous paradise. They failed, but their promises were popular.

Africa’s military regimes

Militaries ruled by force, not consensus, but plenty of people liked their disciplinary verve. Whipping the public into shape, sometimes literally, had a real appeal to people who felt that the world had become too unruly. Independence did not always mean freedom, and soldiers’ rigid ideas shaped decolonisation in ways that we’re only starting to understand.

Long submerged by more hopeful ideological currents, militarism is now rising back to the surface of African politics. My book describes where militarism came from, and why it lasted so long.

Petty and paranoid

Between 1956 and 2001 there were about 80 successful coups, 108 failed ones and 139 plots across Africa south of the Sahara. Some countries had many coups (Sudan has the highest, with 18 known attempts since 1950) while others had none (like Botswana). But even in places where the military wasn’t in charge, the threat of a military takeover shaped how civilians governed.

The successful coups produced military regimes that were remarkably durable. Their leaders promised their regimes would be “transitional” or “custodial” and that they would hand back power to civilians as soon as they could.

Few did, and in some countries military rule lasted for decades. This could involve a graveyard-like stability where a single soldier-king ruled for an entire generation (like Burkina Faso), or constant turmoil as one junta gave way to another (like Nigeria). Military governments were petty and paranoid – each officer knew he had a line of rivals behind him waiting for their moment.

In these “revolutions”, as coup plotters called their takeovers, a new ideology emerged. Militarism was a coherent and relatively consistent vision for society, even though not all military regimes were the same. It had its own political values (obedience, discipline), morals (honour, bravery, respect for rank), and an economic logic (order, which they promised would bring prosperity).

It had a distinct aesthetic, and a vision for what Africa should look and feel like. The military’s internal principles became the rules of politics at large. Officers came to believe that the training they used to make civilians into soldiers could transform their countries from the ground up. Some came to believe, ironically, that only strict discipline would bring true freedom.

The army officers who took power tried to remake their societies along military lines. They had utopian plans, and their ideology could not be boiled down to the big ideas of their times, like capitalism and communism. There were military regimes of the left, right and centre; radical and conservative; nativist and internationalist.

Militarism was a freestanding ideology, not just American liberalism, Soviet socialism or European neocolonialism dressed up in a uniform. Powerful outsiders pulled some of the strings in African politics, but not all of them, and officers were proud of the fact that they followed no one’s orders but their own.

Military tyranny

Part of militarism’s appeal was its maverick independence, and military regimes endeared themselves to the public by cutting ties with unpopular foreigners, just like Niger and Burkina Faso did with France in 2023.

Soldiers ran their countries like they fought wars. Combat was their metaphor for politics. Their goal was to win – and they accepted that people would get hurt along the way.

But what did “winning” look like when the enemy was their own people? They declared war on indiscipline, drugs and crime. To civilians, all of this was hard to distinguish from tyranny, and military rule felt like a long, brutal occupation.

No military dictatorship succeeded in making the martial utopia that soldiers promised. Other parts of government pushed back against the military’s plans, and African judiciaries proved especially formidable opponents. Civil society groups fought them tooth and nail, and challenges came from abroad, especially from the African diaspora.

Like most revolutions that don’t succeed, militarists blamed the public for not committing to their vision and outsiders for sabotaging them. They do this today, too.

Today’s military regimes don’t seem to have the same long-term visions of their predecessors, but the longer they stay in power the more likely they are to start making plans. Despite all their promises to return to the barracks, they don’t seem to be going any time soon.

If we’re trying to anticipate what the continent’s military regimes might do next, it makes sense to look to the past. In the late 20th century, military regimes promised to make Africa into a “soldier’s paradise”. That promise is part of their strategy today.

(Author: Samuel Fury Childs Daly, Associate Professor of History, University of Chicago)

(Disclosure Statement: Samuel Fury Childs Daly does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment)

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
 

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People try to clear the area after a dam burst, in Kamuchiri Village Mai Mahiu, Nakuru County, Kenya, Monday, April 29, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AP

Flash floods and a landslide swept through houses and cut off a major road in Kenya, killing at least 45 people and leaving dozens missing on April 29, the Interior Ministry said.

Police official Stephen Kirui initially told The Associated Press that the Old Kijabe Dam, located in the Mai Mahiu area of the Great Rift Valley region that is prone to flash floods, had collapsed, carrying with it mud, rocks and uprooted trees.

But in a statement late April 29, the Nakuru County said that the water mass that caused the flash floods was a clogged railway tunnel.

Vehicles were entangled in the debris on one of Kenya’s busiest highways and paramedics treated the injured as waters submerged large areas.

The Kenya Red Cross said 109 people were hospitalized while 49 others were reported missing.

William Lokai told Citizen TV that he was woken up by a loud bang and shortly after, water filled his house. He escaped through the roof together with his brother and children.

Ongoing rains in Kenya have caused flooding that has killed at least 169 people since mid-March, and the country’s Meteorology Department has warned of more rainfall.

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Kenya’s Interior Minister Kithure Kindiki ordered the inspection of all public and private dams and water reservoirs within 24 hours starting April 29 afternoon to avert future incidents. The ministry said recommendations for evacuations and resettlement would be done after the inspection.

The Kenya National Highways Authority issued an alert warning motorists to brace for heavy traffic and debris that blocked the roads around Naivasha and Narok, west of the capital, Nairobi.

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The wider East African region is experiencing flooding due to the heavy rains, and 155 people have reportedly died in Tanzania while more than 200,000 people affected in neighboring Burundi.

A boat capsized in Kenya’s northern Garissa county on Sunday night, and the Kenyan Red Cross said it had rescued 23 people but more than a dozen people were still missing.

Kenya’s main airport was flooded on April 27, forcing some flights to be diverted, as videos of a flooded runway, terminals and cargo section were shared online.

More than 200,000 people across Kenya have been hit by the floods, with houses in flood-prone areas submerged and people seeking refuge in schools.

President William Ruto had instructed the National Youth Service to provide land for use as a temporary camp for those affected.

Nigerians are facing one of the West African nation’s worst economic crises in years triggered by surging inflation, the result of monetary policies that have pushed the currency to an all-time low against the dollar. The situation has provoked anger and protests across the country.

The latest government statistics released Thursday showed the inflation rate in January rose to 29.9%, its highest since 1996, mainly driven by food and non-alcoholic beverages. Nigeria’s currency, the naira, further plummeted to 1,524 to $1 on Friday, reflecting a 230% loss of value in the last year.

“My family is now living one day at a time (and) trusting God,” said trader Idris Ahmed, whose sales at a clothing store in Nigeria’s capital of Abuja have declined from an average of $46 daily to $16.

The plummeting currency worsens an already bad situation, further eroding incomes and savings. It squeezes millions of Nigerians already struggling with hardship due to government reforms including the removal of gas subsidies that resulted in gas prices tripling.

Nigeria’s economy

With a population of more than 210 million people, Nigeria is not just Africa’s most populous country but also the continent’s largest economy. Its gross domestic product is driven mainly by services such as information technology and banking, followed by manufacturing and processing businesses and then agriculture.

The challenge is that the economy is far from sufficient for Nigeria’s booming population, relying heavily on imports to meet the daily needs of its citizens from cars to cutlery. So it is easily affected by external shocks such as the parallel foreign exchange market that determines the price of goods and services.

Nigeria’s economy is heavily dependent on crude oil, its largest foreign exchange earner. When crude prices plunged in 2014, authorities used its scarce foreign reserves to try to stabilise the naira amid multiple exchange rates. The government also shut down the land borders to encourage local production and limited access to the dollar for importers of certain items.

The measures, however, further destabilised the naira by facilitating a booming parallel market for the dollar. Crude oil sales that boost foreign exchange earnings have also dropped because of chronic theft and pipeline vandalism.

Monetary reforms implementation

Shortly after taking the reins of power in May last year, President Bola Tinubu took bold steps to fix the ailing economy and attract investors. He announced the end of costly decadeslong gas subsidies, which the government said were no longer sustainable. Meanwhile, the country’s multiple exchange rates were unified to allow market forces to determine the rate of the local naira against the dollar, which in effect devalued the currency.

Analysts say there were no adequate measures to contain the shocks that were bound to come as a result of reforms including the provision of a subsidized transportation system and an immediate increase in wages.

So the more than 200% increase in gas prices caused by the end of the gas subsidy started to have a knock-on effect on everything else, especially because locals rely heavily on gas-powered generators to light their households and run their businesses.

Why naira is plummeting

Under the previous leadership of the Central Bank of Nigeria, policymakers tightly controlled the rate of the naira against the dollar, thereby forcing individuals and businesses in need of dollars to head to the black market, where the currency was trading at a much lower rate.

There was also a huge backlog of accumulated foreign exchange demand on the official market — estimated to be $7 billion — due in part to limited dollar flows as foreign investments into Nigeria and the country’s sale of crude oil have declined.

Authorities said a unified exchange rate would mean easier access to the dollar, thereby encouraging foreign investors and stabilising the naira. But that has yet to happen because inflows have been poor. Instead, the naira has further weakened as it continues to depreciate against the dollar.

What authorities are doing

CBN Gov Olayemi Cardoso has said the bank has cleared $2.5 billion of the foreign exchange backlog out of the $7 billion that had been outstanding. The bank, however, found that $2.4 billion of that backlog were false claims that it would not clear, Cardoso said, leaving a balance of about $2.2 billion, which he said will be cleared “soon.”

Tinubu, meanwhile, has directed the release of food items such as cereals from government reserves among other palliatives to help cushion the effect of the hardship. The government has also said it plans to set up a commodity board to help regulate the soaring prices of goods and services.

On Thursday, the Nigerian leader met with state governors to deliberate on the economic crisis, part of which he blamed on the large-scale hoarding of food in some warehouses.

“We must ensure that speculators, hoarders and rent seekers are not allowed to sabotage our efforts in ensuring the wide availability of food to all Nigerians,” Tinubu said.

By Friday morning, local media were reporting that stores were being sealed for hoarding and charging unfair prices.

How Nigerians are coping

The situation is at its worst in conflict zones in northern Nigeria, where farming communities are no longer able to cultivate what they eat as they are forced to flee violence. Pockets of protests have broken out in past weeks but security forces have been quick to impede them, even making arrests in some cases.

In the economic hub of Lagos and other major cities, there are fewer cars and more legs on the roads as commuters are forced to trek to work. The prices of everything from food to household items increase daily.

“Even to eat now is a problem,” said Ahmed in Abuja. “But what can we do?”

Gabonese President Ali Bongo Ondimba casts his vote at a polling station during the presidential election in Libreville, on August 26, 2023
| Photo Credit: via Reuters

Mutinous soldiers in Gabon said Wednesday they were overturning the results of a presidential election that was to extend the Bongo family’s 55-year hold on power.

The central African country’s election committee announced that President Ali Bongo Ondimba, 64, had won the election with 64% of the vote early Wednesday morning. Within minutes, gunfire was heard in the center of the capital, Libreville.

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A dozen uniformed soldiers appeared on state television later the same morning and announced that they had seized power.

The soldiers intended to “dissolve all institutions of the republic,” said a spokesman for the group, whose members were drawn from the gendarme, the republican guard and other elements of the security forces.

The coup attempt came about one month after mutinous soldiers in Niger seized power from the democratically elected government, and is the latest in a series of coups that have challenged governments with ties to France, the region’s former coloniser.

Unlike Niger and two other West African countries run by military juntas, Gabon hasn’t been wracked by jihadi violence and had been seen as relatively stable.

In his annual Independence Day speech August 17, Mr. Bongo said “While our continent has been shaken in recent weeks by violent crises, rest assured that I will never allow you and our country Gabon to be hostages to attempts at destabilization. Never.”

Anti-France sentiment

At a time when anti-France sentiment is spreading in many former colonies, the French-educated Bongo met President Emmanuel Macron in Paris in late June and shared photos of them shaking hands.

The coup’s leaders vowed to respect “Gabon’s commitments to the national and international community.”

Mr. Bongo was seeking a third term in elections this weekend. He served two terms since coming to power in 2009 after the death of his father, Omar Bongo, who ruled the country for 41 years. Another group of mutinous soldiers attempted a coup in January 2019, while Mr. Bongo was in Morocco recovering from a stroke, but they were quickly overpowered.

In the election, Mr. Bongo faced an opposition coalition led by economics professor and former education minister Albert Ondo Ossa, whose surprise nomination came a week before the vote.

There were concerns about post-election violence, due to deep-seated grievances among the population of some 2.5 million. Nearly 40% of Gabonese ages 15-24 were out of work in 2020, according to the World Bank.

After last week’s vote, the Central African nation’s Communications Minister, Rodrigue Mboumba Bissawou, announced a nightly curfew from 7 p.m. to 6 a.m., and said internet access was being restricted indefinitely to quell disinformation and calls for violence.

Every vote held in Gabon since the country’s return to a multi-party system in 1990 has ended in violence. Clashes between government forces and protesters following the 2016 election killed four people, according to official figures. The opposition said the death toll was far higher.

Fearing violence, many people in the capital went to visit family in other parts of the country before the election or left Gabon altogether. Others stockpiled food or bolstered security in their homes.