Former Political Science lecturer at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) Dr Richard Amoako Baah, has posited that the fact that the continent is witnessing high spate of coup d’etats among countries is a tell-tale that democracy is failing in Africa.
He said as long as the people are voting for politicians only to come into politics to enrich themselves, is a sure sign that democracy has failed on the continent.
Dr Baah pointed out that if the people have voted for parliamentarians to represent them in the oversight of the spending by the ruling government in power and when they fail to deliver on that mandate then it means democracy is failing.
He charged that if the people go to court for fair adjudication but the judges can sell their conscience for the price of a goat, it means that democracy is failing in the country.
Dr Baah stated that by the time the soldiers will intervene by way of coup d’etats then it means democracy has failed already.
The political science don pointed out that the soldiers are not coming in to make anything better but rather they harbour their own ambitions to be heads of state, hence the incompetence of the politicians grant them the excuse to step in by way of coup d’etat.
He cited the example of the late former President Rawlings who staged the first coup d’etat only to realize that he can himself seize and sustain power by the gun, which precipitated his second coming into power.
Dr Baah posited that when the incompetence of the politicians creates hardship for the people to endure in the country, it creates the fertile ground for soldiers to stage coup d’etats that receives massive public acceptance as in the case with Guineans.
He said the democracy that Africans inherited from the West is inferior in order to protect their interests in their former colonies that they were leaving behind.
Dr Baah said this in an interview with Kwame Tutu on the 100 Degrees on Onua TV, Monday, September 6.
He was commenting on the backdrop of the attempted coup d’etat staged by the military in Guinea to oust President Alpha Conde out of office on September 5.
“The truth is that by the time soldiers stage a coup d’etat it means democracy has failed already. If we vote for politicians only to steal the nation’s money from the coffers is a sign that democracy has failed. If the people vote for parliamentarians to protect the public purse hence must have oversight over the spending of the government and they fail to check them, it means democracy is failing”, Dr Baah posited on the 100 Degrees programme.
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