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South Africa and Iraq: The Missing Example

South Africa and Iraq: the missing example
David Mikhail
15 - 12 - 2005


The successful transition to democracy in South Africa could be an inspiration to Iraqis struggling with their own legacy of violence and dictatorship, says David Mikhail.

" A nation is liberated and its tyrannical past withers into history. After a period of political and sectarian violence an interim constitution is drafted. The provisional government consists of one party possessing a 63% majority which peacefully coexists with a number of other political parties, including ethnic-based organisations. Within two years a final constitution is drafted, approved by the country’s supreme court, and ratified into law. The country celebrated the ten-year anniversary of its inaugural elections and will soon celebrate the ten-year anniversary of its permanent constitution.

This is not – except in the idyllic perception of some of the Iraq war’s architects and advocates – a vision of the Iraqi state in 2013. Rather, it is a description of the most successful process of democratisation in recent political history – that experienced in South Africa. While the world was transfixed by the spreading Iraqi insurgency in 2004, South Africa was celebrating a decade of democracy that had not been aborted even by the viciousness of civil war. In 2006 the country will mark a decade since its permanent constitution was installed. " ...Read rest of this article here

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