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JUDD DEVERMONT is Director of the Africa Program at the Center for Strategic and Interna-

tional Studies. From 2015 to 2018, he served as National Intelligence Oicer for Africa at the

Oice of the Director of National Intelligence.

JON TEMIN is Director of Africa Programs at Freedom House. From 2014 to 2017, he served on

the Policy Planning Sta at the U.S. Department of State.

July/August 2019 131

Africa’s Democratic

Moment?

The Five Leaders Who Could Transform

the Region

Judd Devermont and Jon Temin

I

n the 60-plus years since the countries o” sub-Saharan Africa

started becoming independent, democracy there has advanced

unevenly. During the Cold War, many African states turned into

Soviet- or U.S.-backed dictatorships. Afterward, some nascent de-

mocracies made notable gains, but others ended up backsliding. Even

as some countries in the region have grown into success stories, most

have failed to embrace true democracy, despite a deep hunger for it

among their populations. Today, a mere 11 percent o” Africans live in

countries that Freedom House considers free.

But change is afoot. Whereas from 2010 to 2014, the region expe-

rienced nine transfers o” power from one leader to another, since

2015, the region has experienced 26 o” them. Some o” these transi-

tions amounted to one leader relinquishing his or her seat to a hand-

picked successor, but more than hal• featured an opposition candidate

defeating a member o” the incumbent party. O” the 49 leaders in

power in sub-Saharan Africa at the beginning o” 2015, only 22 o”

them remained in power as o• May 2019. Just one o” the newcomers,

Emmerson Mnangagwa o” Zimbabwe, entered o–ce through a coup

(although once someone is chosen to succeed Omar al-Bashir in Su-

dan, the count will grow to two). Gone are the decades when power

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