COMMENTARY
By Teddy Fikre
As an Ethiopian, and a person of the African Diaspora in general, it saddens me to see my people–our people–keep routing for our individual differences instead of coming together for our collective enrichment. I don’t know about you, but hollering about my culture, trying to earn distinction as a child of a Gondere and a Menze, or bragging about being Ethiopian has not earned me one break in life. I work like everyone else to make it, if I missed a secret club that offers benefits of being of a “special” ethnicity or culture, please someone let me know. Assuming that there is no such club, why then do we constantly go out of our way to elevate our egos at the expense of another group?
While the unfortunate many are living in an impoverished state in Ethiopia, Eritrea, Somalia, etc., the blessed minority of us–whether in the United States or elsewhere–obsess about our ethnic individualism instead of coming together to revive our respective countries. We have been blessed with the gifts of intellect and ambition necessary to advance our cause; instead we use these gifts to attack each other. Trust me, you are not helping out the average Ethiopian, Eritrean, or Somali by constantly disparaging your supposed enemy; the only thing you are doing is enabling the “ruling class” who use these differences to enrich themselves at the cost of the people.
It’s easy to attack someone in the abstract, to denigrate an intangible individual, but next time you feel like uttering a word of hatred–regardless of your nationality or ethnicity–look at the Eritrean woman in the store with two kids who did nothing to you–your words are aimed at her the same as they are at your supposed enemy. Look at the Ethiopian man who is working the midnight shift, trying to put his children in college–your words of ill will are affixed at him the same way they are affixed to your abstract foe. Look at the Somali child who is trying hard to attain the American dream–your word of derision target her as much as it targets some amorphous adversary.
We all know that there have been historical injustices and that no one group’s hands come out totally clean, but how many generations have to fight the same battles before we call a truce. We should not be ensnared by the sins of our fathers or the bitterness of past generations. The vitriolic venom that is spewed in the name of ethnic pride is nothing but empty rhetoric that diminishes our collective aspirations.
The fingers of the hand are weak, a pinkie alone cannot pick up a brick, nor can a thumb by itself build a house, working together, they can move mountains, clenched they become a powerful force to protect our collective rights. Imagine if we banded together in America to advocate for policies that advance our collective interests. After all, we have more in common than we have that sets us apart. The way forward for Africa is not through ethnic exceptionalism, rather it is through economic collectivism—we have to enter into a new age of a post-ethnic philosophy. Think about the impact our unity can have back in Ethiopia , Eritrea , Somalia and the rest of Africa .
Patrick Henry knew of the power of Unity, during the Revolutionary War, he proclaimed, “Let us trust God, and our better judgment to set us right hereafter. United we stand, divided we fall. Let us not split into factions which must destroy that union upon which our existence hangs.”
Next time you want to point a finger in the air to brag about being “number one”, just remember that the finger you point upwards will not do anything to build or protect the very ethnicity you are so proud of. Collectively we are powerful, individually we are always going to be impotent; letting others exploit our resources and historical wealth while we stand apart bragging about our ancestors and past accolades–but hey who cares, at least “we” are number one right?
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The writer can be reached at [email protected]
7 thoughts on “Ethnic obsession and its Futility”
God Bless You Brother.
I think it is never too late, we can still correct it. Disinforming the general public for political profit (the Ethiopianreview way) is understandable, but having a prejudiced opinion about others as an individual is not healthy.
It is very unfortunate that the so called liberation front of Tigrai is nothing more than power and money hungry dictator. This is all being done in the name of democracy. Is is possible to have peace and stability by when some are eaters and others are onlookers.
The need to be united has been repeatedly emphasised. What we are lacking is action. We need a scholar that can make a critical assessment of the issue and indicate the way forward; determining how to start the process of bringing the different groups together. A kind of strategic document similar to what Ato Andargachewu produced on the future of peaceful struggle may help.
Hi Minale,
You raised a very interseting issue when you said “We need a scholar that can make a critical assessment of the issue and indicate the way forward; determining how to start the process of bringing the different groups together”
I discussed this issue with a known contributer of articles to various websites a while ago. I am stongly convinced that there is a need of moral/intellectual guidance for our people. Especially in the diaspora. Currently our opinion is shaped by Paltalk rooms and ameteur jounalists.
Anyways here are four of several useful articles that could be interesting to you. These writers objectively critisize the Ethiopian socio-cultural settings that according to the writers are the sources of all the mess we are now in:
1. http://www.ethiopianreview.com/content/729 (Ethiopian Socio-Cultural Rules Require Fundamental Change) by Maru Gubena
2. http://www.ethiopianreview.com/content/473 (Unity of Purpose: changing mindsets to sustain Ethiopia?s democratization) by Ewunetu Feleke
3. http://www.ethiomedia.com/carepress/dysfunctional_behaviors.html (Time to declare war on dysfunctional behaviors) by Dessalegn Asfaw
4. http://addisvoice.com/article/could_ethiopian.htm (Could Ethiopian Academics Have Done Better? by Alethia
Hoping that it would trigger a formation of some sort of Association of Ethiopian Intellectuals somewhere in the future, I have began listing my favorite activists of social transformation. I call my list B.E.S.T (Brilliant Ethiopians for Social Transformation). At first it consisted of 5 individuals and today it grew up to the list below. [political figures not included]
[in no particular order]
1. Maimire Mennasemay
2. Messay Kebede
3. Alemayehu GebreMariam
4. Obang Metho
5. Ephrem Madebo
6. Alethia
7. Dessalegn Asfaw
8. Maru Gubena
9. Ewunetu Feleke
who is next?
Consistency is the major criteria for me to select the intellectuals who will be in my list.
Hi AleQa Bru,
Thank you for sharing your thoughts and the list of recommended readings. I have found the readings interesting and valuable. As you said they critically assess the setbacks in Ethiopia’s socio-cultural norms and values and its effect on our attitude and behaviours today.
However, my concern is that we should not stop by analysing the problem in depth, but also we should go ahead and provide the action plan that can get us out of the problem we are in. Fore example, from Ewnetu Feleke’s article and your own thought above, I am able to cite two important points that could be considered as part of a possible action plan.
1. “Ethiopian Opposition political parties, civic groups and others need to begin discussions and dialogue to craft and agree on a meaningful Code of Conduct to govern behaviours and attitudes and to resolve conflicts amicably, as and when they arise.” (From Ewnetu)
2. The role of a group of ‘activists for social transformation’ (as you said) appears to be crucial, not only to achieve long term socio cultural transformation, but more importantly, to discipline and guide our current political culture. This group can take the lead in crafting the ‘Code of Conduct’ mentioned above and facilitate discussion and agreement among different political parties on the document. Even, with the agreement of the political parties, the group of activists for social transformation may be able to assume the responsibility of overseeing the standard of political culture as per the code of conduct.
These are the kind of things we need to act on immediately. What we need right now, as I think, is objective assessments of differences among the different political groups and the setbacks and potentials for cooperation among them. Then the assessment should include recommended action plans to build cooperation for which the above two could be examples.
Thanks
Hi Minale,
Good that you found the articles interesting and valuable. I learned a lot from these writers and I like as many people as possible to read their articles; the ones i posted so many others which can be found on the Internet.
That’s why I am keeping this list I mentioned in my previous comment.
Now let me say something about your concern that we should not stop by just analysing. You said action is needed. That is true. Analysis is not the end. Action must follow. But I do not think the first action is to write a “Code of Conduct” document by the political, civic, and other leaders. For that to happen, these leaders must realize there is something wrong with what they have been doing until now. And I don’t think that can happen in just a few days, weeks, months or years for that matter.
In my opinion, the first action should be to raise public awareness on the issues mentioned by the scholars whose articles you read. Lets find as many scholars as possible who critically analyzed our problems and bring them to the fore front of opinion making.
Media people like ER could facilitate this by inviting some of them regularly for interviews on several issues. That way these scholars will have maximum exposure to the general public and they will get the chance to educate the general public including the political, civic and others leaders of our community.
When we do this, we will accomplish 2 things:
1. We will have in relatively short period of time a group of intellectuals who will function as moral leaders. This group will gradually take over the role of Paltak rooms to shape our opinion.
2. In the long term, we will have a society made up of individuals with integrity, good character and better norms and values than we have today. From the new society we will be able to produce better leaders be it political or otherwise.
I would like to know what you think of this…
cheers,
AleQa Bru
Hi AleQa Bru
I would like to express my earnest appreciate for your continued interest to discuss this very important issue, which has been beneficial to me.
While I agree with you on the role of moral leaders and the importance of awareness creation, I’m afraid that too much emphasis on these two elements may divert the focus of attention from the main goal. My very short term objective is to see the end of ‘woyane’ dictatorship and the birth of democratic and just government in Ethiopia.
Hence, my wish is all efforts of the opposition to be well focused on this objective. I believe that we have well qualified leaders among the opposition group. So, whatever weaknesses they have, I can not see the need for an extended awareness creation program for these political leaders. The main problem among the leaders, as I understand, is not due to lack of awareness or being less educated than the individuals you listed. Rather, the problem is due to lack of system and organizational capacity to survive harsh and complex political situation of our country. It is this problem that magnified the weaknesses that could have been systematically dealt with and shaped within own organizational set up.
Currently, the pressing issue we have is how to create effective cooperation among the opposition groups. So, what we need right now is to explore the challenges ahead and the limitations and opportunities we have, and then to design the strategy that enables the different opposition groups work together towards a clearly defined common purpose. In this regard, intellectual support to our political leaders has to focus on building organizational capacity, networks, and systems. This will not undermine the importance of awareness creation and cultural transformation; which has to be promoted continuously and could be done in many different ways.
Finally, I would like to note that the two possible action plan items, I mentioned previously, are only examples meant to explain my idea; and I feel that listing and prioritizing action plan items would be beyond the scope of our discussion forum. Generally, my suggestion was for a certain scholar to explore the issue and come with a proposal containing specific action plan.