Those of us who are not “born free” South Africans — who instead were born into a repressive, authoritarian regime — have, I am sure, become good at recognising the hallmarks of the strongman’s playbook: the suppression of dissenting voices, the rigging of elections, the policing and censorship of language and media, and the neutering of the checks and balances on the executive — the courts, the press, and civil society. In 2025, it is a playbook that seems to be gaining traction on almost every continent, at an alarming rate.
Last week, the research institute and think-tank Freedom House — which analyses the state of political rights and civil liberties across the world — reported that 2024 saw global democratic freedoms regress for the 19th consecutive year. The organisation’s 2025 Freedom in the World report concluded that 60 out of 195 countries were now worse off than at the same time one year ago, with only 34 showing signs of improvement. In some countries — Rwanda, Russia and Myanmar — this further decline may not come as a shock. But in others, once the standard-bearers of human rights and civil liberties, such democratic backsliding should be a real concern. Perhaps nowhere more so than in the US.
Six weeks into his second term in the Oval Office, Donald Trump appears intent on putting paid to the notion that the US is a credible defender of democratic freedoms and liberal values. Though we will not be privy to Freedom House’s assessment of Trump’s first year in office until March next year, the early evidence is clear. In January, he enlisted Elon Musk to help him purge the federal government and its institutions of competent civil servants in favour of inexperienced loyalists. He has cosied up to warmongering autocrats and rebuffed his country’s democratic allies. He has waged war against his critics in the press, bringing lawsuits against the media houses that he believes are biased against him.
Depressingly, rather than fight the president on cases they had a good chance of winning, the social media giant Meta and the broadcaster ABC settled out of court to the tune of $40m (R730m). CBS may soon follow suit. Earlier this week, Trump threatened to cut federal funding to universities that allowed “illegal protests” and to deport foreign students participating in them.
Trump’s lawsuit against Meta stemmed from founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s decision to suspend his Facebook account after the attack on the Capitol on January 6 2021, which was incited by the outgoing president’s refusal to accept the results of the 2020 election.
Unconstitutional seizures of power and the refusal of elderly heads of state to leave office are electoral outcomes which for decades have been associated with politics in Africa, sometimes fairly, but often not. But unlike Trump and a growing international corps of anti-democratic heads of state, it was a growing number of democracies in Africa which set the standard for peaceful electoral transitions.
In November 2024, Botswana’s then-incumbent president, Mokgweetsi Masisi understood the precedent he was setting when he told the press, “I will respectfully step aside and participate in a smooth and transparent transition process ahead of [the] inauguration.” Masisi unequivocally conceded electoral defeat following the Botswana Democratic Party’s drubbing at the hands of Duma Boko’s Umbrella for Democratic Change (UDC). This, after the BDP had spent 58 unbroken years in power. At a time when peaceful transfers of power are by no means a formality, this kind of statesmanlike concession is in danger of becoming the exception rather than the norm.
Anybody who doubts the validity of repeated warnings about global threats to democracy should note the many ways in which the essentials of autocratic governance are taking root across the globe
In the same bumper election year, Paul Kagame, who has won every Rwandan presidential election since 2000, extended his 24-year rule with a statistically improbable 99% majority. In three leadership contests preceding this one — 2003, 2010 and 2017 — Kagame claimed more than 90% of the vote. These elections are, of course, little more than a formality — an autocrat’s vanity contest. Select opponents are permitted to run, but more ardent critics are brutally repressed. The German broadcaster Deutsche Welle has compiled a list of “Rwanda’s disappearing dissidents” — a harrowing catalogue of the deaths and disappearances of those who have dared speak up against Kagame’s regime.
In addition to their growing number, the grim reality of today is that lawless autocrats have a tendency to take sides with, and learn best practice from, each other. Whether it’s Kagame or Nicholas Maduro, Vladimir Putin or Alexander Lukashenko, their mutual validation legitimises actions that should be deemed criminal: most often, the breaking of international law and assaults upon the sovereignty of others.
Earlier this year, The Economist drew an apt comparison of how Kagame’s sponsorship of the M23 militia in the Democratic Republic of Congo follows the blueprint of Putin’s covert armament of separatist forces in Donbas in 2014. The Financial Times points out that at a time when dictators across the globe are violating territorial boundaries with growing impunity, Kagame is capitalising on this opportunity to gain control of the DRC’s wealth of mineral resources.
The UN has estimated that M23 are collecting a minimum of $800,000 (R14.6m) a month from the illegal production and trade of coltan — a black metallic ore pivotal to the manufacture of most sophisticated modern electronics. As rare earth deposits have become a prized geopolitical currency in a burgeoning trade war between the East and West, the copper, cobalt, coltan and lithium embedded in the grounds of Ukraine and the DRC have become powerful incentives for warmongering by nefarious state actors.
Anybody who doubts the validity of repeated warnings about global threats to democracy should note the many ways in which the essentials of autocratic governance are taking root across the globe. No democracy is infallible. While governance in South Africa is not without its flaws, the foundations of our democracy have shown themselves to be strong and resilient. As democracy’s historic standard-bearers fall, South Africa must take up the opportunity to exercise leadership and commit to being an exemplar of self-determination, political freedom and human rights.
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.