What Ghana polls say about 2017

Supporters of Akufo-Addo celebrate in Accra, on December 9, 2016. Neither politicians nor voters speak in “ethnic” terms, and while everyone was afraid of election violence, it rarely happens on a large scale. PHOTO | AFP

What you need to know:

  • Just as in Kenya in 2013, when two broad coalitions monopolised the vote, the Ghanaian election was a two-horse race between the NDC and the NPP.
  • Unlike in Kenya, there are no cases of senior political leaders accused of crimes against humanity who have subsequently gone on to win the vast majority of the vote in their home areas.
  • Another important difference between Ghana and many other states on the continent is that the Electoral Commission (EC) has real independence.

At first glance, Wednesdays’ elections in Ghana are much like the ones that we see in countries such as Kenya.

The campaign was a two-horse race between old political rivals, the contest was extremely close, the electoral commission struggled to keep control of the process, and civil society warned of the danger of violence.

But if we look a bit closer, there were also dramatic differences.

Although Ghana has clear ethnic voting patterns, neither politicians nor voters speak in “ethnic” terms, and while everyone was afraid of election violence, it rarely happens on a large scale.

Instead, when it was announced that the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) had won the presidential and parliamentary polls, the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) accepted defeat, presiding over a peaceful transfer of power.

Despite the website of the electoral commission being deliberately crashed, and the circulation of many false results which confused the picture, candidates and voters remained remarkably calm.

The fact that Ghanaian elections share a lot of characteristics with states such as Kenya, but tend to have very different outcomes, raises some really important questions in the run up to the 2017 Kenyan polls.

Why has Ghana been able to hold such tight contests without political instability, and is there anything that we can learn to improve the prospects for a peaceful and legitimate process in Kenya next time round?

Just as in Kenya in 2013, when two broad coalitions monopolised the vote, the Ghanaian election was a two-horse race between the NDC and the NPP.

These two parties have dominated Ghanaian politics since the re-introduction of multi-party politics in the early 1990s.

Moreover, despite the presence of other candidates on the presidential ballot, the “big two” have increased their share of the total vote over time, securing 98.4 per cent of the poll between them in 2012.

And just as in Kenya, elections are fiercely contested.

TRUST ISSUES

Although Ghana is one of Africa’s leading democratic lights, politicians are so desperate to gain an advantage over their rivals that they hand out vast amounts of money, T-shirts, food and other “small things” in a bid to secure the loyalty of voters.

For their part, the electorate is more than happy to participate in this ritual, and often demands gifts from candidates in order to participate in campaign meetings.

Indeed, while it is tempting to think that democratic consolidation in Ghana must have inculcated stronger democratic values among its citizens, this is not always the case.

For example, a nationally representative survey that I ran in Ghana in December 2015 with Gabrielle Lynch and Justin Willis generated some surprising findings.

Most notably, Ghanaians are less critical of vote buying and the manipulation of development funds than people in other African countries.

Only 23 per cent of respondents stated that leaders who manipulate development expenditure to advantage their own community were “wrong and should be punished”.

Many more felt that such behaviour was “wrong but not punishable” (36pc) or was “not wrong at all (40pc).

The story was similar when we asked about election bribery, which 43pc of people said was either not wrong at all or wrong but not punishable.

For purposes of comparison, this is higher than in Uganda (40pc), which has a history of authoritarianism and election rigging.

While election bribery is not seen as that much of a concern, election unrest is. According to research conducted by the respected Centre for Democratic Development, a majority of the population (54pc) expected violence in 2016.

Given this, it is clear that what separates Ghana and other countries in which multiparty politics has been more destabilising is not that elections are “clean”, or that they do not generate profound national tensions.

Rather, the difference lies in how these pressures are managed.

One of the main differences between Ghana and Kenya is the level of trust between different parties, and the fact that citizens punish leaders who embrace violence.

In the Kenyan context, trust between rivals is extremely low.

IMPROVED ENVIRONMENT
Leaders may swap coalition partners at well, and be prepared to join almost any alliance if it will propel them to State House, but this does not mean that they trust the people with which they share a platform.

Instead, we have consistently seen that coalition promises have been broken, breeding suspicion.

The most famous example of this, of course, was when President Mwai Kibaki refused to honour a pre-election deal to appoint Raila Odinga as Prime Minister should he win the 2002 polls.

By contrast, in Ghana the fierce competition between the parties has not undermined the level of trust between them.

An article by Anja Osei published in the journal African Affairs found that “MPs in Ghana form a dense and strongly interconnected network bridging ethnic and party cleavages, and that MPs from different parties have developed a measure of trust in one another”.

As a result, Osei argues, they are better placed to peacefully manage political crises.

Over the past 20 years, the greater cohesion and communication between Ghanaian leaders has had two major consequences.

First, leaders are more willing to transfer power, because losing presidential candidates trust the incoming government to maintain basic democratic standards.

Second, although localised violent episodes and the use of “macho men” around the polls is fairly common, party leaders have never sought to systematically deploy violence as a strategy to win or manipulate elections.

Instead, there is a strong norm against the use of militias.

Thus, unlike in Kenya, there are no cases of senior political leaders accused of crimes against humanity who have subsequently gone on to win the vast majority of the vote in their home areas.

One consequence of these developments is that while national campaigns are as hotly contested as ever, the atmosphere on the ground has improved over time.

Take the Volta region, known as the NDC’s “World Bank” because it votes so overwhelmingly and consistently for the party.

During the first multi-party election held in 1992, opposition flags and posters in the area were torn down, and NPP activists were afraid to openly campaign.

Today, almost every tree and lamppost in the Ho Central constituency features the NDC flag and the NPP flag flying side-by-side, and opposition supporters proudly state their affiliation in public.

CONVTROVERSIAL EXERCISE
This is not to suggest that there are no tensions on the ground, or that the NPP voters never feel intimidated.

You still have to be brave to oppose the dominant political force in your community.

But the space for dissenting voices has grown over time, as has the tolerance for criticism of the NDC itself.

This stands in strong contrast to Kenya, where episodes of election violence in 1992, 1997 and 2007, and the refusal of leaders to give up power, has increased the political temperature over time in parts of Rift Valley, Central, and Nyanza.

Another important difference between Ghana and many other states on the continent is that the Electoral Commission (EC) has real independence.

In part, this is related to the strong legal foundations that the Commission enjoys, but it is also rooted in the performance of Kwadwo Afari-Gyan, the Chair of the commission between 1993 and 2015.

Under Afari-Gyan’s leadership the EC made impressive progress, consistently strengthening the electoral framework.

In addition to introducing new procedures, this involved building consensus among the parties themselves.

Following deeply controversial elections in 1992, when the NPP boycotted the legislative elections, it was the EC that brought the rival parties together to talk about what had gone wrong and what could be improved.

In the years that followed, the meetings of the Inter-Party Advisory Committee convened by the EC became an important venue through which leaders could voice their concerns, and come to agreement on how elections should be contested.

This was only possible because the Commission, and Afari-Gyan, were perceived to be neutral arbiters rather than partisan players out to bias the election.

Given the politicisation of electoral commissions in many other African countries, it is hard to imagine many that could follow the Ghanaian example.

In Kenya, for example, the performance of the Electoral Commission of Kenya in 2007 and the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission in 2013 was deeply controversial.

IEBC'S AUTONOMY

Combined with the prolonged disagreement over the appointment of new commissioners ahead of 2017, this means that it is highly unlikely that the new Commission will be able to command the same authority as its Ghanaian equivalent.

Should other countries in Africa seek to emulate the Ghanaian example?

In principle, there are clearly advantages to the way that Ghana’s political system has developed.

Heated election campaigns are effectively managed in a way that promotes political competition while minimising the risk of conflict.

Moreover, with every election that passes peacefully, the commitment of leaders to the rules of the democratic game become further entrenched, which bodes well for the future.

However, it would be difficult for a country like Kenya to emulate this model in the short time available till the next elections.

Many of the core elements of Ghana’s success story have deep roots. Building trust and effective institutions takes decades, not months.

It would be possible, however, to begin laying the right foundations.

A critical first step would be to stop playing political football with the IEBC, and to allow a truly independent and respected body to evolve.

@fromagehomme