Throughout the 1990s, the international donor community supported Ethiopia as a country that embarked on a democratic path almost after 2 decades of socialist military rule. The country’s achievement, so it was said, was both economic and political. Economically the ‘new government’ has taken some steps towards liberal and market oriented system. Politically, Zenawi fooled the world with his rhetoric and thus naively labelled progressive leader.
International community invested in the regime’s constitution-making process that led to its adoption in 1995. The constitution theoretically set up a number of democratic rights for its citizens. Defiant of the absence of separation of power between the legislative, the executive and the judiciary, and omission of the duration of the term of office for the Prime Minster, the constitution has taken a reverse track. Ethiopia today is governed under a system of one-man rule engineered by Meles Zenawi, who has now been in power for the last 17 years by suppressing all forms of democratic voice.
The problem is getting worse by the legacy of international donors’ condone because the regime violates its constitution, bans free press, crackdown on peaceful demonstrations, and rigs national election. By pouring in a huge sum to pay for state spending on military apparatus and infrastructure, these donors has helped the regime to consolidate its power and suppresses the opposition. Moreover, the subsidies from donors allow the regime to direct more of its own revenue into expanding its huge patronage schemes, making Zenawi depend increasingly for his political survival on continued financial and diplomatic support from his foreign donors although his regime has continued dishonouring its promises.
Yet there is a ray of hope in this seemingly hopeless situation. The regime’s corruption, violence and vast patronage ate away economic resources. This undermined its ability to function properly in the long term because it destroyed the economic foundations of the regime’s political survival. To date the regime has been saved from this grim prospect by foreign aid donors. If the international donors pulled the plug, the regime could no longer be shielded from the consequence of its own mischief, and would have to bend to democratic pressure.
The regime has established all-round strategy to personalize its power at the expense of the Ethiopian people. The adoption of structural adjustment—liberalization, deregulation, devaluation, and privatization in the 1990s blatantly served the interest of the regime not of the people. It has created surrogate institutions that appeared to represent private sector, but in reality remained subservient to the regime. As Zenawi’s antidemocratic sentiment gathered momentum, the business class has mostly become a bystander and left the struggle for democracy aside. Such oblivious nature of private sector only leads to personalization of power. As a result, the regime has become the largest owner of industries and businesses as well as its biggest employer. Investment is consolidated in the hands of the regime so much so that the best way to get into business and be part of the looting is to deal with the regime itself. Virtually, the praised programs — liberalization, privatization, devaluation and devolution are all remained on paper without practice. The reality is that public access to basic social services is significantly diminishing; unemployment is rising, inequality is being widened thus making the poor poorer, and the regime richer.
The educated middle class, instead of opposing the regime like other middle class citizens in other parts of the world, has chosen to flee the country, leaving Zenawi largely unopposed as he consolidated his personal rule. Other professionals who remained in the country are integrated into his patronage network. Some others are employed in NGOs, which is highly censored by the regime too.
Why has this been happening? The answer lies in the regime’s use of force and intimidation on the one hand and its manipulation of patronage on the other. Zenawi has always sought to use the army to build his personal political base. He employs violence sparingly and selectively – as a tacit instrument when the political process fails to yield before his requirements or the opposition appears to need whipping into submission. For instance, the regime waged hefty war with Eriteria from 1998 – 2000, which was responsible for about 70,000 lives and wastage of billions of dollars. The same massacres were extended into Oromia, Gambella, Sidama, and sovereign state–Somalia. Furthermore, Zenawi’s success in consolidating his power and stifling democracy emanates from his knack for integrating large chunks of the ‘political’ class into his vast patronage empire. Patronage, typically in the form of government contracts, tenders, and jobs, to bribe business communities, low skilled personnel and bilateral corporations at the expense of the nation.
In an effort to direct the attention of international donors, Zenawi’s government promised to hold a free and fair election with multiparty political competition in 2005. Nonetheless, many international election observers have proved that the opening of multiparty contest was just the icing on the cake. The government had long been engaged in practices both official and unofficial that rendered constitutional guarantees impotent. The election was rigged and manoeuvred by the incumbent party and its cronies, which revealed the true nature of the regime. The point of change was to strengthen the Prime Minister while enfeebling the institutions that might act as a check upon him. The government manoeuvred the election result by such fraudulent means as bribery, blackmail, naked intimidation, and use of excessive forces. With the skids thus greased, the re-election of constituencies filed for supposed irregularity glided through easily, opening the door for the ruling party to hammer aggressively the democratic voices. Election, in Ethiopia – as in most of Africa – are invariably marred by the executive, and the fact that no definite term is fixed in the constitution for the prime Minster’s term of office, the future of democracy looks bleak.
After his attempt to mislead the world community by holding the so-called free and fair election, the regime launched another weapon to divert the world leaders – ‘robust economic growth as proof that poverty is declining in the country because of good governance’. However, the statistics by which indicators of such economic growth derived were far from being credible. In addition to ignoring social and environmental degradation from the equation, the statistics failed to address the long-term problems.
To improve his chance for success, Zenawi also exploited local councils to build its oppressive organizational infrastructure, cajoled leaders from opposition parties to join its own gambling polity. The decentralization of the budget to a district level to a certain degree gave the local officials an economic reason to work for Zenawi although, armed coercion made them fearful of what would happen if they broke with Zenawi’s agenda of power usurpation.
In conclusion, the worst obstacle to democratic development in Ethiopia has been the personalization of state power. The military and economic aids from abroad were used to selectively suppress dissents. The money sluices through a massive patronage machine that Zenawi uses to recruit support, reward loyalty, and buy off actual and potential opponents. In his effort to personalize the state further, Zenawi has skilfully undermined formal institutions of governance, preferring as he does to use highly arbitrary and informal methods of recruiting and rewarding officials. Above all, the absence of clear separation between the branches of government allowed the emergence of a very strong and an out of control executive resulting in such tyrant one-man regime. The way out could be building institutions that democracy requires, reworking the constitution, and then encouraging mass-political participation and unfettered electoral competition. This demands however, backing and stand staunchly with determined political oppositions as they struggle to empower the people, who should be the sovereign authority in Ethiopia, not the elite that came to power by force and is staying on it against their will by force. When elections are held in an institutional wasteland like Ethiopia, say in 2010 political competition typically coalesces around and entrenches the ethnic and sectarian divisions created by Zenawi as usual. The implication is that, not only is the one- man rule legitimized, but also subsequent efforts to democratize the country will be more difficult and more violent than ever.
Four articles — Andargatchew, Daniel, Girma and Bertukan. Andargatchew advocates for a violent form of struggle while Bertukan stands diametrically opposed to the thesis. Daniel supports a form of struggle similar to that of ANC; but he is doubtful whether Andargatchew’s definition of violence matches his understanding of ANC’s form of struggle.
I don’t see any conflict between Andargatchew’s and Daniel’s articles, at least up to this moment, as Andargatchew hasn’t yet clarified the specific forms this ‘violence’ will be taking. In fact, leaving his supposition about the definition of Andargatchew’s term ‘Amets’, the positive contribution of Daniel’s article to the discussion is with regard to giving definitive forms to Andargatchew’s reference to Amets.
Girma Kassa’s is a bit difficult to follow. On the one hand, he lauds Tegbar League’s actions and yet denounces violence. In fact, he advocates even wider and coordinated simultaneous sets of actions similar to those of Tegbar League’s, which would cover the country so as to make governance by TPLF impossible. Here is where I lose Girma. Is this not what in simple language called insurrection? What would happen when the uprising in a certain woreda amasses the capability to kick out the agents of the state, but the agents become unwilling to relinquish their position and start shooting at the crowd? Will you be using violence to smoke them out or retreat in observance of Bertukan’s oath to Ephrem Yitshak? If you are supporting the throwing of stones at city buses, what on earth can be wrong about blowing a T-45 that comes to demolish whole villages? Or, to be prepared to stop Agazi killers from marching on school children?
I find Girma’s position logically untenable. If he is to be consistent, he should subscribe to either Daniel’s or Bertukan’s line. Mixing the two doesn’t help to clarify the situation. If he is saying that he stands against protracted warfare, it is understandable on the merits of the multitude of views of the commentators on EMF’s website. But, this immediately reduces Girma to Daniel’s view — protracted armed struggle is not a viable option. Apart from these, the remaining choice becomes only that of Bertukan’s line — the irreversible marriage to the peaceful struggle, presumably meaning also avoidance of any actions that lead to loss of life and hence confrontation with the state.
Girma’s questioning the morality of supporting violence from diaspora is also unclear. I cannot understand what makes his support for Tegbar League morally justifiable in contradistinction to Andargatchew’s advocacy for uprising. I don’t think Girma was standing at the head of the school children who were throwing stones at city buses when he lauded Tegbar League’s actions.
When Girma attempts to elevate the discussion to theoretical generalisation, he starkly commits the sins he was trying to accuse Andargatchew about. After misreading Andargatchew to have said that democracy is required in order to conduct peaceful struggle, he continues to tell us that no pre-condition is required to conduct peaceful struggle. Regrettably, I would like to refer him back to paragraph 3 under section 5 on page 18. According to my reading of Andargatchew’s article, I cannot find any place where he put the institutionalisation of a democratic system as a pre-condition for peaceful struggle. He has explicitly stated for this not to be the case when he wrote:
When we look at democratic systems from this angle, we find them to be the best and most capable of all currently existing systems with respect to accommodation and management of differences. Even though a given system may not be democratic, it can be capable of accommodating political difference. But, for this to happen certain conditions like…
This for me says only one thing: the best system that manages political conflicts is a democratic system. No more! In fact, when Andargatchew cites the need for the prevalence of those things like law, morality, monarchy, God etc… poised higher in a society than the conflicting parties, it is a clear indication of his endeavour to find preconditions that clearly fall far short of the scale of institutionalisation of a democratic system.
If Girma truly wants to engage in constructive discussions along these lines, what he should answer primarily is whether peaceful struggle could have been possible in Hitler’s Germany or Idi Amin’s Uganda or for that matter in Mengistu’s Ethiopia? If he is to answer ‘yes’ to the above question, I rest my case and am willing to sit and learn ‘how’. But, if he may answer in the negative, he should also make efforts to find out what conditions should have been in place there for peaceful forms of struggle to have been possible? By asserting his statement about the redundancy of pre-conditions for peaceful struggle on the basis of mis-quotes from Andargatchew, Girma can only be seen as having constructed suitable premises which make his pre-held conclusions plausible.
Most interesting is Bertukan’s — not least because of her position as a leader of a movement. Firstly, I am astounded by the speed at which she sprung for the rebuttal. This, from a movement whose best achievement during the last 8 months since its leaders were released from prison is only tearing itself into shreds over matters matured children even would contemptuously ignore. Regrettably, this can only be seen as a testimony to our worst fears about the capability of Kinijit’s leaders to live up to the trust invested in them by their followers and supporters.
Why hasn’t she released press releases in all these times against the machinations of Woyane and its electoral board when her movement’s ‘V’ sign and organisation name is snatched away from her? Why hasn’t she requested for the resignation of the Government of the day when the bullions in the national bank turned ‘Ballestra’? Or, denounced the sky rocketing life expenses for the ordinary Ethiopian, which even Lidetu had something to say about? Bertukan’s priorities are at best misplaced.
The following line from Bertukan’s letter is also significant on the merits of its undertones:
Based on the pretext of Kinijit leaders prolonged incarceration and EPRDF’s anti-democratic stance, a few supporters of Kinijit in the diaspora are raising questions against the peaceful form of struggle.
I think this is a complete miss of the cause that gave Kinijit’s leaders the prominence they have enjoyed for far too long: Ethiopians want change and Kinijit leaders put themselves forward as viable agents. Nothing more! The Kinijit leaders will enjoy their prominence so long as they can be seen to deliver. The interest of the need for change on the part those Ethiopians supporting Kinijit is paramount. It is not the other way round. The trust given to Kinijit’s leaders can be prolonged only so far as they are advancing the paramount interest of the followers’ need for change. This trust is a contract not a fief for life.
It would have been more appropriate for Kinijit’s leaders to start from true reflection on their past experiences. I believe such a reflection would convince Bertukan about the lack or failure of leadership on Kinijit’s part to be the cause for Andargatchew’s proposal for another option. The direction her movement is trudging on at the moment wouldn’t put her politically on any elevated platform than those of Lidetu or Beyene or Bulcha. Attainment of such a position requires much more than past glory. At least, Bertukan needs to tell us in what ways her form of struggle may be different from the parliamentarian opposition’s.
In my view, her reaction to Andargatchew’s article has put Bertukan on an inferior platform than Beyene and Bulcha albeit rhetorically. To the credit of the two parliamentarians, unlike Bertukan, I haven’t seen them missing opportunities to point their fingers at Woyane’s repression as the main culprit for encouraging violence in the country, rather than attacking their potential allies or second level differences, under similar circumstances.
If I recall correctly, one of the eight negotiation points Kinijit proposed as a way forward back in 2005 included the independence of the Ethiopian defence and security forces from the tutelage of EPRDF. Wouldn’t it be most appropriate for a leader of a movement to reiterate one of its cardinal points whenever the opportunities arise, as the reason to write the letter may be, well before making calls to armed opposition movements to lay their arms and join the “peaceful struggle”?
The interest of the movement would have advanced if Bertukan used her three pages letter to tell us about what the leadership has mapped out for the furtherance of the peaceful struggle. Are they planning to continue the struggle through their representatives in the parliament? Or are they entertaining calls for defiance actions that may lead to confrontation with the security forces? What will they do when the state bans them from exercising their constitutional rights to peacefully demonstrate in public or organise? Will they stand up to the security forces even if that may lead to violent confrontations or retreat? Or enter a plea to Ephrem Yishak or that woman in US state department? How are they organising the movement — publicly and openly or clandestinely? These are questions which Kinijit’s leaders should have answered to, well over eight months ago, on the day of their release from prison. This shouldn’t have waited for a solemn request from Kinijit’s believers or provocation from radical rebels.
Let us not forget that this is a cause for which hundred died, tens (if not hundreds) of thousands languished in Woyane’s prisons or lost their living or were exiled, another thousands were expropriated unlawfully and families separated. For a leader of a movement this should be much burden that wouldn’t allow a day’s peaceful sleep, let alone allow the squandering of such a length of precious time as eight months are.
I can’t therefore help raising an eyebrow while reading references to moral superiority interspersed in various places in Bertukan’s letter. In my view, Andargatchew can be seen here to have a higher moral stance than Bertukan and co., because of his endeavour to keep the movement going by looking at other options at the time when Bertukan’s “marriage with the peaceful struggle” was seen to be vacuous.
The three summarised points given as reasons for denouncing armed struggle are also vacuous. For the sake of completeness, I summarise and translate the core points as follows:
1. armed struggle doesn’t result in anything other than hatred, poverty and sufferings;
2. the use of arms is incompatible with the empowerment of citizens to freedom and integrity;
3. the use of force against oppressors is not morally superior to use of force for oppression.
To me, none of the above three make any sense at all, if they mean what they say—general truths. I am completely at a loss how resistance could be equated to oppression? By what reason or logic could one put Ethiopia’s patriotic fighters resistance on the same moral footing with the Italian fascist occupiers; or ANC’s resistance with apartheid rule? Hasn’t ANC’s resistance delivered equality to the black majority of South Africa; or our patriotic forbears’ resistance freedom to Ethiopians from racist fascist rule? The history of anti-colonial struggles during the second half of the last century is full of examples where armed resistance delivered freedom, prosperity, social justice and restored human integrity.
Needless to say, the horrors of war should be avoided as much as possible. If there are other means leading to the desired goals, no sane person, let alone, those claiming to champion the betterment of peoples’ living conditions, would opt for it. But modern day political reality is a bit convoluted to be captured by Aristotelian reasoning only.
People may be thrown into situations whereby they will be confronted with uncomfortable choices only — living under unacceptable suffering or take up arms with full responsibility for the consequences of there actions. Under such circumstances, it can’t be anyone’s prerogative to moralise against the person’s choice to take up arms unless you are to deliver him from his sufferings. The fact that the terms of the suffering may be acceptable for you cannot be an argument against the other party’s choice for raising arms. The reference to the latter’s choice as backward and uncivilised would also be at best unjustified and unfair. Sadly, the rhetoric is indicative of the chronic malaise that caused the cannibalisation of Kinijit.
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The writer of this article can be reached through [email protected]
Tegbar has noticed the recent talk of armed struggle and whether or not Kinijt should seek such alternative. It is a question posed on Ethiopian Review, with various interesting responses including one that appears on ethiomedia. So, should armed struggle be an option, or should it leave the table? … Continue reading >>
Gulf Daily News – A BAHRAINI teenager, who was allegedly attacked with a hammer by an Ethiopian housemaid, is recovering at the Salmaniya Medical Complex, it was revealed yesterday.
The 14-year-old from Riffa sustained a fracture on his skull, hospital sources told the GDN.
The maid, who allegedly attacked him on Saturday, was suffering from depression and had expressed a desire to leave Bahrain, according to other sources.
“The family was reportedly trying to make arrangements for her to leave in a few weeks time,” they said.
The teenager was allegedly attacked when he went inside the house to fetch something from the kitchen as the family organised a barbeque in the compound outside.
He reportedly asked the maid for assistance, but she allegedly refused.
“The boy then said something to the maid, after which she reportedly attacked him,” said the sources.
The maid is being held in custody pending a psychiatric appraisal, they added.
The recent arrest of money exchangers in Ethiopia and the seizure of their money by Woyanne thugs is a day-light robbery of innocent store owners who are trying to make a living.
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APA (Addis Ababa) – The Woyanne regime on Saturday launched an operation to shut down all black market money changers, accusing them of being illegal traders. The Ethiopian Woyanne federal police said that they have arrested a number of “illegal” money changers in Addis Ababa along with hundreds of thousands dollars and euros in their possession.
The crack down on these “illegal” black marketeers is being taken after the country faces inflation, which is said to be over 20%.
This is the first time that the government has started to take measures against these money changers, despite them operating quite openly in the past 16 years.
Over 400 licensed changer shops are estimated to operate in Addis Ababa legally during the past several years.
These people were operating quite in the open without any government interference during the past 16 years.
These people, like in many other countries, are giving a higher exchange rate than the official banking system, which compels many people to use their services.
Some of these money changers told APA that they were not given any notice to stop their businesses, if the government claims them to be “illegal”.
This week, for instance, one US Dollar was changing at 9 birr 70 cents at the bank while it was 10 Birr and 45 cents in the black market.
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Over $6 mln seized in black market raid
(Capital) — Police in Ethiopia have seized a staggering two million dollars in hard currency with an illegal money changer and 13 million birr in cash with another trader in an unexpected police raid, where several alleged illegal traders were arrested.
The individual with 13 million birr in cash was caught on Thursday March 13, around American Gibi in a place called Beteseb Supermarket. The hard currency was also taken as evidence. Some said that the amount seized during the raid could be over six million dollars including the amount apprehended in Ethiopian birr.
Furthermore, Addis Ababa Police has taken into custody over 35 illegal traders in connection with foreign currency exchanges that police claims has contributed to the current destabilization of prices in the country.
One dollar was changed for 10.60 birr in the past two days before the police cracked down on the black market network on Thursday, March 13, 2008.
Souvenir shops around Filwoha, behind the Ethiopian Postal Service headquarters, in front of Gandhi Memorial Hospital, behind Ethiopia Hotel, around American Gibi, and behind Hilton Hotel were raided by the police.
“The illegal money changers have been in the business for several years without facing much hassle from police,” said observers surprised by the sudden raid.
National Bank on its part had alerted on Friday, March 14 that the public should be aware of counterfeit birr that are being disbursed through the black market.
According to Ethiopian law, foreign currency is only exchangeable at authorized banks, hotels and other outlets and proper receipts should be obtained for transactions. Exchange receipts are required to convert unused Ethiopian currency back to the original foreign currency.
Non compliance with the law results in penalties levied for exchanging money on the black market, ranging from fines to imprisonment.
Halifax Today – Police are investigating the deaths of a young mother and father whose bodies were discovered in their Leeds home in northern England. The couple, both aged 28, were discovered at a property in Beeston, on Sunday morning.
West Yorkshire Police were unable to confirm reports the couple were discovered by their 10-year-old daughter.
It is understood the deceased male was found hanged in the hallway of the property. Details of how the woman met her death have not emerged.
A police spokesman said they were not looking for anyone else in connection with the deaths.
A spokesman said: “We attended an address on Waverley Garth, Beeston, just after 8am on Sunday to find the bodies of a 28-year-old man and woman.
“We are not looking for anyone else in connection with the incident.”
It is understood the deaths are being treated as a “domestic” incident.
A neighbour said the couple came to live in Beeston four years ago.
The couple were originally from Ethiopia but have lived in Holland for the past couple of years and hold Dutch passports, it was reported in the Yorkshire Evening Post.
