Sign up now for TIME's WorldWatch email newsletter. Senegalese opposition leader Abdoulaye Wade had failed four times to be elected President. Some commentators seized upon the peaceful transition as evidence of Africa's maturing democratic tradition. But while Senegal's success story is worth celebrating it remains an exception.
Most African countries continue to struggle with even the most basic democratic principles.
The number of countries allowing multiparty parliamentary or presidential elections has risen from three in 1989 to 42 today, but more elections have not automatically led to greater democracy. One reason for the slow pace of change is that Western-style democracy is still very new to Africa. Traditional systems of rule, which often included a tribal or village leader and a council of elders, rarely survived colonialism. So government becomes an exercise in grabbing power to control the state, not of running the state on behalf of the people of a nation. Where democracy has gained a foothold, voters are often frustrated by the results.