Africa’s greatest crisis isn’t poverty—it’s presidents who refuse to retire, feeding on power until nations rot while pretending it’s stability. In plain terms, Africa’s thrones have become nursing homes for aging autocrats who confuse immortality with leadership—proof that when power outlives purpose, democracy dies gasping for air.
I’m not here to flatter the old guards who sit on
Africa’s thrones like gods who forgot the meaning of time. I’m here to tell the
uncomfortable truth: some of these men have ruled so long that their shadows
have become the national flags. Paul Biya of Cameroon is 92 and still clutching
power like a relic from a lost century. Uganda’s Yoweri Museveni, at 81, treats
the presidential palace like a family estate. And Teodoro Obiang of Equatorial
Guinea, who has ruled for over 46 years, could easily open a museum dedicated
to his own reign. These men are not just presidents—they are monuments of
political decay, standing tall while the nations around them sink.
Let’s not sugarcoat it: these leaders are not symbols of
stability; they are symptoms of stagnation. The longer they stay, the worse
their countries become. I have lived long enough to see how time turns even
good rulers into tyrants. At first, they promise order and progress. But as the
years roll by, the promises curdle into propaganda, the revolution into
repression, and the constitution into confetti. Under these “fathers of
nations,” free speech dries up, corruption spreads like cancer, and the rule of
law becomes a ghost story people whisper about. When power becomes a mirror,
not a window, the nation stops seeing its future and starts admiring its
prison.
Paul Biya came to power in 1982 when Ronald Reagan was
president, Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” was topping charts, and most of today’s
Cameroonian youth weren’t even born. Four decades later, he rules from
Switzerland for months at a time while his country burns with poverty and
separatist conflict. Cameroon’s Anglophone crisis—born from years of political
neglect—has displaced over 700,000 people and killed thousands. Yet Biya, the
“absent monarch,” rarely appears in public. His administration is as predictable
as a broken clock: elections are rigged, opponents are jailed, and promises of
reform vanish into the air like cheap perfume.
Yoweri Museveni, meanwhile, mastered the art of
reinventing tyranny. When he seized power in 1986, he declared that “the
problem of Africa is leaders who overstay in power.” Four decades later, he
rewrote Uganda’s constitution to remove age and term limits so that he could
rule indefinitely. Irony has never looked so smug. His son, General Muhoozi
Kainerugaba, has already started positioning himself as heir to the throne—a
“next generation dictatorship” in the making. What Museveni calls democracy,
Ugandans call dynasty. And while his regime boasts of stability, it’s the
stability of a locked coffin: nothing moves, nothing breathes, nothing changes.
And then there’s Teodoro Obiang of Equatorial Guinea—the
world’s longest-serving president. Since 1979, he has run his oil-rich nation
like a family business. His son, nicknamed “Teodorín,” flaunts a $30 million
Malibu mansion, private jets, and a fleet of luxury cars, all while 70% of
citizens live below the poverty line. Transparency International ranks
Equatorial Guinea among the most corrupt nations on Earth, and the U.S.
Department of Justice once seized millions in assets linked to Obiang’s son’s corruption.
The message is clear: when a president becomes the state, the treasury becomes
his wallet.
These “dinosaurs” share a common playbook. They rig
elections with the grace of magicians pulling rabbits from their own pockets.
They jail critics and journalists under the banner of “national security.” They
suffocate civic space, turn parliaments into echo chambers, and use state media
as personal megaphones. And the longer they stay, the more their countries pay.
Research by the Brookings Institution has shown that African nations led by
long-term autocrats experience higher corruption, lower GDP growth, and weaker
human development outcomes than countries with peaceful transfers of power. The
World Bank estimates that Africa loses over $148 billion annually to
corruption—money that could build schools, hospitals, and infrastructure but
instead bankrolls private jets, offshore accounts, and endless propaganda.
I’m not blind to the argument that longevity equals
stability. But if stability means being stuck in a time loop while the rest of
the world races forward, then Africa’s so-called “stable regimes” are really
just embalmed democracies. Zimbabwe under Robert Mugabe learned that the hard
way. Once hailed as a liberator, Mugabe ruled until the economy imploded under
hyperinflation and the people revolted. When the end came, it wasn’t through a
peaceful election—it was through a military coup. That’s the tragedy of these
long reigns: they make change impossible until chaos makes it inevitable.
The deeper issue is cultural. Many of these rulers see
themselves as irreplaceable saviors—“the only one who can keep the country
together.” It’s a myth born of fear and fed by flattery. Their loyalists tell
them they’re chosen by God, indispensable to history, and too wise to retire.
But a leader who sees himself as the sun forgets that even the brightest
star burns out. Nations are not family heirlooms; they are living organisms
that need new blood, new ideas, and new dreams to survive.
History shows that no empire built on one man’s ego
lasts. Mobutu Sese Seko’s Zaire collapsed into anarchy after his fall. Blaise
Compaoré of Burkina Faso fled into exile when his people refused another
constitutional scam. Even Omar al-Bashir, who ruled Sudan for 30 years, was
dragged out by protests. Yet, like old lions refusing to leave the pride, Biya,
Museveni, and Obiang stay put—snarling at time itself.
The consequences are brutal. Economies stagnate, foreign
investors flee, and young Africans—the continent’s greatest resource—seek
escape routes to Europe. Sub-Saharan Africa’s youth unemployment rate hovers
around 20%, while millions of educated young people feel trapped in systems
that reward loyalty over merit. This is how brain drain becomes brain death:
when ambition must leave the country to breathe.
So here’s the paradox: Africa is the youngest continent
in the world, but it’s ruled by some of the oldest men alive. It’s like asking
a rotary phone to run a 5G network. The continent cannot keep innovating with
leaders stuck in analog mode. Every year these men remain in power, Africa
loses more than economic momentum—it loses imagination.
But change doesn’t come from magic; it comes from
defiance. Africans must stop treating power like a family heirloom and start
seeing it as a public trust. If the ballot box is broken, the voice of the
people must still roar. If protest is banned, persistence must whisper in every
corner until the echo becomes thunder. Because when the roots of a tree rot,
you don’t polish the bark—you plant anew.
The dinosaurs of African politics are not eternal; they
are simply extinct in denial. And when their statues finally crumble, it will
not be history that weep—it will be the people who wonder why it took so long.
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