A third of Africa will head to the polls in 2024, with at major issues on the line in at least 18 countries gearing up for an election year. These include coup-hit Mali, Chad and Burkina Faso – if the junta leaders in those countries stay true to their word. From Algeria to South Africa, RFI looks at the main polls to watch.
Senegal
Population: 18 million
Election: Presidentials
Date: 25 February
In his New Year address, Senegalese president Macky Sall, elected for the first time in 2012, called for peaceful elections after a year marked by violence.
Last year saw staunch opposition protests and a complicated legal battle for Ziguinchor mayor Ousmane Sonko, who ended up in jail in July, and almost lost his right to run.
Despite authorities banned a ceremony declaring his candidacy, Sonko and most opposition parties supporting him managed to hold an online event Facebook on 31 December.
International observers and African political analysts say Senegal is travelling down a dangerous path for a democracy that has long been considered a beacon of stability in West Africa.
Mali
Population: 23.6 million
Election: Presidential
Date: Expected in February
Mali's military government came to power after a coup in 202, and has since promised to return the country to civilian rule. However presidential elections have been repeatedly delayed.
Polls scheduled for 4 and 18 February have been "slightly delayed for technical reasons", junta spokesman Abdoulaye Maiga said in a statement in late September.
He also cited a dispute with Idemia, a French company that has provided Mali with biometric passports and that is involved in creating a civil registry database.
At the end of June, voters approved a new constitution – a move that was necessary before organising elections. But the opposition and civil society fears the new constitution may actually help to keep the military in power.
South Africa
Population: 60.7 million
Election: Parliamentary
Dates: Expected between May and August
South Africa is celebrating 30 years of democracy, but the biggest question for 2024 seems to be whether the ruling African National Congress can cling to its now fragile grip on power.
The 2024 election could be a watershed one. For the first time since the end of apartheid, the party that Nelson Mandela led into office is in a real danger of losing a national vote.
This is mainly due to its failure to fight the economic downturn and high unemployment, to deliver on promises regarding crumbling infrastructure and widening inequality, and amid accusations of corruption.
The political landscape has also become increasingly more competitive.
Rwanda
Population: 14.3 million
Elections: Presidential and parliamentary
Date: 15 July
Rwanda will hold presidential and parliamentary elections in July, and incumbent President Paul Kagame will seek to extend his three decades in control of the East African country.
Candidates will be allowed to campaign from 22 June until 12 July, but as Kagame was reelected with more than 90 percent of the vote in elections in 2003, 2010 and 2017, he's largely expected to win again.
His only known challenger is for now Green Party leader Frank Habineza, who announced his intention to run in May.
Kagame has won international acclaim for presiding over peace and economic growth since the end of the 1994 Rwandan genocide, in which an estimated 800,000 ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed, but he has also faced mounting criticism from human rights groups for the suppression of political opposition and the muzzling of independent media.
Most of his opponents are in jail or in exile.
Chad
Population: 18.6 million
Election: Presidential
Date: Expected in October
Chadians just saw the promulgation of their new constitution at the end of last week, following a referendum mid-December.
On Monday, the former opposition leader Success Masra was appointed prime minister by transitional leader Mahamat Idriss Déby Itno. He will be in charge of organising elections.
Déby took power in 2021 following the death of his father, Idriss Déby, who himself took power in a coup 33 years ago.
He initially promised an 18-month transition to elections.
But last year his government adopted resolutions that delayed elections until 2024 and allowed him to run for president.
Several opposition groups had called for a boycott of the referendum, saying the junta had too much control over the process.
Tunisia
Population: 12.5 million
Election: presidential
Date: Expected in October
The incumbent Tunisian President Kais Saeid was elected in 2021 and has since increased his powers. He is already a declared candidate.
Tunisia will first go to local election in January, including the selection of the newly created Regional Council, in a test for the opposition, where most parties say they feel pushed out by the regime.
Saeid is expected to win, but a growing economic crisis, marked by inflation and lack of jobs, remains a major challenge for his campaign as much as his potential second term.
Ghana
Population: 34.4 million
Elections: Presidential and parliamentary
Date: 7 December
The incumbent president, Nana Akufo-Addo, is stepping down after serving two terms, and his New Patriotic Party will try to win an unprecedented third consecutive stint in control of the country's top office.
In November, Vice-President Mahamudu Bawumia won the nomination as Ghana's ruling party presidential candidate in the 2024 election.
He will face the opposition's National Democratic Congress candidate, ex-president John Dramani Mahama, who lost to Akufo-Addo in the 2016 and 2020 elections.
Former agriculture minister Owusu Afriyie Akoto and former MP Francis Addai-Nimoh are also running.
Political analysts estimate that the polls are in favour of Bawumia.
But Ghanaians face the worst economic turmoil in years, with a massive debt load and, like most other sub-Saharan African nations, a fallout due to the global pandemic and the Russia-Ukraine war.
Algeria
Population: 46 million
Election: Presidential
Date: Expected in December
Abdelmadjid Tebboune has been in power in Algeria four years, taking over from Abdelaziz Boutelfika, who was ousted from office in April 2019 after protesters took to the streets to denounce his candidacy for a fifth term.
The December 2019 vote listed five candidates linked to Bouteflika and was widely boycotted.
Protesters denounced an old political elite, in power since Algeria's independence in 1962.
The anti-government movement, named Hirak, instrumental in pushing president Bouteflika out, gathered pace but has weakened since the Covid period.
Yet, unlike most of Africa, Algeria is enjoying a growth rate of 4.2 percent, foreign exchange reserves of more than $70 billion and highest non-hydrocarbon exports since 1962, estimated at $7 billion.
Comoros
Population: 860,000
Election: Presidential
Date: 14 January
Togo
Population: 9.2 million
Election: Parliamentary
Date: Expected in early 2024
Madagascar
Population: 30.7 million
Election: Parliamentary
Date: Expected in May
Mauritania
Population: 4.9 million
Election: Presidential
Date: 22 June
Mozambique
Population: 34.4 million
Elections: Presidential and Assembly of the Republic
Date: 9 October
Botswana
Population: 2.7 million
Election: Parliamentary
Date: Expected in October
South Sudan
Population: 11.2 million
Elections: Presidentoal and parliamentary
Date: Expected in December
Dates to be announced:
Burkina Faso
Population: 22 million
Burkina Faso has been ruled since 2022 by a junta led by Captain Ibrahim Traore, who has promised a return to democracy with presidential elections by July 2024.
But increasing jihadist attacks have challenged that timeframe and the polls look as though they will surely be pushed back.
Mauritius
Population: 1.3 million
Election: Parliamentary
Namibia
Population: 2.6 million
Elections: Presidential and parliamentary
Guinea Bissau
Population: 2.2 million
Election: Presidential
