Around Africa, elections have become too inconvenient, By Chidi Anselm Odinkalu

José Eduardo Van-Dúnem dos Santos was 37 when the ruling Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola, (better known by its Portuguese acronym, MPLA) chose him to succeed its founding president, Augustinho Neto, in September 1979. By 2010, dos Santos had been in power for 31 years. But the shy and retreating dos Santos was…