Post Conflict Elections and Democracy: A Comparative Analysis of the Mozambique and Angolan Elections

The post-conflict election period in Mozambique and Angola provides interesting cases replete with challenges and lessons for Africa. While Mozambique faced the challenge of getting President Joaquim Chissano of FRELIMO and RENAMO leader Afonso Dhlakama together for dialogue, Angola’s major challenge was the failure to disarm belligerents, making it easy for UNITA to return to conflict after its 1992 electoral defeat by MPLA. Whilst Mozambique is regarded as a post-war democratisation ‘success story’, Angola is known as a tricky case of post-war elections because the 1992 polls resulted in fresh war between UNITA and MPLA.

The case studies of Angola and Mozambique chronicle the experiences of two African countries that experienced internal strife soon after independence from colonial rule. A protracted civil war erupted immediately after Mozambique gained its independence from Portugal in 1975. In 1992, a negotiated peace agreement was signed by the warring factions, the Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (FRELIMO) and the Mozambique National Resistance Movement (RENAMO). The major aim of the signed peace agreement was to allow the participation of various parties in elections. In 1994, the first ever multi-party elections, organised and supervised by the United Nations (UN), were held. President Joaquim Chissano and FRELIMO won both the presidency and a majority of the 250 parliamentary seats. RENAMO won 112 seats and a coalition of other political parties won nine seats. This outcome was of course not unpredictable. The 1994 elections were characterised by low-key electoral campaigns by both major parties and an uneven playing field in terms of the manner in which state resources were utilised in favour of the ruling party, FRELIMO. In spite of these shortcomings, observers declared the elections largely “free and fair”. The elections were hailed by various observers as a mark of success from war to peace and a move towards democratisation. Subsequent elections held in 1999 and 2004 proved these observations to be fairly founded.

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