Introduction
The collapse of colonialism in Africa in the last decades of the twentieth century witnessed the change in the nature of political party systems in Africa. Soon after independence, one party governments became a hallmark in most newly independent African states. Many of these governments were independence movements who led the fight against colonialism, and therefore inherited the mantle of liberators, and by virtue of this came to dominate post-colonial governments. After independence, Ghana adopted a one-party system of governance under Kwame Nkrumah’s Conventional Peoples’ Party (CPP). For Ghana, the one-party system was associated with anticolonial nationalism and state consolidation in the developing world. Thus, the CPP holds both a remarkable and atrocious record of accomplishment.
As corollary to the above, one can assert that post-independent, Africa has specifically been the site of surprisingly vigorous debate over the one-party state . Certainly, there are arguments for both the effectiveness and drawbacks of one-party states in post-independent Africa. The argument in favour of the African one-party state system was that it would promote national unity in order to achieve …show more content…
They based their argument on clan chiefs, kings or heads that held monopoly power in African settings. They rejected any form of party system of governance that was different from the one-party system, claiming that it was alien to the African traditional system of government. Furthermore, they asserted that party systems such as multi-party democracies are an extension of colonial rule and did not advocate for their demands of freedom. The one-party protagonists maintained that a multiparty system eventually leads to a weakening of the central governing authority and threatens the very existence and integrity of the young
The collapse of colonialism in Africa in the last decades of the twentieth century witnessed the change in the nature of political party systems in Africa. Soon after independence, one party governments became a hallmark in most newly independent African states. Many of these governments were independence movements who led the fight against colonialism, and therefore inherited the mantle of liberators, and by virtue of this came to dominate post-colonial governments. After independence, Ghana adopted a one-party system of governance under Kwame Nkrumah’s Conventional Peoples’ Party (CPP). For Ghana, the one-party system was associated with anticolonial nationalism and state consolidation in the developing world. Thus, the CPP holds both a remarkable and atrocious record of accomplishment.
As corollary to the above, one can assert that post-independent, Africa has specifically been the site of surprisingly vigorous debate over the one-party state . Certainly, there are arguments for both the effectiveness and drawbacks of one-party states in post-independent Africa. The argument in favour of the African one-party state system was that it would promote national unity in order to achieve …show more content…
They based their argument on clan chiefs, kings or heads that held monopoly power in African settings. They rejected any form of party system of governance that was different from the one-party system, claiming that it was alien to the African traditional system of government. Furthermore, they asserted that party systems such as multi-party democracies are an extension of colonial rule and did not advocate for their demands of freedom. The one-party protagonists maintained that a multiparty system eventually leads to a weakening of the central governing authority and threatens the very existence and integrity of the young