By Gerson U Tjihenuna This is a rejoinder to Mr Bankie’s opinion piece, which was published in two parts in the 16th and 17th January 2007 editions of “New Era”. One of the hallmarks of a true democracy is the free competition of ideas and this has prompted me to come up with a polemic to Mr Bankie’s article. The nature of his article, the socio-political scope it has attempted to cover as well as its length required a deep reflection before one could formulate a critique. That is why I have taken some time to write this rejoinder and I apologise to the readers for that because some of them might not even re-call what I am referring to. This anti-thesis to Mr Bankie’s article will not try to unravel his article paragraph by paragraph, but it will rather attempt to pinpoint the major shortcomings – at least from a hard-nosed social sciences perspective. The article seems, in my opinion, to have raised more questions than answers. It seems to be more of an accurate historical presentation of political events rather than an in-depth analysis of a socio-political phenomenon. It is highly descriptive but very thin on analysis. From a historical perspective the article is indeed very rich and educative but unfortunately, from the point of view of students of social sciences, no justice seems to have been done to the topic the author set out to analyse. Students of Social Sciences would be more interested to hear how political parties influence the democratic process in Namibia and vice versa. The opinion piece simply lacks a social construction analytical framework or a dialectical approach, which should treat political parties as subjective agents that actively help to construct the socio-political order in Namibia, while they are, at the same time, products of that order. Furthermore, the article seems to lack a cause and effect theoretical flow or linkages because it does simply not tell the reader, in any meaningful way, how the historical and social factors have impacted on the formation and development of political parties and on the quality of our democracy. There were few isolated historical factors that were mentioned, as having had an influence on the formation of political parties in Namibia, for example the ideas of Marcus Garvey and a few factors here and there, and that was almost all about it. The issues that are flagged in the heading of the article, i.e. political parties and democracy, are treated in a piecemeal fashion without any continuous cause and effect thread or flow being developed in the body of the article. This is partly attributed to the fact that the author does not tell the reader from the outset as to what exactly he is trying to prove or disprove. At the same time, the effectiveness, or the lack thereof, of political parties in Namibia cannot be fully appreciated without interrogating the relevance of the Western democratic model to Namibia. Mr Bankie seems to take a presumptive and uncritical approach to the application of the Western democratic model to Namibia. It puzzles me that Mr Bankie, someone known for his Pan-Africanist ideas, seems to forget that such an uncritical application of a western model into an African cultural setting can have a negative bearing on the performance of the political parties as well as on the quality of democracy in general. Any serious analysis of our democracy should empirically appraise the quality of our democratic project in the context of the Western democratic model, and at the same time try to transcend the paradigm set by such a model. In other words it should answer the question whether the western democratic model is the ideal dispensation for Namibia or should we perhaps do some soul-searching for an ideal democracy borne out of our own historical and cultural experiences? Coupled to the concept of the relevance or irrelevance of the Western democratic model is the issue of the nature of the post-colonial African nation state, which state is more often then not, a soft state. According to the Wikipedia (the Free Encyclopedia), a nation-state is a specific form of state, which exists to provide a sovereign territory for a particular nation, and which derives its legitimacy from that function. The state is a political and geopolitical entity; the nation is a cultural and/or ethnic entity. Therefore the term “nation-state” implies that they geographically coincide, and this distinguishes the nation-state from any other types of state, which historically preceded it. On the other hand, a soft state can be described as a state whose institutions are not really fully developed and stable and where the rule of law does not necessarily rule supreme. Is the post-colonial nation state in Africa, which is based on the Scramble for and the division of Africa by the European colonial powers at the Berlin conference of 1884 and whose national identity is pre-imposed by historical factors, capable of navigating the diverse, and sometimes competing, socio-cultural interests in the process of shaping or re-shaping a national identity in the context of cultural unity in diversity or simply put, to address the national question? The 1884 Berlin Conference set out to divide Africa among the then colonial powers without due regard to the different African cultural and linguistic groupings in and across these different territories. The nation state in Europe is, by and large, composed of homogeneous ethnic groups. In Africa it is not necessarily the case because, more often than not, one would find ethnic groups across the borders of two neighbouring states. This can be problematic in the process of nation building and can influence the quality of democracy as well, as you can have individuals within a certain group or groups whose loyalty to the government of the day or to the nation state in general can be shaky. Again for the sake of ethnic balance and/or representation some leaders may be brought in either at the party or state level not because they can make quality contributions but just because their specific groups need to have a sense of being represented. This makes the process of democratic consensus building very laborious and it automatically influences the quality of democratic outcomes. The challenges facing a new nation state like Namibia in the process of nation building also have an influence on the quality of our democracy and Mr Bankie should have taken this into account as well. The other question that has been left unanswered by Mr Bankie is how do the political parties relate to each other and to other social entities (subjects), e.g. trade unions, faith-based organizations, the media etc., within the public sphere. By public sphere we mean that space outside the state parameters where civil society organizations and other players interact with each other. Does the public sphere provide enough democratic space for different political parties to articulate their aspirations and political programmes? This will be in terms of the resources at their disposal, the support base they are able to obtain, the influence they are able to wield, etc.? Mr Bankie does also not to tell the readers what the performance of different political parities during elections tells us. Why do different political parties perform the way they do in national, regional and local elections and how does this influence our democracy? Political parties and democracy should also be analysed within a two-dimensional philosophical framework of time and space. In other words, how did political parties, which were then liberation or socio-political movements before independence, understand democracy as an ideal within the broad liberation struggle project and how do they understand and relate to it now? One cannot talk about political parties and democracy in Namibia without answering all these questions. Another cardinal question that was not answered is, do we in Namibia have enough deliberative or informed and engaging citizens, who are capable of creating demands and counter demands on their political parties, in other words people who are capable and able to hold their political parties accountable? The article should also have clarified as to how “democratic” supply and demand plays itself out in the Namibian “political” market and the role of political parities in that. In the same breath, the reader is left wondering as to what extent do ordinary people define, influence and drive the agendas of the various political parties of which they are either supporters or members? At the end of the day democracy, be it at state or political party level, is about the inalienable sovereignty of free citizens who entrust the leadership mandate to the leaders on the basis of accountability. The article has also not explained whether the voters and supporters of different political parties in Namibia are sophisticated enough or not to be able to vote for and support a political party on the basis of its political programme or the policy issues at stake, or do they support parties because of loyalty borne out of historical reasons? In other words do our voters vote for policy issues or do they vote for individuals? All these issues have a direct bearing on the quality of democracy and the performance of political parties in Namibia and Mr Bankie should have done well to explore them. Mr Bankie further seems to take it for granted that the separation of state powers – between the Legislature, the Executive and the Judiciary – automatically guarantees the existence of a rigorous system of checks and balances and this is unfortunately based on normative or theoretical assumptions and has never been empirically certified – at least to the best of my recollection. Such an approach is premised on institutional determinism, i.e. that the presence of democratic institutions is the only determining factor for the existence of democracy. This overlooks the importance of a vibrant political culture that is conducive for the flourishing of democracy, and the existence of a deliberative citizen who is able to raise, articulate and engage crucial public issues. Mr Bankie has, in short, not fully explained how the historical and social factors have shaped the formation and development of political parties in Namibia as well as the quality of our democracy. Unfortunately the heading of his article created an impression on the reader that that was what he would set out to do – which does not seem to be the case. In one sentence, Mr Bankie’s article seems to have fallen short of carrying out a rigorous audit of the democratic project in Namibia. By way of conclusion, may I hasten to add that Mr Bankie is a good personal friend of mine whom I highly respect and this critique in no means is meant as a personal attack on him but it is rather an attempt to broaden the boundaries and raise the level of academic debates in the country in general. His article, not withstanding some shortcomings that I have tried to point out, was otherwise well researched and resourceful indeed.