THE UNITED NATIONS: MORE TRADITIONAL LEADERSHIP IN AFRICA

The Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) was established by the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) of the United Nations (UN) in 1958 as one of the UN's five regional commissions. ECA's mandate is to promote the economic and social development of its member States, foster intra-regional integration, and promote international cooperation for Africa's development.

In 2007, ECA published a very important rapport named Relevance of African Traditional Institutions of Governance. The main facts and observations contained are:
- Invented chieftaincies unsuccessful: in colonial and post-colonial States, chieftaincies imposed, as opposed to chieftaincies traditionally selected by the people, have been largely unsuccessful as they subverted traditional political values;
- Continuity and stability: despite efforts of the post-colonial States to abolish the colonial system of indirect rule and to strip chiefs of most of their authority or to abolish their office, chieftaincy has continued to operate remarkably well in rural areas, as custodians of customary law and communal assets, dispensing justice, resolving conflicts and enforcing contracts;
- Local governance: chieftaincy can be translated into better governance since chiefs serve as custodians of and advocates for the interests of local communities within the broader political structure (i.e. the State, the province ...);
- Collective raison d'être: the conception of traditional institutions that the source and raison d'être of power is the collective good of all members of society, provides a strong philosophical basis for establishing accountable governance;
- Efficiency: over-centralization of power in post-colonial States often obfuscates cpmmunity-based initiatives and democratic practices at the grassroots while only the articulation of indigenous political values and practices can provide good governance through harmonization with modern democratic practices;
- Checks and balances: chieftaincy is accompanied by mechanisms of checks and balances, resulting at the lower levels in chiefs exercising little power beyond presiding over community meetings, where decisions are largely made in a consensual manner;
- No human right violations: in the case of chiefs who submitted to the colonial or post-colonial State, it is not clear if their collaboration with the State worsened or ameliorated the conditions of their communities; chiefs have often presented to district heads the argument that their people would not accept certain measures, and in order to maintain law and order, the district heads often supported the chiefs; f.ex. the South African chiefs under the apartheid system, have never been recorded in the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission as being engaged in or accused of committing gross human right violations during this period; if chiefs betrayed their responsibility to their communities by collaborating with the State, then the State would be at the centre of the problem;
- Adherence: why would the populations under chieftaincy choose to continue to adhere to the traditional institution if chiefs did not command any accountability or if they treated the population as subjects with no rights;
- Ethnic conflicts: chiefs have the potential to mitigate ethnic conflicts by applying traditional conflict-resolution mechanisms to narrow differences;
- Public service delivery: public service delivery in rural areas has been smoother in areas where government structures have had good relations with traditional leaders;
- Political raison d'être: in a democratic environment where the population exercises control over the activities of the State, the demands that the latter places upon chiefs can be expected to coincide largely with those of the communities; the people can easily vote with their feet by abandoning chieftaincy and embracing the institutions of the State; the State can also easily bypass or dismiss chiefs who lose legitimacy;
- Democratic values: political values in traditional institutions are the same as values highly praised or re-discovered in western democracies i.e. decentralization of power, direct participation in decision-making, resolution of conflicts by narrowing differences, respect for dissent and protection of minority views and interests by requiring consensus on decisions (as compared with State electoral mechanisms where people may vote along ethnic lines); narrowing the gap between the rulers and the ruled through direct participation of all adult males in making and in enforcing rules; equitable access to land, mostly by the communal land tenure system; therefore, the incorporation of African traditional political values into the modern values of governance of the post-colonial State constitutes the critical step in the reconstitution of the African State, too often perceived to be an apparatus of exploitation and oppression;
- Upper houses: the most common form of integration of chiefs into the modern system of governance has been the creation of an upper house or house of chiefs in parliament, with a largely advisory rôle: more of these upper houses of chiefs can be found in the sections of Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, South Africa, Zambia, Zimbabwe; they are all inspired by the British upper house system.