“He is too crude a would-be dictator. You don’t do openly what he is doing. He hasn’t learnt anything from what we have been teaching him as African dictators when we have attended the UN General Assembly gatherings. We had secret meetings with Trump and we taught him how to remain in power against the people’s will. He is such a poor student and now he is pretending to be the world’s greatest teacher on clinging to power. He is the world’s greatest poor teacher in dictatorship and power grabbing” chimed an African Dictator in a ZOOM-conference meeting with other African Dictators and some still surviving colonial governors.
“We clearly told Trump to avoid the Jammeh lesson. It brings about condemnation and violence. Jammeh lost an election in the Gambia but wanted to cling to power openly but he was ousted. Prior to that Bagbo in the Ivory Coast tried to do it and ended up inducing violence and ouster and the intervention of the International Criminal Court,” contributed another African Dictator.
Another African Dictator stirred and pronounced, “I told Trump to heed JFK who loudly stated in an oft-quoted truism that ‘those who resist peaceful change make violent change inevitable’. The Americans have not faced this refusal to hand over power peacefully since the founding of the Republic. Now they don’t know how to do it themselves. But there are many ample lessons around though impossible to graft onto the American Democratic landscape. But Trump could have done it quietly if he imbibed the lessons we African dictators have been trying to teach him”.
“Remind me what are those lessons that we thought could have succeeded in America learning from Africa?” asked one new comer African dictator.
” Change the law immediately after assuming power. Induce others. Pay others to sponsor bills to change the constitution as if it is the public that are clamouring for change”.
“You are so naive Sir, that can’t work in an entrenched democracy like the US with its strong institutions of democracy and embedded democratic consciousness. We in Africa have succeeded in leveraging anti-democratic ethoes because of the anemic nature of our democracy. Colonialism only taught us permanent dictatorship. We in fact only learnt briefly how to win independence by using the lingo of democracy taught by the White man but which he didn’t teach us directly how to use to win our independence. Once we won our independence, we immediately reverted to what the White man had taught us. What felt comfortable for the leaders groomed under colonialism and that was dictatorship. We immediately embarked on either one party state dictatorships or the colonial way of assuming power through military means and coup de tats. And with the help of the Americans and the colonial powers, what lessons could we have taught the Americans? Trump is the modern great teacher of how to cling to power openly without shame. We African dictators are the ones who are learning how to do it”.
Another African dictator raised his head and pronounced, “you see Africans could teach Trump one or two things. Zambia for example brought about its one party state dictatorship legally through a process now known as Inquirisation of Politics. You institute an Inquiry and accept the recommendations of the inquiry and adopt them. And Kaunda was in power for 27 years as a result. Then democracy set in in the 1990s for close to three decades and then Lungu wanted to revert to one party state dictatorship through Inquirisation and Bill 10, a legal process. It was shot down but it was subtle. You don’t make too much noise crudely as to what you want to do. Chiluba failed to cling to power and going for the third term by trying to change the constitution. Other African dictators succeeded through forcing third terms like in Rwanda and Uganda. But those regimes are different. The leaders initially assumed power through revolutionary means. Those leaders had the backing of the military through which they assumed power in the first place. Zambia’s democracy is people-power centred. Any attempt to engineer a third term will be thwarted by the people. Chiluba learnt a bitter lesson. Bill 10 was consigned to the dustbin of history by people-power. Zambia can’t teach Trump any lessons fellows, neither can Trump teach Zambian dictators any lessons on how to cling to power as any attempt shall be resisted vigorously”.
“We are forgetting one thing about the Trump attempt at clinging to power,” interjected an ousted African military dictator. “Trump controlled both houses of Congress in 2017. He could have immediately gone for a constitutional amendment to abolish the two-term limit since it was clear from the beginning that he wanted to become an American Emperor. It is painful to lose power especially for ego-maniacs like Trump. Even decent fellows like Kaunda and Rupiah cried after being told that they had lost the elections. Trump, an ego-maniac is weeping publicly by proclaiming that he won the election even when he lost. He could have changed the constitution given that he had control over Congress at the beginning. The process of constitutional amendment would have been difficult and not smooth but you never know what could have happened. Even now what separates Trump and Biden is a mere six million voters. That is an even distribution. America can easily be turned into a constitutional dictatorship. Americans love stability and dictatorship. Trump’ s adherents are more committed and loyal to him than those committed to Biden. Trump could possibly have pulled off the miracle of the removal of two term limits”.
Another African dictator rose up and claimed, “You have a point there. People think that America always had this two-term limit. This is a recent amendment in American constitutional law. FDR was in his 4th term when he died in office during the 2nd World War. The two-term limit was constitutionalised after that. It didn’t exist before. This two-term limit was then copied by other countries, especially in post-colonial states. Britain doesn’t have it. European countries don’t have it. Israel doesn’t have it. Canada doesn’t have it. But it is a democratic safeguard against dictatorship and African dictators realised they made a mistake when they agreed to the two-term limit in the early 1990s and began to clawback. It won’t work and Trumpian lesson of crudely hanging on to power after losing the elections will not go down well in Africa. People are resigned and committed to democracy, including in Zambia”.
One Scholar attending the ZOOM conference finally gathered courage to speak: “Trump talks about the secret weapon of the judiciary to keep him in power despite the loss of the election. The secret and or open weapon of the judiciary has kept one or two dictatorships in power in Africa. The judiciary enabled George W. Bush to assume the Presidency. This time, however, it appears Trump won’t be helped by the secret weapon of the judiciary. You lose the vote you lose the court as one Scholar put it. Even in Africa, the judiciary is awakening. It can no longer be used as a secret weapon to enable or maintain dictatorships assume power or remain in power. In Zambia, it is stated that the ConCourt has already proclaimed President Lungu as eligible for a third term. The court never made any such finding or pronouncement. The court in fact interpreted the constitution as if Lungu had assumed the Presidency from Vice-Presidency. He didn’t. The Court never confronted the import of Article 106(3) of the Constitution. The Court had even rephrased the question and answered a question that was not put before it. Indeed judiciaries can be used as secret weapons to enable dictators assume power or remain in power. This is only possible, however, if the secret weapon massacres the provisions of the constitutions and therefore democracy. But there are serious consequences to be visited on the judiciary for its direct and deliberate assassination of democracy it is sworn to uphold. Trump may be seeing a pie in the sky. Visible but unreachable. The same will soon be the case in Africa where the judiciary will merely be a pie in the sky for African dictators. It will no longer be their secret weapon to cling on to power”.
This ZOOM meeting of African dictators is concluded with no lessons to transmit to Trump assembled. Trump lessons for Africa shall be discussed in the next ZOOM summit. Adjourned.
Dr Munyonzwe Hamalengwa is the author of “Class Struggles in Zambia, 1889 to 1989 & the Fall of Kenneth Kaunda, 1989-1991” (University Press of America, 1992 available on Amazon.com).
forthedefence@yahoo.ca