Democratic Transition and Electoral Violence in Togo

Following the presidential election held in Togo on April 24, 2005, after the death in office of long-time president Gnassingbé Eyadéma, unprecedented levels of violence erupted across the country adding to the history of troubled elections in Africa. This paper investigates the Togolese presidential election of 2005, which is to date the smallest election held in Africa and one seriously marred by violence. The study was conducted following the methodology as under: Collecting, sorting and analyzing secondary information relating political history of the country. We find that 5% of Togolese were affected by the violence regardless of their ethnicity and wealth. The chances of being a victim of violence were higher in where politically-connected gangs operated. Violence, which was mainly triggered by the perception that the election had been rigged, reduced trust and social capital among communities making violence more likely to reoccur. The main finding is that treating electoral violence as a criminal matter or a cyclical phenomenon is not likely to end future elections from being violent. The more robust approach of adopting postelection political agreements in Togo showed early promise, but the protests following the recently held elections in Togo show a continuing institutional weakness for managing electoral conflict.