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The imperative for Ethiopians dealing with Eritrea

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By Neamin Zeleke

There is a fundamental change in our thinking process. There is a shift of attitude among Ethiopians. A positive and essential change. Fuzziness of thought is giving way to clear thinking. A state of being in a limbo and inaction are succumbing to decision and a resolve for action. Vacillation and lack of confidence are clearing way to faith in oneself and confidence in the ability to change an utterly unacceptable life under an ethnocentric and brutal dictatorship. Confidence and faith that no one else but only Ethiopians can liberate our country from the fascistic and ethnocentric dictatorship of the minority Tigrean elite. Confidence that we are able and willing to do it by forging alliances with who ever accepts our need and willing to work with us towards our national salvation. Ethiopia’s national salvation could only be a reality if Ethiopian patriotic and democratic forces have a base, and outside support to wage their multi-pronged struggle. The requisite is for a sovereign country to become a trusted ally of Ethiopian opposition forces and provide them all around support.

Such is the defining moment in the making indeed. A surge of a critical mass of Ethiopians who are yearning for freedom and wiling to do whatever it takes. Ethiopians are saying “give me death or give me liberty.” No more tribal dictatorship! The people of Ethiopia are coming to the final and unequivocal resolve. Our people are saying we must, once and for all, take the destiny of this generation and that of Ethiopia’s posterity into our hands. A paradigm shift is taking place, a shift towards the view that in order to liberate Ethiopia from the anti-Ethiopia ruling Tigrayan mafia, Ethiopians need to make a strategic alliance with the State of Eritrea. The Rubicon has been crossed.

Ethiopians abroad and at home recognize that the quest for peaceful struggle is hopelessly dwindling. Whatever little political space there was for peaceful forms of struggle in the country have been blocked by the TPLF regime to essentially cripple Ethiopian opposition groups from gaining any meaningful support from the Ethiopian people. The regime has devised numerous machinations to prevent a repeat of the 2005 phenomena from unfolding again.

Serfdom or Liberty

Tigrayan minority dictatorship has made it clear time and again that it will never heed the call and the demand for our freedom, the quest for real and genuine multi-party democracy, and the thirst for justice and yearning for the rule of law by the people of Ethiopia. It would not listen to our demand for equality and doing away with the domination of a single and minority ethnic elite in all spheres and aspects of the Ethiopian state, economy, military, etc. Meles Zenawi’s Gestapo known as Agazi, Federal Police and the other death squads of the ruling Tigrean mafia committed all that carnage against our people during the 2005 election. Millions endured humiliation and tens of thousands were crushed by the brutality unleashed against them. The old and young, women and children alike were rounded up by the tens of thousands to be taken to the concentration camps in Dedesa, Birr Shelko, and Ziway. Savage and sub-human treatment were meted out against unarmed, peaceful protesters and those who watched on the sidelines. The entire massacre in the hundreds, the inhuman torture and imprisonment of tens of thousands of Ethiopians by the TPLF regime was with one and sole objective of ensuring the continuation of its illegitimate rule.

As well known at various times during its tenure, the TPLF has unleashed its atrocities against the Amhara; it has committed atrocities against the Oromo people. It has committed genocide against our people in the Ogden region, and crimes against humanity against our people in Gamebela. Thousands of people from southern parts of Ethiopia were killed at various times due to the TPLF’s deliberate fanning of ethnic differences to divide and rule. In the name of constitution and “constitutional order” it has instituted a political system where there is a rule of the “jungle”, as Prof. Mesfin Woldemariam once dubbed the reality in Ethiopia, in contradistinction to the rule of law. Each and every article of the so-called constitution has been violated by the regime itself. Essentially a constitution is a social contact between the governed and the governors. And that social contract has been breached time and again none other than by its own author, the TPLF. To begin with, the so-called constitution was designed in such a way that a single and minority ethnic elite under the leadership of the TPLF and a group of satellite organizations and feeble individuals from other ethnic groups would be able to control every aspect of life. Much that has been made public in words and writings vividly and in no uncertain terms prove the unprecedented and hitherto unseen drive of minority Tigrean elite for domination of Ethiopia and the concomitant relegation of all other ethnic groups to a second class citizen status. Any threat to such domination by minority ethnic elite under the TPLF leadership is labeled a crime against the “constitutional order” and the “constitution”.

In a nut shell, this brutal dictatorship has strangled the Ethiopian people for the past eighteen years and bleeding us dry. It is this reality which proves time and again that such an evil force will not relinquish power unless forced to do so by a force through a determined, steadfast, and bitter struggle waged on all fronts by our people using all the available and necessary means.

The people of Ethiopia from all ethnic groups have crossed the threshold where any human being can carry abuse, total humiliation, deprivation, and being reduced to sub-human beings, second class citizens a la apartheid South Africa. There is now fundamental recognition that is permeating across a broad spectrum of Ethiopians that the source of all ills, all malaise, and our national agony is none other than the TPLF mafia holding the levers of state power. And that dictators rarely give up state power unless forced through a bitter struggle.

Freedom can not be realized without a sacrifice that is needed from each every one of us. Liberty can never materialize without fighting for it. And dictators will not give up unless we fight for our rights. And as Thomas Jefferson, one of the founding fathers of the United States, aptly observed two centuries ago, the tree of liberty has to be watered with the blood of tyrants in order for it to blossom. Today, the Ethiopian people are not only demanding for their liberty but willing to fight and make all kinds of sacrifice for it. We are at cross roads; we either choose freedom or accept and leave in serfdom.

No Permanent Enemy

If Ethiopians are serious about our freedom, rule of law, genuine democracy; if we care for our liberty from tyranny, we must think of outside “the box”. We must think on our own terms and stand on our grounds regardless of what our arch enemies define as to who Ethiopia’s enemies are and who is not. The TPLF regime, Ethiopia’s arch nemesis and internal cancer that is eating away our national fabric, must not be allowed to dictate and set the agenda as regard to who is for Ethiopia and who is against Ethiopia, as it has no moral grounds whatsoever, nor historical track record to tell us so. If allying with Eritrea is found useful, rational, necessary and sustainable — after examining all the hard facts and looking at all the strategic advantages and disadvantages of doing so — then it should be done on these criteria alone. Least of all, not because the Tigrayan dictatorship and its mouthpieces abroad dictate to us and attempt to bombard us shamelessly as to who should be our allay and who should not. There is no doubt in the mind of any sane Ethiopian that Ethiopia’s national interest has never been one and the same with that of the TPLF’s interest and agenda. It never was and nor will it ever be.

It is then imperative for Ethiopians to deal with Eritrea towards strategic steps, in the long term interest of the two peoples. Understandably, for many of our fellow Ethiopians this may leave a bitter taste. But we can not continue to leave and relive in the past. We have to move forward and look towards the future, although no single soul would dare question the fact that Ethiopia and the people of Ethiopia lost much when Eritrea became an independent state. So did the people of Eritrea. They too lost. That is then, but we are here now. For the sake of both Ethiopians and Eritreans, we should be able to put all agendas on the table. The loses, in all their manifestations that attended the separation of the two countries, could be worked out for a mutually advantageous gain for the two countries and their peoples’ future peace and development, be it economic, security, and maritime matters central to both countries — an issue extensively addressed by the President of Eritrea during his recent interview. We Ethiopians should be bold enough to start honest dialogue along this line.

Lord Palmerson, the often quoted British statesman, aptly said that nations do not have permanent friends or enemies, but permanent interests. The central question then becomes, if Woyane allied itself with EPLF to promote its strategic interest, why can’t the current Ethiopian opposition do the same? The President of Eritrea asked the same question in his recent interview with Elias Kifle and Sileshi Tilahun. But the differences between what the TPLF stood for then and what the Ethiopain patriotic and democratic forces stand for now is like that of light and darkness. Moreover, the President of Eritrea has made it public that his country has no intention of working against Ethiopia’s unity. What we expect is for him to live up to his public pronouncements.

Hence, the people of Ethiopia have to see the incontrovertible reality eye to eye. We have to come to terms with the unfolding reality. The cruel reality, the undeniable fact, the incontestable truth that has come out loud and clear. Ethiopia’s current agony and the excruciating pain our people have been forced to endure each and every day have their immediate, clear and present causes not with Eritrea, but the TPLF-led minority regime that claims to represent less the 6% of the population strangulating and suffocating a nation and 80 million Ethiopians.

(The author can be reached at [email protected])

13 thoughts on “The imperative for Ethiopians dealing with Eritrea

  1. A very interesting explanation how to coordinate our efforts towards removing the racist , Aboy sebhat party, EFFORT, classified as the property of Tigray people , which is established by selling the gold reserve of ethiopia which is accumulated starting from the era of Menilik.

    If Eritrea is benefited from sea ports it is natural to pay for the service rendered , and if the two nations come together, they will work towards mutual benefit, but the woyane , which is a cancer eating ethiopia, should be removed by any means, this is a great opportunity to get a next door base, for the opposition parties, for military activity , close to release media, and make use of cover of the erirean forces, from woyanes attack, for example who can you base your opposition in Somalia, where the woyane can get in and out easily, how can u use kenya, or sudan, they are risky, in addition the closeness of the sea it is easy to get facilities for various movements, so it is the best opportunity to use , what would we have done if eplf is befriended woyane, we do not have any base and to lament for many years, we have to use the enmity between woyane and eplf, as it weakens, the regime, and give safe heaven for the opposition, the only thing expected from us is to coordinate our effort. It does not matter if we took different apporaches as far as it brings down the Junta, so go forward G7, olf, ONLF, and others and give sleepless nights for woyane, look how it send a cold sweat in the back of woyane after the interview with PIA, and Aboy sebhat is blaming the eritrean people and PIA.

    The war between eritrea and woyane in 1998 should be taken as a good opportunity to through away woyane from its base, and then we will return all the money and gold stolen from the crust of ethiopia, and we will establish new ethiopia, with out ethnic politics.

    Go ethiopia and eritrea

  2. I agree with your points.Now we know what the Eritrean people and the Eritrean Government stand on Ethiopian unity and the future of the two people and the people of the horn. It is high time to come to practical terms of coordinating our effort with our eritrean brothers.
    Let’s encourage all the freedom fighters to forge an alliance amonge themselves and work closely with the Eritrean people.
    WE DONT HAVE TIME TO WAST.

    Always with EPPF

  3. There is nothing to add to your comment it is well written and pointed out all the issues people have to work with and organize.

    I think the Eritrean People and PIA have one comment goal regarding to unite Ethiopia. We believe in principle not the enemy of my enemy is my friend. All people in Ethiopia are equal and should have any chance for everything.

    God speed the Etiopian and Eritrean

  4. I agree with you 100%, that we need to stop blaming Eritreans for all of our problems and start working with them genuinely for mutual benefit and with mutual respect. The only real and genuine ally we have in the area is PIA and the Eritrean people.
    One thing I know about these people is that they are not opportunistic like TPLF, and they are very principled and very candid.
    My warning to G7 and other opposition is that you need to be genuine when dealing with PIA and Eritrean people. They don’t have patience for small talk, they don’t sugar coat things and they don’t like wishy washy people.

    We missed our opportunity to in 1998, 2005. I hope we don’t repeat the same mistake. This is the time.

    Peace to our region

  5. I have never seen before the Weyanes are crying every where after the interview PIA with Ethiopian review.
    Aiga forum, walta forum, Aboy Sebhat. Aboy Zehaie,Sium Mefn , Bereket etc ….and now so called state of Tigray are crying Eritrea and the people of Eritrea.
    In other word basically what they saying is that even we will return what we stolen from Eritreans people just please Eritreans do not trust The Amhara do not trust Ethiopians do not make any friendship with them. To my dismay as if they have not done any harm to Eritrean people. But The Weyane they can’t fool the people of Eritrea and Ethiopia again. This is the beginning of a true friend ship between the two people and like PIA said the relation ship between Ethiopia and Eritrea is the sky is the limit. Weyane this is
    The beginning of your end! Thank You Elias and ethiopan review for the light at the end of the tunnel.

  6. No doubt the two countries merge as perhaps one big economic nation in the region.By gone is by gone! We do not need to go backward and blame each other for what happened in the past. It is imperative to start things a fresh for the bright future.My kids are Amharas and went to Texas A&M Univerity. They get along with Eritreans friends like brothers and sisters both sides care less about our past. This is the trend i like us to take with our fellow Eritreans . Now with President Esaias visionary plan we shall do away the ethenic politics of the woyanes and established a democratic nation of Ethiopia.It is immenent wOyanes will be flushed out.

  7. Mamush D.

    Woyannes are in a panic, no Eritrean takes them seriously, save for the few Eritrean traitors who have been hired by Woyanne since 1998.

    Every Eritrean is having a great time seeing Woyanne twist in the wind, believe me if it was not for the Eritrean government keeping us calm, the majority of Eritreans want to go do some serious harm to Woyannes in Tigray.

    The Eritrean government is far sighted, they know tomorrow things will change, they are telling every Eritrean not to hold grudges and get revenge, in the end the Ethiopian and Eritrean people have to live as neighbors, brother and sisters in the long run, that also includes the people of Tigray. We are lucky to have such a wise leadership that can see beyond tomorrow.

  8. There is no permanent friend or enemy…True True True. If woyane can work with shabia and be able to control our country, why cant we do the same and get our country back from this tigrea tribal junta. Wake up my people.

  9. selam neamn,

    I like your piece and couldn’t agree more with its timely contents. It goes without saying that we need the Eritreans as I believe they need us as well. It is MORE than give and take situation. Our destinies are intertwined. We live together and perish the same.

    However I noted the following statement in your otherwise nice presentation:
    “Understandably, for many of our fellow Ethiopians this (Ethiopians to deal with Eritrea towards strategic steps) may leave a bitter taste”. The question I have for you is why is that?

    I believe if it was a matter of “Grievance”, the Eritreans have a deeper case against us when the Eritreans were summarily massacred, whole sale villages burnt to the ground, women and children abused for simply being Eritreans and their brothers and sisters in Ethiopia did not raise a finger to all the crimes that were committed by Ethiopian regimes all in their name. That is a shame that neither can be denied nor forgotten. But, the Eritreans had the magnanimity to let bygones be bygones and the wisdom to look further than the shadows of their noses.

    Why would any Ethiopian be upset with the Eritrean people who fought for their independence that was illegally stolen from them in a broad daylight at tremendous pain and sacrifice to them? What is “Understanding” about some chauvinist people who may not be happy to see the Eritreans achieve their independence from the devil jaw, as it were?

    No, sir! There is neither understanding nor subtle acceptance to all these naysayers who may be grumbling about Eritrea’s hard fought independence. If anything, we should tell all our people who may be ignorantly entertaining such divisive and greed, selfish attitude to cool it and help us work with our Eritrean cousins for the benefit of both of our people. No more bloodshed between our loving peoples. Enough of that cyber war mongering! Let there be peace where no power can break. Our people deserve better.

  10. Dear Yenatulij,
    As an Eritrean who literally has a scar from the previous unjustifiable war against Eritreans during the Dergue era, I couldn’t agree with your statement more. You’re absolutely right. Eritreans are, by nature, humble and willing to forgive and forget and move on. But, they should not be asked to apologise for been victims of a chain of oppression and injustice perpetuated by very much all the past and present Ethiopian and Weyane leaders. No regret and no apology here. And, we don’t ask for apology from our beloved Ethiopian brothers and sisters either for, as much as it was and still is painful, it was a result of misguided information and brainwash disseminated by very few self-centered elites. Furthermore, the very fact that Ethiopians are stretching their hands of good will and cooperation with Eritreans as we have been seen from the commentaries is a clear indication of the acknowledgement of the mistakes of the past and what we should do to move forward as good neighbours.
    Thank you Yenatulij for your always enlightening and open-minded comments which I find uplifting. Also, thank you Elias and ER for allowing us to exchange ideas on this forum.

  11. No permanent enemy or friend, what is more important is common interest. Ethiopians and Eritreans should work together for a better tomorrow. This new opening with Eritrea is causing a panic in the TPLF camp. They know fully well the more Eris and Ethios are talking the end of the beginning of the racist weyane regime is coming to an end.

    I hope I am not wrong even when I hate what Shabia did to our country but I some how trust them. Eritreans are true to their words. They are not used car salesmen like weyanes.

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