The Ewes moved into the area which is now Togo from the Niger River
valley between the 12th and 14th centuries. During the 15th and 16th
centuries, Portuguese explorers and traders visited the coast. For
the next 200 years, the coastal region was a major raiding center
for Europeans in search of slaves, earning Togo and the surrounding
region the name "The Slave Coast." In an 1884 treaty signed at
Togoville, Germany declared a protectorate over a stretch of
territory along the coast and gradually extended its control inland.
Because it became Germany's only self-supporting colony, Togoland
was known as its model possession. In 1914, Togoland was invaded by
French and British forces and fell after brief resistance. Following
the war, Togoland became a League of Nations mandate divided for
administrative purposes between France and the United Kingdom.
After World War II, the mandate became a UN trust territory
administered by the United Kingdom and France. During the mandate
and trusteeship periods, western Togo was administered as part of
the British Gold Coast. In 1957, the residents of British Togoland
voted to join the Gold Coast as part of the new independent nation
of Ghana.
By statute in 1955, French Togo became an autonomous republic within
the French union, although it retained its UN trusteeship status. A
legislative assembly elected by universal adult suffrage had
considerable power over internal affairs, with an elected executive
body headed by a prime minister responsible to the legislature.
These changes were embodied in a constitution approved in a 1956
referendum. On September 10, 1956, Nicholas Grunitzky became prime
minister of the Republic of Togo. However, due to irregularities in
the plebiscite, an unsupervised general election was held in 1958
and won by Sylvanus Olympio. On April 27, 1960, in a smooth
transition, Togo severed its constitutional ties with France, shed
its UN trusteeship status, and became fully independent under a
provisional constitution with Olympio as president.
A new constitution in 1961 established an executive president,
elected for 7 years by universal suffrage, and a weak National
Assembly. The president was empowered to appoint ministers and
dissolve the assembly, holding a monopoly of executive power. In
elections that year, from which Grunitzky's party was disqualified,
Olympio's party won 90% of the vote and all 51 National Assembly
seats, and he became Togo's first elected president.
During this period, four principal political parties existed in
Togo: the leftist Juvento (Togolese Youth Movement); the Union
Democratique des Populations Togolaises (IDPT); the Parti Togolais
Du Progres (PTP), founded by Grunitzky but having limited support;
and the Unite Togolaise (UT), the party of President Olympio.
Rivalries between elements of these parties had begun as early as
the 1940s, and they came to a head with Olympio dissolving the
opposition parties in January 1962, ostensibly because of plots
against the majority party government. Many opposition members,
including Grunitzky, fled to avoid arrest.
On January 13, 1963, President Olympio was assassinated in an
uprising of army non-commissioned officers dissatisfied with
conditions following their discharge from the French army. Grunitzky
returned from exile 2 days later to head a provisional government
with the title of prime minister. On May 5, 1963, the Togolese
adopted a new constitution which reinstated a multi-party system,
chose deputies from all political parties for the National Assembly,
and elected Grunitzky as president and Antoine Meatchi as vice
president. Nine days later, President Grunitzky formed a government
in which all parties were represented.
During the next several years, the Grunitzky government's power
became insecure. On November 21, 1966, an attempt to overthrow
Grunitzky, inspired principally by civilian political opponents in
the UT party, was unsuccessful. Grunitzky then tried to lessen his
reliance on the army, but on January 13, 1967, Lt. Col. Etienne
Eyadema (later Gen. Gnassingbe Eyadema) ousted President Grunitzky
in a bloodless military coup. Political parties were banned, and all
constitutional processes were suspended. The committee of national
reconciliation ruled the country until April 14, when Eyadema
assumed the presidency. In late 1969, a single national political
party, the Rally of the Togolese People (RPT), was created, and
President Eyadema was elected party president on November 29, 1969.
In 1972, a national referendum, in which Eyadema ran unopposed,
confirmed his role as the country's president.
In late 1979, Eyadema declared a third republic and a transition to
greater civilian rule with a mixed civilian and military cabinet. He
garnered 99.97% of the vote in uncontested presidential elections
held in late 1979 and early 1980. A new constitution also provided
for a national assembly to serve primarily as a consultative body.
Eyadema was reelected to a third consecutive 7-year term in December
1986 with 99.5% of the vote in an uncontested election. On September
23, 1986, a group of some 70 armed Togolese dissidents crossed into
Lome from Ghana in an unsuccessful attempt to overthrow the Eyadema
government.
In 1989 and 1990, Togo, like many other countries, was affected by
the winds of democratic change sweeping eastern Europe and the
Soviet Union. On October 5, 1990, the trial of students who handed
out antigovernment tracts sparked riots in Lome. Antigovernment
demonstrations and violent clashes with the security forces marked
the months that followed. In April 1991, the government began
negotiations with newly formed opposition groups and agreed to a
general amnesty that permitted exiled political opponents to return
to Togo. After a general strike and further demonstrations, the
government and opposition signed an agreement to hold a "national
forum" on June 12, 1991.
The national forum, dominated by opponents of President Eyadema,
opened in July 1991 and immediately declared itself to be a
sovereign "National Conference." Although subjected to severe
harassment from the government, the conference drafted an interim
constitution calling for a 1-year transitional regime tasked with
organizing free elections for a new government. The conference
selected Joseph Kokou Koffigoh, a lawyer and human rights group
head, as transitional prime minister but kept President Eyadema as
chief of state for the transition, although with limited powers.
A test of wills between the president and his opponents followed
over the next 3 years during which President Eyadema gradually
gained the upper hand. Frequent political paralysis and intermittent
violence marked this period. Following a vote by the transitional
legislature (High Council of the Republic) to dissolve the
President's political party--the RPT--in November 1991, the army
attacked the prime minister's office on December 3 and captured the
prime minister. Koffigoh then formed a second transition government
in January 1992 with substantial participation by ministers from the
President's party. Opposition leader Gilchrist Olympio, son of the
slain president Sylvanus Olympio, was ambushed and seriously
wounded, apparently by soldiers, on May 5, 1992.
In July and August 1992, a commission composed of presidential and
opposition representatives negotiated a new political agreement. On
September 27, the public overwhelmingly approved the text of a new,
democratic constitution, formally initiating Togo's fourth republic.
The democratic process was set back in October 1992, when elements
of the army held the interim legislature hostage for 24 hours. This
effectively put an end to the interim legislature. In retaliation,
on November 16, opposition political parties and labor unions
declared a general strike intended to force President Eyadema to
agree to satisfactory conditions for elections. The general strike
largely shut down Lome for months and resulted in severe damage to
the economy.
In January 1993, President Eyadema declared the transition at an end
and reappointed Koffigoh as prime minister under Eyadema's
authority. This set off public demonstrations, and, on January 25,
members of the security forces fired on peaceful demonstrators,
killing at least 19. In the ensuing days, several security force
members were waylaid and injured or killed by civilian
oppositionists. On January 30, 1994, elements of the military went
on an 8-hour rampage throughout Lome, firing indiscriminately and
killing at least 12 people. This incident provoked more than 300,000
Togolese to flee Lome for Benin, Ghana, or the interior of Togo.
Most had returned by early 1996.
On March 25, 1993, armed Togolese dissident commandos based in Ghana
attacked Lome's main military camp and tried unsuccessfully to kill
President Eyadema. They inflicted significant casualties, however,
which set off lethal reprisals by the military against soldiers
thought to be associated with the attackers.
Under substantial domestic and foreign pressure and the burden of
the general strike, the presidential faction entered negotiations
with the opposition in early 1993. Four rounds of talks led to the
July 11 Ouagadougou agreement, which set forth conditions for
upcoming presidential and legislative elections and ended the
general strike as of August 3, 1993. The presidential elections were
set for August 25, but hasty and inadequate technical preparations,
concerns about fraud, and the lack of effective campaign
organization by the opposition led the chief opposition
candidates--former minister and Organization of African Unity
Secretary General Edem Kodjo and lawyer Yawovi Agboyibo--to drop out
of the race before election day and to call for a boycott. President
Eyadema won the elections by a 96.42% vote against token opposition.
About 36% of the voters went to the polls; the others boycotted.
Ghana-based armed dissidents launched a new commando attack on
military sites in Lome in January 1994. President Eyadema was
unhurt, and the attack and subsequent reaction by the Togolese armed
forces resulted in hundreds of deaths, mostly civilian. The
government went ahead with legislative elections on February 6 and
February 20, 1994. In generally free and fair polls as witnessed by
international observers, the allied opposition parties UTD and CAR
together won a narrow majority in the National Assembly. On April
22, President Eyadema named Edem Kodjo, the head of the smaller
opposition party, the UTD, as prime minister instead of Yawovi
Agboyibo, whose CAR party had far more seats. Kodjo's acceptance of
the post of prime minister provoked the CAR to break the opposition
alliance and refuse to join the Kodjo government.
Kodjo was then forced to form a governing coalition with the RPT.
Kodjo's government emphasized economic recovery, building democratic
institutions and the rule of law and the return of Togolese refugees
abroad. In early 1995, the government made slow progress toward its
goals, aided by the CAR's August 1995 decision to end a 9-month
boycott of the National Assembly. However, Kodjo was forced to
reshuffle his government in late 1995, strengthening the
representation by Eyadema's RPT party, and he resigned in August
1996. Eyadema reemerged with a sure grip on power, controlling most
aspects of government.
In the June 1998 presidential election, the government prevented
citizens from effectively exercising the right to vote. The Interior
Ministry declared Eyadema the winner with 52% of the vote in the
1998 election; however, serious irregularities in the government's
conduct of the election strongly favored the incumbent and appear to
have affected the outcome materially. Although the government did
not obstruct the functioning of political opponents openly, the
President used the strength of the military and his government
allies to intimidate and harass citizens and opposition groups. The
government and the state remained highly centralized: President
Eyadema's national government appointed the officials and controlled
the budgets of all subnational government entities, including
prefectures and municipalities, and influenced the selection of
traditional chiefs.
The second multi-party legislative elections of Eyadema's 33-year
rule were held on March 21, 1999. However, the opposition boycotted
the election, in which the ruling party won 79 of the 81 seats in
the National Assembly. Those two seats went to candidates from
little-known independent parties. Procedural problems and
significant fraud, particularly misrepresentation of voter turnout,
marred the legislative elections.
After the legislative election, the government announced that it
would continue to pursue dialog with the opposition. In June 1999,
the RPT and opposition parties met in Paris, in the presence of
facilitators representing France, Germany, the European Union (EU),
and La Francophonie (an international organization of
French-speaking countries), to agree on security measures for formal
negotiations in Lome. In July 1999, the government and the
opposition began discussions, and on July 29, 1999, all sides signed
an accord called the "Lome Framework Agreement," which included a
pledge by President Eyadema that he would respect the constitution
and not seek another term as president after his current one expired
in 2003. The accord also called for the negotiation of a legal
status for opposition leaders, as well as for former heads of state
(such as their immunity from prosecution for acts in office). In
addition, the accord addressed the rights and duties of political
parties and the media, the safe return of refugees, and the security
of all citizens. The accord also contained a provision for
compensating victims of political violence. The President agreed to
dissolve the National Assembly in March and hold new legislative
elections, which would be supervised by an independent national
election commission (CENI) and which would use the single-ballot
method to protect against some of the abuses of past elections.
However, the March 2000 date passed without presidential action, and
new legislative elections were ultimately rescheduled for October
2001. Because of funding problems and disagreements between the
government and opposition, the elections were again delayed, this
time until March 2002.
In May 2002 the government scrapped CENI, blaming the opposition for
its inability to function. In its stead, the government appointed
seven magistrates to oversee preparations for legislative elections.
Not surprisingly, the opposition announced it would boycott them.
Held in October, as a result of the opposition's boycott the
government party won more than two-thirds of the seats in the
National Assembly. In December 2002, Eyadema's government used this
rubber-stamp parliament to amend Togo's constitution, allowing
President Eyadema to run for an "unlimited" number of terms. A
further amendment stated that candidates must reside in the country
for at least 12 months before an election, a provision that barred
the participation in the upcoming presidential election of popular
Union des Forces du Changement (UFC) candidate, Gilchrist Olympio,
who had been in exile since 1992. The presidential election was held
June 1, 2003. President Eyadema was re-elected with 57% of the
votes, amid allegations of widespread vote rigging.
On April 14, 2004, the Government of Togo signed an agreement with
the European Union that included 22 commitments the Government of
Togo must honor as a precondition for resumption of EU aid. Two of
the most important of these commitments were a constructive national
dialogue between the Government of Togo and the traditional
opposition parties and free and democratic legislative elections.
By November 2004, Togo had made modest progress on some commitments,
releasing 500 prisoners, removing prison sentences from most
provisions of the Press Code, and initiating a dialogue with the
core opposition parties. Consultations were ongoing with the
European Union with regard to when and how to resume development
cooperation.
On February 5, 2005 President Gnassingbe Eyadema died. In an
unconstitutional move, the military leadership swore in as President
Faure Gnassingbe, the late President Eyadema's son. Immediate
condemnation by African leaders followed by sanctions of the
Economic Community of West African States and the African Union
combined with pressure from the international community led finally
to a decision on February 25 for Faure Gnassingbe to step down.
Protest efforts by the public included a large demonstration in Lome
that was permitted to proceed peacefully. Prior to stepping down,
Gnassingbe was selected as leader of the ruling party and named as a
candidate in the announced presidential elections to choose a
successor to Eyadema. Abass Bonfoh, National Assembly Vice
President, was selected to serve as Speaker of the National Assembly
and therefore simultaneously became interim President. Real power
apparently was retained by Gnassingbe as he continued to use the
offices of the President while the interim President operated from
the National Assembly.
Deeply flawed elections held in April 2005 were marred by violence
and widespread accusations of vote tampering, causing tens of
thousands of Togolese to flee to neighboring Benin and Ghana. Faure
Gnassingbe was pronounced the winner and was pressed by the
international community--including regional heads of state--to form
a government of national unity, including key opposition figures.
After Gnassingbe failed to reach agreement with the opposition, he
named as Prime Minister Edem Kodjo of the CPP, an original founder
of the ruling RPT and former OAU Secretary-General and Togolese
Prime Minister. Kodjo subsequently named a cabinet that kept
security-related ministries in the hands of the RPT and did not
include any representatives from the genuine opposition.
In August 2006 President Faure Gnassingbe and members of the
opposition signed the Global Political Agreement (GPA), bringing an
end to the political crisis triggered by Gnassingbe Eyadema's death
in February 2005 and the flawed and violent electoral process that
followed. The GPA provided for a transitional unity government whose
primary purpose would be to prepare for benchmark legislative
elections. CAR opposition party leader and human rights lawyer
Yawovi Agboyibo was appointed Prime Minister of the transitional
government in September 2006. Leopold Gnininvi, president of the
CDPA party, was appointed minister of state for mines and energy.
The third opposition party, UFC, headed by Gilchrist Olympio,
declined to join the government, but agreed to participate in the
national electoral commission and the National Dialogue follow-up
committee, chaired by Burkina Faso President Blaise Compaore.
The legislative elections held on October 14, 2007, in which all
opposition parties participated, were declared free and fair by
international and national election observers. The RPT, with 50
seats, won a majority. The UFC took 27 seats, with the CAR receiving
the remaining 4. RPT members were elected to all the internal
leadership positions within the National Assembly.
On December 3, 2007, President Gnassingbe appointed as the new Prime
Minister Komlan Mally, an RPT member and former Minister of Urban
Development. The President named the rest of his cabinet on December
13, 2007 from the RPT and a number of lesser parties. The number of
ministries was reduced substantially, down to 22 from 35. The other
two parties elected to the National Assembly, the UFC and CAR, were
not represented in the cabinet.
On September 5, 2008, Prime Minister Mally submitted his resignation
to President Faure, who named Gilbert Fossoun Houngbo, formerly of
the UNDP, to the position two days later. The rest of the cabinet
was named on September 16, 2008 and is composed of members of the
RPT, the CDPA, the CPP, and civil society. The number of ministers
rose from 22 to 26, plus two secretaries of state. |
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