By Flight Captain; Mike Mukula
The assumption that multiparty democracy is the inevitable pathway to prosperity and progress in Africa deserves serious re-examination. While multiparty politics has delivered stability and growth in some societies, its transplantation into African contexts has often produced the opposite: political fragmentation, social regression, and weakened state capacity.
To insist that one political model is universally valid, regardless of history, social structure, or stage of development, is both misleading and intellectually lazy.
Africa’s political challenge has never primarily been the absence of elections; it has been the absence of cohesion, effective authority, and development-oriented governance.
Multiparty democracy, as practiced across much of the continent, has too often deepened divisions along tribal, ethnic, and religious lines rather than forging national unity.
Political parties in many African states do not emerge from ideological differences about policy or economic models, but from identity, patronage networks, and zero-sum competition for state power.
Elections, instead of being mechanisms for accountability, become census exercises of tribe against tribe.
History offers uncomfortable but instructive lessons. During the colonial period, particularly in Uganda, the British did not govern through “one man, one vote” or competitive party politics.
For nearly seven decades, authority was centralized in the Governor and his District Commissioners, whose word was law. While colonial rule was exploitative and morally indefensible, it nonetheless demonstrated a key administrative reality: effective governance requires order, coherence, and a clear chain of command.
The post-independence tragedy of many African states was not the rejection of colonial authoritarianism, but the reckless replacement of centralized authority with fragmented political competition before national integration had taken root.
It is therefore misguided to assume that political systems that evolved organically in Europe or North America over centuries of social consolidation, industrialization, and cultural homogeneity can simply be imported wholesale into African societies with vastly different historical trajectories.
Even in the West, multiparty democracy is increasingly strained, polarized, and dysfunctional. To present it as a finished, universally applicable model for Africa is not only dishonest but dangerous.
The Movement system, by contrast, was conceived as a transitional and integrative framework suited to societies emerging from conflict and deep division.
By minimizing partisan competition and emphasizing broad participation, consensus, and national programs, the Movement system sought to neutralize sectarian politics and refocus the state on reconstruction and development. Its core strength lay in prioritizing national unity over political pluralism for its own sake.
Equally important is the principle of individual merit as a basis for governance. Africa’s progress will not be secured by the number of political parties on a ballot paper, but by the quality, discipline, and patriotism of those entrusted with leadership.
Governance by merit emphasizes competence, integrity, experience, and commitment to national goals rather than party loyalty or populist appeal. It allows capable individuals to serve without being imprisoned by divisive party structures.
Critics argue that abandoning multiparty democracy risks authoritarianism. This concern is legitimate but incomplete. Authoritarianism is not prevented by the mere existence of multiple parties; it is prevented by strong institutions, a culture of accountability, and leadership anchored in national interest. Multiparty systems without these foundations merely produce competitive corruption and organized disorder.
Africa must therefore reclaim the intellectual courage to design political systems rooted in its realities, not external prescriptions. A return to a Movement-style system adapted, accountable, and merit based offers a pragmatic alternative to the destructive politics of permanent electoral confrontation. Democracy should be a means to development and dignity, not a ritual that undermines both.
Africa’s salvation will not come from multiplying political parties, but from building unity, discipline, and capable leadership. Governance systems must serve development, not ideology. A merit-based Movement system, rooted in national purpose and accountability, offers a more realistic path to stability and progress than imported models that continue to divide our people.
The Writer is the Chairman Pan African Movement, UGANDA CHAPTER
