Previously, I have written about an Eritrean “adviser” to Ethiopian opposition groups named Col. Fitsum who has been arbitrarily arresting Ethiopians, blocking reform inside the opposition groups, sabotaging their activities so that they stay weak, turning their members against each other, and robbing funds that are being sent to EPPF from its supporters in the Diaspora. Several Ethiopians, including myself, tried to make the Eritrean government aware of Col. Fitsum’s misconducts, to no avail, leading to politically damaging speculations that he is not acting alone and that he is carrying out a government policy.
Things turned from bad to worse when recently Col. Fitsum arrested a prominent Ethiopian opposition figure, Col. Tadesse Muluneh, a founder and former leader of the Ethiopian People’s Patriotic Front (EPPF). Another prominent member of EPPF, Shambel Zewdu Ayalew, who was forced out of the organization by Col. Fitusm, had disappeared for over two weeks and I learned last Friday that he is back in his residence in Asmara. He now seems to be fine, although shaken up and is unwilling to speak to any one. Despite multiple requests for explanation, the Government of Eritrea (GOE) so far has chosen to remain silent about what happened to Col. Tadesse and other Ethiopians who disappeared.
Those of us who are expressing concern about Col. Tadesse’s arrest are now being targeted by Fitsum for propaganda attack. On Sunday, January 2, one of his prisoners named Mengistu, whom he installed as a spokesperson for EPPF, was interviewed by ECADF paltalk room where he said that those who ask about Col. Tadesse and other Ethiopians who have disappeared are trying to soil EPPF’s name. When pressed for an answer by the moderators and some in the audience, Mengistu, in a shivering voice, said that he and his colleagues are not in a position to get information and that he doesn’t think he should make an effort to find out what happened. Instead, he tried to explain that Col. Tadesse has left EPPF long time ago on his own will, and Shambel Zewdu also left because of health reasons. Mengistu’s answers have offended many in the audience who know about the circumstances under which both individuals left EPPF. They were forced out by Col. Fitsum. In Shambel Zewdu’s case, he had to literally run through the streets of Asmara to General Tekle Manjus’ office to seek protection. One of those who was ordered by Fitsum to arrest Shambel Zewdu was Mengistu himself.
It needs to be mentioned here that Gen. Tekle is a decent and humble person who is well-liked by every Ethiopian I met in Eritrea. It’s because of Eritreans like Gen. Tekle I still hesitate to conclude, despite mounting evidence, that what Col. Fitsum is a doing has not been sanctioned by Eritrean government. Unlike Col. Fitsum, many Eritrean officials such as Gen. Tekle, seem to be corruption-free and live a hermit-like life with little or no personal wealth. They also appear to be sincere in their desire to reach out to Ethiopians.
Cooperation between Ethiopians and Eritreans is a necessity for both people, but obstacles like Col. Fitsum, a corrupt and petty criminal who is knowingly and unknowingly serving Woyanne’s interest, must be removed. It is impossible to work with the Eritrean government in a mutually beneficial way while individuals like Fitsum are allowed to run amok.
Going back to Mengistu’s interview on ECADF, his answers have angered and disturbed many of the over 400 members of the audience. I, however, am not angry at him. I know Mengistu personally. I met him several times in Eritrea during the past two years. He is not a bad person. He is disillusioned by what is being done to EPPF and is desperate for a way out of the mess. I feel sorry for him because he is a prisoner and victim of Col. Fitsum. He was ordered to give an interview to try to misinform Ethiopians in the Diaspora, and discredit individuals who are exposing his crimes against Ethiopian opposition groups and their members. Truth and hard facts cannot explain away by cheap propaganda.
The fact is that EPPF is currently under the complete control of the rogue colonel who is too ignorant to understand that his actions, such as arresting prominent Ethiopian opposition figures, will damage the Ethiopia-Eritrea relation that many, including myself, have worked hard to build. I and many others were willing to tolerate his misconducts until EPPF is reformed and his interference is curtailed, if not completely stopped. When I realized that it was impossible to reform EPPF without a protracted effort that may take several years, I withdrew my support starting last August and took a different route completely separate from EPPF. Many others, including most of the fighters, have left the organization. The once promising EPPF has now dwindled down to less than 70 fighters, many of whom would not return if Fitsum allows them to leave Eritrea. Mengistu and most of the executive committee members would also not return if they leave Eritrea. That is why Col. Fitusm does not allow them to travel any where. Another executive committee member, Nurjeba, was arrested for over a year about 3 years ago for trying to escape to Sudan. As things stand now, EPPF fighters and leaders are Col. Fitsum’s hostages.
It was this kind of mess that we were trying to fix after being given assurances from President Isaias Afwerki that if there is any intervention at all from the Eritrean government it will be by Eritrean advisers who have genuine interest in working with us on the basis of mutual interest. There are indeed several Eritreans inside the government who have such interest.
I’m told by Eritreans that the GOE moves slowly and that the problems will be addressed soon. In the mean time, as I have been advocating cooperation with Eritrea in a very open manner while others sneak around in the dark, I will also point out difficulties we are facing in an open manner, especially when it comes to such a flagrant violation of the trust that we were trying to build between Ethiopians and Eritreans.
My purpose begins by stating that my reading of Asgede Gebre Selassie’s book Gahdi 1 significantly departs from the review of the book by Tecola Hagos, an esteemed friend and an established public intellectual for the democratization of Ethiopia. Even though Tecola was critical of some aspects of the book, notably, of the “jubilation” that Assegid displays in his narratives of the TPLF’s victories against the Ethiopian army––since he seems to forget that the so-called victories were victories against his own country––in the main, his review is laudatory. The main reason for the praise is neither the literary quality of the book nor its conceptual insights but its truthful account of important political and military events by a person who had been both a direct participant and observer.
Nonetheless, every time Tecola reviews a book, something insightful is bound to happen, mostly because he has a way of putting the finger on issues that the author either failed to articulate properly or does not want to confront. His review of Gahdi is no exception to the rule, and the discernment comes out in the following statement: “what is most puzzling to me is the fact that why TPLF that was well organized, had superior manpower and weapon by the 1980s remained in some kind of subservient relations with EPLF’s Leadership.” The puzzle is real and reveals the failure of the book in that Assegid never succeeds in dissipating it. On the contrary, the book aggravates the riddle to the point of casting serious doubts on the veracity of its reports and explanations of events.
Though I reserve a more complete and detailed review of the book for a later date, I could not postpone the crucial importance of Tecola’s puzzlement, as it throws into relief the great question of Ethiopians about the nature of the TPLF. My claim is that Assegid’s book goes a long way in delivering the essence of the TPLF, provided that one reads it, not as an accurate account of events, but as a sloppy attempt at self-exoneration. I say “sloppy” because the book rests on a flagrant contradiction between Assegid’s visceral commitment to the TPLF and his own political demise, which he identifies with the loss of Assab and the wretched condition of Ethiopia under the TPLF.
The commitment is expressed by Assegid’s unreserved admiration of the TPLF’s fighting spirit and superior military strategy, an admiration so unbounded that he does not hesitate to say that the TPLF was the major, if not the only, defeater of the Derg. His account of the military force of the EPLF is deliberately demeaning, not to mention his utter contempt for the Ethiopian army. It is no exaggeration to say that, according to him, the TPLF would have defeated the Derg even without the EPLF when the plain fact is that the TPLF prevailed only after the Ethiopian army had been considerably diminished in its unsuccessful confrontations in Eritrea. The fate of the Derg was decided, not in Tigray, but in the Sahel mountains.
Unfortunately for Assegid, the more he assigns the exclusive victory over the Derg to the TPLF, the more he enhances the military and organizational power of the TPLF, and the less comprehensible becomes its subordination to the EPLF, all the more so as at times Assegid speaks as though the EPLF were the instrument of the TPLF rather than the other way round. Consequently, to explain why the TPLF failed in its commitments to liberate the Ethiopian peoples and create a prosperous and united Ethiopia with Assab as its main port, Assegid concocts the thesis that its leadership fell into the hands of Eritrean agents, the principal actors being Meles Zenawi, Abayi Tsehai, Sebhat Nega, Seyoum Mesfin, etc. Hence the puzzling issue: if the TPLF was so strong and the EPLF so weak, how on earth was the weak able to dominate the strong?
Assegid alludes to repression and deception silencing pro-Ethiopian elements in the TPLF. But his explanation falls flat when he himself admits that the anti-Eritrean forces within the TPLF failed to show a strong opposition to those working for the EPLF (see p. 31). Moreover, throughout the book, Assegid shows that the EPLF systematically engaged in activities detrimental to the TPLF and that the two organizations were sworn enemies from the get-go. He even states that the EPLF conspired with the Derg to undermine the TPLF, for instance by providing sensitive information to the Derg (pp. 138-139).Given this deep and protracted animosity, it is not clear how the leaders and fighters of the TPLF could be tricked, let alone forced, into giving the leadership to groups that were openly siding with the cause of Eritrea.
To the extent that the explanation of the derailment of the TPLF from its original goal is hardly convincing, the reason why Assegid clings to an irrational explanation is obviously rooted in his refusal to take a hard and critical look at the ideological and political goals of the TPLF. Since he refuses to question the original intent, he had to come up with an explanation involving derailment, essentially through the suggestion that Eritrean agents infiltrated the organization and brought about the betrayal. What speaks here is not reason or the resolution to understand and admit mistakes, but passion and the need to exonerate oneself by attributing the negative outcomes to a conspiracy, however unbelievable it may be.
The bare truth, however, is that the secession of Eritrea was the major condition allowing the TPLF to become the single hegemonic force controlling Ethiopia. Unquestionably, so long as the EPLF was a contending force within Ethiopia, the domineering goal of the TPLF could not come to pass so that pushing Eritrea out of Ethiopia was the appropriate strategic choice. (For further information on this point, see my article “The Underside of the Eritrean Issue.”) This same hegemonic goal explains why the TPLF decided to battle with the EPRP and the EDU, even as an alliance with these opponents of the Derg would have been more logical for an organization committed to democratize Ethiopia.
The point is that the TPLF has never been an organization committed to democracy; instead, it had a hegemonic agenda from the start, a point that has been recently underscored by another but more remorseful founding member. I have in mind Aregawi Berhe, who wrote: “the TPLF leadership put forward ethno-nationalism with ‘self-determination including and up to secession’ as its principal goal mainly because it offered the best chance of building an effective fighting force that leads to power, which understandably is the elite’s own goal” (A Political History Of The Tigray People’s Liberation Front (1975-1991), p. 307.)
What this reveals is that the so-called agents of Eritrea actually designed the right strategy to achieve domination. They understood very early that the best way to weaken the Derg and become the sole owner of Ethiopia was to fully support the Eritrean independence. The port of Assab was the necessary sacrifice to realize such a goal, given that any desire to retain the port would lead to war, thereby placing the TPLF in the same situation as the Derg. Indeed, to secure Assab, the TPLF would be forced to occupy Eritrea and engage in the same destabilizing conflicts as the Derg, with the added difference that it would have been in a much more disadvantageous position to pursue its hegemonic interests.
The great lesson here is that dissident members of the TPLF cannot join the struggle for democracy by denouncing the derailment of the organization for the simple reason that the theory is contradictory and utterly untenable. They must have a hard and critical look at the initial ideology and political agenda of their organization and admit that the predominance of Meles and his clique is neither an accident nor the product of a conspiracy, but a logical development of both the initial stand against Ethiopia and the subsequent hegemonic aspiration. They must do so for their own sake and regeneration into a democratic force, for admission of guilt chiefly conditions their emancipation from the demons of resentment, radicalism, and vindictiveness.
Let alone in the strictly patriarchal society like Africa where the father as the head of the family wields a great deal of power that make or mar the psychology of his children, even in the Western society that prides itself of liberty and emancipation of women, the presence or absence of fathers be it in a domineering or accommodating fashion plays a pivotal role in shaping the personality of children into manhood or womanhood. Although, I may touch upon the general parent-children relationship irrespective of gender, since this missive is inspired by Elias Kifle’s nominating his father as the Ethiopian Review 2010 person of the year, I would mostly concentrate on father-son relationship. As Africa is still in its rudimentary stage, relationships in the social scheme of things are crude and rude. Therefore, husbands can “discipline” their wives by beating them up. Also the spouses do the same towards “disciplining” their children.However,we should bear in mind that despite the dominant patriarchal culture, there are some communities in Africa that never impose iron discipline on their children, especially on boys. Pastoral communities are known for raising their boys in an absolutely free and fiercely independent ways. That’s the general picture of a society in rural Africa including the multitude of uneducated and poverty stricken urban dwellers.
Come to the so-called few educated and middle class family. You find nothing much changed in disciplining wives and kids. The only difference here is the subtlety of the method applied. When disciplining goes out of hand and serious abuses take place, it would still remain a hush-hush story for the most part to protect the honor and privacy/GEMENA/of the family from any scandal.Thankfully, this has nothing to do with being backward or having a black skin color. Westerners themselves have many skeletons in their respective closets to this effect. But there is another kind of imposition on children, particularly on boys. If the father is successful, renowned or someone who is seen as a role model in the community, the son is also expected to grow up like him which can be taxing on his personality. Daughters don’t have this sort of burden so long as they succeed to land a husband with good social standing and confine themselves to the three Ks August Bebel described in German as “Kuche, Kirche, Kinder” meaning kitchen, church and children. Probably that is the reason that we still don’t see many women leaders in the Western world despite the much vaunted liberty and emancipation.Ironically, societies considered to be too conservative, backward, extremist or even barbaric produced female leaders long before the Western world. Remember Indira Ghandi of India, Benazir Bhutto of Pakistan, Khaleda Zia of Bangladesh, Corazon Aquino of Philippines and Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf of Liberia? At any rate, it’s not only the father who attains prominence due to his record in public service or valour as a military man or entrepreneurial skill or academic prowess that expects his son to be like him. The society itself expects nothing less of him. Whenever the son falls short of expectation, he will be reminded not to be a weakling and a disgrace to his family, particularly to his father. In short, he would find it difficult to be himself wherefore one remembers Sigmund Freud’s “A son can’t be a man until his father dies.” Without going into the nitty-gritty of what led Freud to arrive at such a drastic conclusion, it’s easy to observe how successful fathers can be overbearing and intimidating more than ordinary fathers thereby overshadowing the healthy growth of their sons. The late Irving Wallace, an American novelist, testified to this fact in his book ‘The Almighty’ by saying “It’s hard for big self-made men who have everything to consider their puny sons as their equals and to trust them.” To emphasize this point, I would cite one example closest to home. According to Mulugeta Lule in one of his articles on the defunct monthly Tobia or Lisaane Hizeb, the renowned Ethiopian, Tekle Hawariat Tekle Mariam deflated his son’s ego, Girmatchew Tekle Hawariat on his appointment as minister by sarcastically remarking “Your appointment will not solve Ethiopia’s problem.” Thankfully, Girmatchew was not daunted. On the contrary, he earned a name and fame for himself. Negadras Tessema Eshete too saw the rise of his own son, Yidenekatchew to renown before he died. Can we say the same about Tadele? Well, almost. On top of being a successful businessman, he is also gifted on public speaking, a trait he inherited from his forefathers. Despite their unsung patriotism and hard-work in their respective endeavor, there are/were/other fathers too who begat sons and successfully raised them to noble causes. To mention a few, Dr. Berhanu, son of Nega Bonger whose father is a leading Hotelier who rose to success from a humble means through hard work. Ato Andargatchew son of Ato Tsige whose father not only taught academics but conducted himself as an exemplary upright citizen to his students. Ato Neamin son of the late Commander Zelleke whose father is particularly remembered for transforming Assab, the then portal town of Ethiopia from a scorching desert to a romantic town most sought by visitors. What is remarkable about these fathers apart from their own achievements is that they have never been like ordinary, content and self-centered fathers who advise their children to concentrate on mediocrity by avoiding risks and sacrifices. Either they encouraged their sons or at least didn’t get in their way. Before I say kudos to all of them including Elias’s dad, Kifle Seifu, I would like to add about those famous and less famous fathers who succeeded on top of their own success to raise their daughters to prominence.
The first one is Professor Getatchew Haile who also had a shootout with the henchmen of a dictatorship. Unlike Ato Kifle, Prof. Getatchew had a showdown with Woyanne’s predecessor, Derg whereby he got wounded and confined to a wheelchair for a life. This, however, had never dampened his spirit. In addition to his own contribution both to the Ethiopian cause and academia, his daughter, Rebecca, whom I believe owe her success to him, published a book titled “Held at a distance; my rediscovery of Ethiopia.” Another one is an Ethiopian I used to know from a distance before I went into exile.Though, he is not widely known on a national scale, he had a good record in the agricultural sector where he served quietly most of his life. On top of his deceptive villager demeanor underneath an astute mind crowned with a PhD, he was known not to buckle for something he didn’t believe in. His name was Dr.Gualu Endegnanew. Recently, I learned happily that his daughter who is the spitting image of him succeeded by achieving the highest position in a field that is heavily dominated by men even in the Western world. She is the first Ethiopian to fly a big commercial airliner as pilot-in-command. Her name is Captain Amsale Gualu. These Ethiopians taught their kids by being there for them and by their own money earned by the sweat of their brow unlike our current rulers who steal from the public coffers to send their spoiled kids to fancy schools in a limousine accompanied by bodyguards. My point, therefore, is Elias’s choice of person of the year for 2010 unlike his rash and highly controversial choice in 2008-09, has a salutary effect on almost all of us. Personally, it made me refer to a very good article I read on BBC Focus on Africa magazine by a Ugandan-born Canadian journalist and freelance writer named Nam Kiwanuka. She began her piece which she titled “My fragile father figure” with how ‘like many African children, grew up in fear of her father hence one of his looks can be enough to send her running.’ Yet, despite her fear, she admired him greatly wherefore she bragged about him “My Dad can do push-ups with one hand; He’s better at Kung fu than Bruce Lee.”
As parting company with a good dose of humour is good to preserve our sanity, I would also like to share my own or rather my last brother’s bragging on account of our father. All of us used to brag, but my brother’s as he revealed it to us much later after we grew up is really funny. He was showing off our father’s travel experience to all the ‘important’ countries to his childhood friend. Since our father was sent twice to U.S in his Air Force years, obviously America came first. Trouble is his friend’s father had also been to the U.S as a civilian employee of Ethiopian Airlines. So my brother began calling all the countries my father visited including the ones he didn’t visit. His friend claimed that his father too had been in all those places. Finally, my brother recalled my father’s conversation while reminiscing about his training days in the Air Force. He just remembered the phrase that my father used to employ “when I was cadet” in Amharic. The direct translation into English sounds like ‘when I was in cadet’ which made my brother assume in his childhood brain that cadet was a country. So he said to his friend “My father had also visited cadet!” whereby his friend admitted that he never heard a country called ‘cadet’ let alone to know about his father traveling to one.
Copycat Dictators and Cartoon Democracies in Africa
Ivory Coast, December 2010. Laurent Gbagbo says he won the presidential election. The Independent Ivorian Election Commission (CEI) said former prime minister Alassane Ouattara is the winner by a nine-point margin. The African Union, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the United Nations, the United States, the European Union all say Ouattara is the winner. Gbagbo is only the latest African dictator to steal an election in broad daylight, flip his middle finger at his people, thumb his nose at the international community and cling to power like a barnacle to a sunken ship.
Ethiopia, May 2010. Meles Zenawi said he won the parliamentary election by 99.6 percent. The European Union Election Observer Team said the election “lacked a level playing field” and “failed to meet international standards”. Translation from diplomatic language: The election was stolen. Ditto for the May 2005 elections.
The Sudan, April 2010. Omar al-Bashir claimed victory by winning nearly 70 percent of the vote. The EU EOM declared the “deficiencies in the legal and electoral framework in the campaign environment led the overall process to fall short of a number of international standards for genuine democratic elections.” Translation: al-Bashir stole the election.
Niger, February 2010. Calling itself the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy (CSRD), a group of army officers stormed Niger’s presidential palace and snatched president Mamadou Tandja and his ministers. In 2009, Tandja had dissolved the National Assembly and set up a “Constitutional Court” to pave the way for him to become president-for-life. Presidential elections are scheduled for early January, 2011.
Zimbabwe, March 2008. In the first round of votes, Morgan Tsvangirai won 48 percent of the vote to Mugabe’s 43 percent. Tsvangirai withdrew from the runoff in June after Mugabe cracked down on Tsvangirai’s supporters. Mugabe declared victory. The African Union called for a “government of national unity”. Former South African President Thabo Mbeki mediated and Tsvangirai agreed to serve as prime minister. A stolen election made to look like a not-stolen-election.
Kenya, December 2007. Mwai Kibaki declared himself winner of the presidential election. After 1500 Kenyans were killed in post-election violence and some six hundred thousand displaced, intense international pressure was applied on Kibaki, who agreed to have Raila Odinga serve as prime minster in a coalition government. Another stolen election in Africa.
Massive election fraud, voting irregularities, vote buying, voter and opposition party intimidation, bogus voter registration, rigged polling stations, corrupt election commissioners and so on were common elsewhere in Africa including Rwanda, Uganda, Nigeria and Egypt. In 2011, “elections” will be held in Chad, the Central African Republic, Malagasy, Uganda, Zambia, Nigeria and other countries. Will there be more stolen elections? One thing is for sure: In January, the Southern Sudanese independence referendum will be held with little doubt about its outcome.
Ivory Coast Headed for Civil War?
The tragedy about Gbagbo is that the one-time university professor was one of the courageous Ivorian leaders who had struggled against civilian and military dictatorships. He was the chief opponent of Ivorian president-for-life Félix Houphouet-Boigny. Today Gbagbo wants to become Félix Houphouet-Boigny reincarnate. After a decade in power, Gbagbo has become addicted to the sweet life (la dolce vita) of dictatorship. He is said to have the support of the country’s military. He controls the south, and “rebels” are said to control much of the north where Ouattara has his support. To complicate matters, there are reports that rogue remnants of Charles Taylor’s bloodthirsty Liberian army are being recruited by both sides of the crises as a perfect storm of civil war gathers over the Ivorian horizon. Is Ivory Coast headed for a replay of the two-year civil war that began in 2002? Unless Gbagbo peacefully leaves power, it seems inevitable that violence and conflict will again reign in the Ivory Coast destroying thousands of lives and the economy of one of the more prosperous African countries.
The international community led by the U.S and France appears to be orchestrating diplomatic pressure, economic sanctions and a cutoff of access to funds at the regional West African bank to force Gbagbo to step aside. ECOWAS (a group of some dozen West African countries) is said to be considering military action; but there is little evidence that it has an offensive military capability to rout Gbagbo’s troops. Gbagbo has intimated that he will retaliate against immigrants from ECOWAS countries in Ivory Coast should military action be initiated to dislodge him. He remains steadfastly defiant and has escalated the crackdown on opponents. He continues to round up opposition supporters; and street killings, abductions and detentions by the military and armed youth thugs are said to be widespread. Gbagbo has repeatedly claimed that the “international community has declared war” on Ivory Coast and he has a constitutional duty to defend the country against such aggression.
The Lesson of Ivory Coast
Informed analysts suggest that Ivory Coast will prove to be a global test case of whether the international community could develop consensus to uphold the outcomes of democratic elections against a defiant African dictator who refuses to leave power peacefully. I disagree for two reasons. First, dictatorships in Africa have always been tolerated by the international community. As in the past, the West will cackle, bray, neigh and yelp about Gbagbo, but at the end of the day they will yawn and walk away shaking their heads and repeating the words of former French President Jacques Chirac, “Africa is not ready for democracy!” Second, the AU and ECOWAS will make sure that nothing is done that will set a precedent for an African dictator being removed from power through international action. These are the same crooks who are today coddling and shielding al-Bashir from prosecution in the International Criminal Court. Today it is Gbagbo; tomorrow it could be any one of them. Africa’s dictators will never, ever allow such a precedent to be established.
Things Keep Falling Apart After One-Half Century of African Independence
Things keep falling apart in Africa because over the past one-half century of independence it has been nearly impossible to hold Africa’s so-called leaders accountable. For fifty years, African “leaders” have been telling Africans and the world that Africa’s problems are all externally caused. Africa is what it is (or is not) because of its colonial legacy. It is the white man. It is imperialism. It is capitalism. It is the International Monetary Fund. It is the World Bank. The continent’s underdevelopment, poverty, backwardness, mismanagement are all caused by evil powers outside the continent. The latest re-invention of the old African Boogeyman is “globalization” and “neoliberalism”, which Zenawi claims has “created three consecutive lost decades for Africa”.
There are indisputable reasons why things keep falling apart in Africa. The major one is the lack of competent leadership with vision, purpose and integrity. Indeed the common thread that sews the vast majority of post-independence African leaders is not steadfast commitment to good governance and democratic practices, but their incredible sense of entitlement to rule forever and ever and ever. In 1964, Kwame Nkrumah invented the whole idea of president-for-life becoming the first certified post-independence African dictator. Many others followed. In 1970, H. Kamuzu Banda of Malawi declared himself ‘President-for-Life”. Jean-Bédel Bokassa, the military ruler of the Central African Republic, kicked it up a notch in the mid-1970s. He coronated himself “Emperor”. Idi Amin of Uganda, Mobutu Sese Seko of Zaire, Félix Houphouët-Boigny of Ivory Coast, Muammar al-Gaddafi of Libya, Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, Albert Bernard Bongo of Gabon, Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, Ismail Omar Guellah of tiny Djbouti, and countless others have clung or continue to cling to power as rulers-for-life. It boggles the mind to call these individuals “leaders”; they are, as the great Afrobeat legend and human rights activist Fela Anikulapo Kuti described them, “animals in human skin”. I would call them hyenas in designer suits or uniforms.
These “animals in human skin” have stoked ethnic and tribal hatred, caused fragmentation and sectarian tensions and have unleashed unspeakable violence on their populations to cling to power in much the same way as the old colonial masters. In Ivory Coast and Nigeria today violent confrontations are being orchestrated by “leaders” along ethnic and religious lines. Just in the past few days, there has been a surge in violence in Nigeria, a country said to be evenly split between Christian and Muslims, with the firebombing of churches. Various scholars have expressed concern over the “heightening of the resurgence of ethnic identity politics in Nigeria” and the rise of armed ethnic militias which not only challenge the legitimacy of the Nigerian state but are also spearheading separatist movements to dismember the Nigerian nation. Given these tensions, more and more “marginalized” Nigerians are said to choose their ethnic identities over loyalty to the Nigerian nation. No doubt echoes of the Biafran War of 1967 reverberate in the minds of concerned Nigerians. Ethnicity and sectarianism are also a core element of the current Ivorian crises. Gbagbo accuses Muslims, who are in the majority in the north, of aiding and supporting the “rebels” who control the region. They have been subjected to attacks and persecution.
As Africa burns in ethnic, political and sectarian fires, the unctuous, hypocritical and self-righteous Western governments frolic in bed with the corrupt dictators in power. They jibber-jabber about democracy, human rights, the rule of law, accountability, transparency and the rest of it, but will gladly hold hands with bloodthirsty African dictators and walk down the primrose path to maintain their oil, mineral and military strategic interests. No Western government involved in Africa will openly admit it, but each and every one of them shares wholeheartedly Chirac’s view that “Africa is not ready for democracy” and that “multi-partyism” is a “kind of luxury,” that is unaffordable by a country like the Ivory Coast (or any other African country for that matter).
Chinua Achebe and Why Things are in Free Fall in Africa
In Things Fall Apart (1959), the great African novelist Chinua Achebe tells the story of the initial encounters in the 1890s between Ibo villagers in Nigeria and white European missionaries and colonial officials. That was the time when things really began to “fall apart” in Africa. The white man “put a knife on the things that held us together and we have fallen apart.” But his depiction could apply to the “falling apart” of many other African societies as a result of contact with colonialism and Christianity. But over the last one-half century, colonialism has become extinct and the white man has “left” Africa. The African leaders who replaced the colonial masters have not hearkened back to pre-colonial Africa and used traditional values and methods to hold the center and keep things from falling apart. Rather, they have followed in the colonial footsteps and lorded over vampiric states which have attenuated and frayed the fabric of the post-independent African societies to ensure their hold on power.
Robert Guest, Africa editor for The Economist, in his book The Shackled Continent (2004), argues that “Africa is the only continent to have grown poorer over the last three decades” while other developing countries and regions have grown. Africa was better off at the end of colonialism than it is today. According to the U.N., life expectancy in Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Sierra Leone, Zambia, Mozambique and Swaziland for the period 2005-2010 is less than 44 years, the worst in the world. The average annual income in Zimbabwe at independence in 1980 was USD $950. In 2009, 100 trillion Zimbabwean dollars (with a “T”) was worth about USD $300. In the same year, a loaf of bread in Zimbabwe cost 300 billion Zimbabwean dollars (with a “B”). The tens of billions in foreign aid money has done very little to improve the lives of Africans. The reason for things falling apart in Africa is statism (the state as the principal change agent) and central planning, according to Guest. The bottom line is that the masses of Africans today are denied basic political and economic freedoms while the privileged few live the sweet life of luxury, not entirely unlike the “good old” colonial times.
Guest concludes that “Africans are poor because they are poorly governed.” The answer to Africa’s problems lies in upholding the rule of law, enforcing contracts, safeguarding property rights and putting more stock in freedom than in force. Much of Africa today is under the control of “Vampire states”. As the noted African economist George Ayittey explains, the “vampire African states” are “governments which have been hijacked by a phalanx of bandits and crooks who would use the instruments of the state machinery to enrich themselves and their cronies and their tribesmen and exclude everybody else.” (“Hyena States” would be a fitting alternative in the African landscape.) Africa is ruled by thugs in designer suits who buy votes and loyalties with cash handouts.
Things have fallen apart in Africa for a long time because of colonialism, capitalism, socialism, Marxism, communism, tribalism, ethnic chauvinism… neoliberalism, globalism and what have you. Things are in total free fall in Africa today because Africa has become a collection of vampiric states ruled by kleptocrats who have sucked it dry of its natural and human resources. It is easy to blame the white man and his colonialism, capitalism and all the other “isms” for Africa’s ailments, but as Cassius said to Brutus in Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar: “The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves.” The fault is not in the African people, the African landscape or skyscape. Africa is rich and blessed with natural and human resources. The fault is in the African brutes and their vampiric regimes.
Achebe took the title for his book Things Fall Apart from William Butler Yeats’s classic poem, which in partial rendition reads:
Things fall apart; the center cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, (substitute Africa)
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
For what it is worth, my humble view is that the African center cannot hold and things always fall apart because the best and the brightest of Africans lack all conviction to do what is right, while the worst are full of passionate intensity to divide the people ethnically, tribally, racially, ideologically, religiously, regionally, geographically, linguistically, culturally, economically, socially, constitutionally, systematically… and rule them with an iron fist. “Ces’t la vie en Afrique!” as the French might say; but to gainsay Jacques Chirac, “Africa is ready for democracy!” (L’Afrique est prêt pour la démocratie!).
