African Affairs Advance Access originally published online on April 21, 2006
African Affairs 2006 105(420):421-441; doi:10.1093/afraf/adi126
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Mauritania, August 2005: Justice and democracy, or just another coup?
Boubacar N’Diaye (e-mail: bndiaye{at}wooster.edu) teaches at the College of Wooster, OH, USA.
A military coup abruptly ended Ould Taya’s authoritarian regime in Mauritania, one of the longest-running regimes in West Africa. The bloodless coup broke a dangerous political impasse and stopped what seemed to be a slide towards breakdown and violence. Using the democratization literature, this article explains its root causes and evaluates the prospects for the establishment of a genuine democracy after two decades of a repressive military and then quasi-military regime. It argues that several variables combined to seal the regime’s fate. These are essentially the deeply flawed, tribally based, make-believe democracy, Ould Taya’s own troubled personality, and finally, the security apparatus’s withdrawal of its backing. The article also argues that the new military junta’s first decisions appear encouraging enough but that its determination to keep a tight control over the transition process and avoid the fundamental aspects of Mauritania’s malaise may jeopardize genuine long-term democratization.
1. Julius O. Ihonvbere, ‘A balance sheet of Africa’s transition to democratic governance’, in John Mbaku and Julius O. Ihonvbere (eds), The Transition to Democratic Governance in Africa (Praeger, Westport, CT, 2003), p. 51.
2. On Mali, see Zeric K. Smith, ‘Mali’s decade of democracy’, Journal of Democracy 12, 3 (2001), pp. 73–9; for the Ivorian experiment under General Guéï, see Boubacar N’Diaye, ‘Not a miracle after all ... Côte d’Ivoire’s downfall: flawed civil-military relations and missed opportunities’, Scientia Militaria 33, 1 (2005), pp. 89–118.
3. Alfred Stepan, ‘Paths toward redemocratisation: theoretical and comparative considerations’, in Guillermo O’Donnell, Philippe C. Schmitter, and Laurence Whitehead (eds), Transitions from Authoritarian Rule (The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, MD, 1988), pp. 64–84.
4. One of the very few Anglophone specialists on Mauritania, Anthony Pazzanita, thought that the prospects for democracy for Mauritania after 1992 were ‘bright’, but apparently never revisited the issue. See Anthony Pazzanita, ‘The origin and evolution of Mauritania’s second republic’, Journal of Modern African Studies 34, 4 (1996), pp. 575–96.
5. For an authoritative discussion of the subject, see Philippe Marchesin, Tribus, ethnies et pouvoir en Mauritanie (Khartala, Paris, 1992).
6. See Abdel Wedoud Ould Cheikh, ‘Des voix dans le désert: sur les élections de l’ère pluraliste’, Politique Africaine 55 (1994), pp. 31–9.
7. There are no official statistics on the ethno-cultural make-up of the country. At independence, it was assumed that the Beydane (including the Haratines) made up 75 percent of the population. However, in the late 1970s, the government kept under seal the results of the national census, prompting allegations that this was done to conceal the demographic shift in favour of blacks, who have a higher birth rate. Unspoken quotas seem to still use 75:25 percent of Beydane and Negro-Mauritanians, respectively. However, there is a growing consensus that the general breakdown given here, although a rough estimate, is closest to the demographic reality of Mauritania today.
8. ‘El Hor’ means freeman. It is a semi-recognized political movement set up by the Haratine elites to fight the manifestations and legacy of slavery. SOS-Esclaves is (until recently non-recognized) a human rights organization set up to monitor the issue of slavery and assist slaves to attain freedom.
9. See Human Rights Watch/Africa, Mauritania’s Campaign of Terror: State sponsored repression of black Africans (Human Rights Watch, New York, 1994); Janet Fleishman, ‘Ethnic cleansing’, Africa Report 39 (1994), p. 45.
10. The chairman of the junta has publicly stated that the fear of a complete breakdown of the state is what prompted the military to act. As I argue, other less lofty considerations, such as personal survival, cannot be discounted.
11. The International Crisis Group, in particular, issued a report that exposed Ould Taya’s attempts to delegitimize the legal opposition, including moderate Islamists, by assimilating them to fundamentalist terrorists, warning that the whole scheme could very well backfire. See International Crisis Group, L’Islamisme en Afrique du nord IV: Contestation islamiste en Mauritanie: Menace ou bouc émissaire? (Rapport Moyen-Orient/Afrique du Nord No. 41, Brussels, 2005).
12. After his November 2003 electoral victory, which the US government must have known to be fraudulent, he received a glowing message of congratulations from President Bush. This support to one of the most repressive regimes in West Africa was bitterly resented by many democratic activists. Initially, the Bush administration was the only government to demand the return of Ould Taya to power, who was called, in the early hours of the coup, by the US ambassador in Nouakchott, as the US State Department daily briefings of 4 August 2005 indicate.
13. The chairman of the military council made this statement three days after the coup when he addressed the assembled leaders of political parties. For the text of the statement, see http://ufpweb.org/transition/ce385/interv/alloc_eli.htm, 4 December 2006.
14. Author’s interviews with Mohamed Vall Ould Oumere, editorial director of La Tribune, Nouackchott, May 2004.
15. Mahamadou Sy, L’enfer d’inal (L’Harmattan, Paris, 2000).
16. The best-known members of this financial and political network: Ahmed Ould Taya (Ould Taya’s brother), Abdallahi Ould Noueguet, Sejad Ould Abeidna (both Smasside), Mohamed Ould Bouamattou (an Oulad Bousbaa), and Abdou Ould Maham (an Idewaali).
17. See Africa Research Bulletin (15 November 1987), p. 8674.
18. See Philippe Marchesin, ‘Origine et évolution des partis et groupes politiques’, Politique Africaine 55 (1994), p. 27.
20. See ‘Petit coup d’Etat entre amis’, La Lettre du Continent (Paris), 25 August 2005.
21. Boubacar N’Diaye, ‘Mauritania’s stalled democratisation’, Journal of Democracy 12, 3 (2001), p. 93.
22. Peter Da Costa, ‘Democracy in doubt’, Africa Report 37, 3 (1992), p. 60.
23. Boubacar N’Diaye, Abdoulaye Saine, and Matturin Houngnikpo, ‘Not Yet Democracy’: West Africa’s slow farewell to authoritarianism (Carolina Academic Press, Durham, NC, 2005), pp. 107–37.
24. Cedric Jourde, ‘"The President is coming to visit!" Dramas and the hijack of democratisation in the Islamic Republic of Mauritania’, Comparative Politics 38 (2005), pp. 421–40.
25. Boubacar N’Diaye, ‘The effect of Mauritania’s "human rights deficit": the case against "to forgive and forget"’, African Journal of Policy Studies 8, 1 (2002), pp. 17–35.
26. N’Diaye et al., ‘Not Yet’, p. 193.
27. The coup leaders made a point to signal the transitory nature of military regime and their willingness to usher in a political system that was completely different from the one they overthrew. See ‘Nouakchott calm, but new "colonels’ regime" faces outside political pressure’ (http://journals.aol.com/mfg917/Lilithharp17/entries/2378, 5 April 2006).
28. Marina Ottaway, Democracy Challenged: The rise of semi-authoritarianism (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Washington, DC, 2003), pp. 3–27. Up to August 2005, Mauritania seemed to fit approximately Ottaway’s ’semi-authoritarianism of decay’ category, pp. 21–3.
29. William Case, ‘New uncertainties for an old pseudo-democracy’, Comparative Politics 37, 1 (2004), pp. 83–104.
30. N’Diaye et al., ‘Not Yet’, pp. 122–6.
31. Robert Jackson and Carl Rosberg, Personal Rule in Black Africa: Prince, autocrat, prophet, tyrant (University of California Press, Berkeley, 1982).
32. Jennifer Widner, ‘Two leadership styles and patterns of political liberalisation’, African Studies Review 37, 1 (1994), pp. 151–74; Larry Diamond, ‘Beyond authoritarianism: strategies for democratisation’, in Brad Roberts (ed.), The New Democracies, Global Change and U.S. Policy (MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 1995); also Juan J. Linz, ‘Crisis, breakdown and re-equilibration’, in Juan Linz and A. Stepan (eds), The Breakdown of Democratic Regimes (Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, MD, 1978), pp. 4–5.
33. Mohamed Nassirou Athie, ‘Il y a onze ans, le 16 mars’, Al Beyane 14 (1996), p. 8.
34. Since the 1978 coup, there has been a proliferation of Arab nationalist groups in the Mauritanian army. See Anthony Pazzanita, ‘Mauritania’s foreign policy: in search of protection’, Journal of Modern African Studies 30, 3 (1992), pp. 288–300. For example, the military council’s No. 2, Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz, is said to be one of the leaders of the Nasserist movement, a pan-Arab nationalist group.
35. See for example, Mohamed Fall Ould Oumère, ‘Il évite le face à face’, Al Beyane 5 (1992), p. 1.
36. Habib Ould Mahfoudh, ‘La tension’, Al Beyane 6 (1992) (Supplement), p. 2.
37. Ibid, p. 1; see also François Soudan, ‘Maaouiya Ould Taya: "Le Sénégal nous veut du mal"’, Jeune Afrique 1513 (1990), pp. 34–7.
38. Pierre-Robert Baudel, ‘La Mauritanie dans l’ordre international’, Politique Africaine 55 (1994), pp. 11–19.
39. Peace and Security Council of the African Union, 37th meeting, ‘Report of the Chairperson of the commission on the situation in the Islamic Republic of Mauritania’ (African Union, Addis Ababa, 8 September 2005), p. 7.
41. N‘Diaye, ‘Not a miracle’, p. 105.
42. Stepan, ‘Paths’, pp. 77–8.
43. See Amnesty International, ‘Mauritania: a future free of slavery?’, 17 November 2002 (http://web.amnesty.org/library/index/engAFR380032002!Open, 17 August 2005).
44. World Bank, World Development Indicators, 2005 (The World Bank, Washington, DC, 2005), p. 23.
45. According to the same World Bank report (Ibid, p. 73), in 2000, the top 10 percent of Mauritanians enjoyed nearly 30 percent of national ‘income or consumption’, whereas the lowest 30 percent share less than 9 percent.
46. Moussa Diop, ‘Quand Ely se fâche, les fauteuils tremblent!’, L’éveil-hebdo 613 (2005), pp. 1, 3.
47. The IMF statement is available at http://www.imf.org/external/country/mrt/index.htm, 10 January 2005.
48. See Nicole Ball and Kayode Fayemi (eds), Security Sector Governance in Africa: A handbook (Centre for Democracy and Development, Lagos, 2004).
49. For a population of less than three million, Mauritania has nearly twice the number of men in the security forces as either Mali or Senegal. The population of each of these states is at least three times that of Mauritania. See International Institute for Strategic Studies, The Military Balance 2002–2003 (International Strategic Studies, London, 2002), pp. 207–11.
50. Guillermo O’Donnell and Philippe C. Schmitter, Transitions from Authoritarian Rule: Tentative conclusions about uncertain democracies (The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, MD, 1989), p. 66.
51. The UN Office for West Africa has finally identified this situation as a major cause of coups and instability in the sub-region. The author has collaborated in the drafting of a report to call attention to this issue and how to address it.
52. Peace and Security Council of the African Union, 37th meeting, ‘Report of the Chairperson’, pp. 10–11.