African Security Issues: Sovereignty, Stability, and Solidarity by Bruce E Arlinghaus

Author:Bruce E Arlinghaus [Arlinghaus, Bruce E]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Ethnic Studies, African Studies, African, Social Science, Political Science, World
ISBN: 9780429745478
Google: odKpDwAAQBAJ
Goodreads: 52143413
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2019-08-16T00:00:00+00:00

State elites also make extensive use of the proportional principle in political recruitment. Again the use of a rule deemed fair by rival interests avoids damaging competition and reinforces confidence in the system and its primary actors. In middle Africa, by contrast with European experience, the application of the proportional principle is an intermittent and largely ad hoc process,67 yet one finds examples of its application in a wide range of political systems. In Sekou Toure's Guinea, there are indications that the president's own ethnic group, the Malinke, have been somewhat overrepresented while the Forest people have been underrepresented; even so, as shown in Table 6.1, the disproportional distributions are not dramatic, and Toure himself has admitted to practicing "ethnic arithmetic" in distributing key political and administrative posts.68 Commenting on the application of the proportional principle in the appointment and promotion of Nigerian public officials, Richard A. Joseph concludes: "The military government during the post-civil war years, 1970-79, became very adept at maintaining this 'unofficial' ethnic balance in its ministerial and parastatal appointments. When the Constitution of the Second Republic was promulgated in 1979, it repeatedly prescribed attentiveness to the 'national character' (i.e. multi-ethnic diversity) of Nigeria in the making of public appointments and the disbursement of government funds."69 And in Ghana, ethnic balancing has figured in the calculations of Flight Lt. Jerry John Rawlings's Provisional National Defense Council (PNDC). An Ewe-led administration (particularly noticeable in the military and police establishments) has shown considerable sensitivity to ethnic sentiments, particularly in the way that it has included two northerners in the seven member PNDC and has made certain those appointed as secretary of a region hail from that region. Moreover, as an attempt to appease Akan misgivings, a majority of ministerial posts have been given to Akan candidates (although it is significant that within that broad category non-Ashantis have been better treated).70 These attempts to give life to the proportional principle in recruitment policies represent a form of tacit exchange among the state and ethnic groups that results in indispensable social linkages.

Where the state has overlooked or cavalierly dismissed the proportionality principle in its political recruitment policies, a noticeable rise in intergroup competition and conflict has materialized. Francois Tombalbaye's heavy reliance upon educated Sara in the Chadian civil service heightened northerners' consciousness of their relative disadvantage in the political process;71 similarly, the Sudanization policies pursued by a northern-dominated government during the period of self-government and after Lt. Gen. Ibrahim Abboud's seizure of control in 1958 were a key precipitant of the 1955 army mutiny and the subsequent military confrontation. As Dunstan Wai remarks on the mutinies; "The manner in which the Su-danization policy was being implemented was disappointing in the extreme to the Southerners who hoped for a fair share of the posts being vacated by British Government officials."72 In brief, then, disproportional recruitment policies have contributed to social incoherence—and, in some instances, have led to grave threats to the survival of the state itself.

The proportionality principle is also a factor

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