The challenges of power-sharing and transitional justice in post-civil war African countries: Comparing Burundi, Mozambique and Sierra Leone

Abstract

This article uses the cases of Burundi, Mozambique and Sierra Leone to analyse transitional justice processes in African societies where powersharing was used as a key tool to end very protracted and violent civil wars. It is argued that, by affording warring parties a prominent role in the postsettlement political environment, power-sharing inadvertently impeded the pursuit of both restorative and criminal justice in all three countries. As an instance of ‘warriors’ justice’, power-sharing was used by such actors as an opportunity to avoid facing retributive justice. Indeed, due to the central position they held within the power-sharing dispensations, former warriors emphasised amnesty while paying lip service to reparations for victims. In all three countries, the decision to revert to the international judicial system or not was mainly motivated by political calculations rather than any genuine concern for justice. However, notwithstanding the shortcomings above, the consensus brought about by the power-sharing dispensations enabled the three countries to effect meaningful institutional reforms, albeit with limited and different levels of success.

Keywords: power-sharing, transitional justice, civil war, Burundi, Mozambique, Sierra Leone