By Koert Lijndier*,

Dutch Correspondent of the NRC Handelsblad Daily Newspaper

17^th of November 2005 – Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

Translation into English by Assefa Negash, M.D., Amsterdam, Holland

The democratic process has been brought to a stand still. Demonstrators are being rounded up by police. For a long time, such an oppressive and suffocating sphere was not prevalent in Ethiopia.

Mezgebu only wants to speak softly or quietly. “The Ethiopian government fights for its survival and it is crushing every opposition” whispers Mezgebu. His panicky or nervous eyes are directed upon someone who is going to stand at the door of his office. “Secret agents are spying or keeping an eye on us, we do not dare to even read critical newspapers any more”. A bitter smile tightens or sets his face. “I hope that I would not be landing in prison because of this talk with you (here Mezgebu is referring to the Dutch journalist Koert Lijndier)”.

Ethiopians appear paralyzed by fear due to the new wave of violence which broke out in many cities two weeks ago. Since the take-over of power by the party of prime minister Meles Zenawi in 1991, never before has such a sphere of anxiety been so dominant and prevalent in the country. After the highly disputed and controversial election results, the democratic process has come to a stand still. The opposition says that the first free election has been tampered with on a massive scale and it has given rise to repression. “The chance of a peaceful solution becomes even slimmer with each passing day” says the head of an Ethiopian help organization.

Desperate Ethiopian civilians have crowded round in front of the offices of the Red Cross and the Ethiopian Human Rights Council in Addis Ababa. They are looking for missing family members who have disappeared without any trace after demonstrations were held against the incumbent regime. According to figures released by the government, around ten thousands of Ethiopians have been rounded up and imprisoned. But according to an Ethiopian organization this figure is three times (i.e. thirty thousand civilians have been rounded up and imprisoned) the number released by the government. More than 40 demonstrators have been killed by government forces during the demonstrations. According to eye witnesses, the disturbances or riots at the beginning of this month were more severe than those of June 2005, during which time the police shot at demonstrators with lethal weapons (guns). This time the demonstrators fought back. The police rounded up young people from the streets and homes without making any distinction between demonstrators and bystanders or onlookers.  

The government allowed the imprisonment of the biggest opposition party – the Coalition for Democracy and Unity (CUD) as well as journalists.  A member of a human rights organization said that “The parliament revoked the immunity of CUD parliament members on the proposal of the ruling party. And now prime minister Meles Zenawi accuses the CUD of treason, a charge which carries the death sentence. The gloves are off and the power struggle is getting even more nasty and bloody”.  

Beyene Petros is leader of the moderate opposition party, the United Ethiopian Democratic Front (UEDF). He said that “The government is convinced of the fact that it has succeeded in suppressing the public uprising. But rage or anger is still present. Only a political solution can pull Ethiopia out of the dangerous political impasse”.

In the long history of Ethiopian, almost always, rulers came to power through violence. This history appears to have repeated itself. The possibility or chance of a compromise seems to have gone away. Not only did the government choose for confrontation. Within the CUD there is a radical wing which is encouraged by the sizeable Ethiopian Diaspora in USA * *. “Ethiopians have learned to endure a lot of violence”, sighs Beyene Petros.

The ruling party of prime minister Meles Zenawi, the Ethiopian Democratic Revolutionary Front (EPRDF) has never been popular among the Ethiopian people.    

They came to power in 1991 after waging a long resistance war, in the northern province of Tigray, against the military regime of Mengistu Haile Mariam. EPRDF’s image of a liberator was short-lived. Because the EPRDF appeared to be the same as Mengistu’s Dergue i.e. a small clique within the party makes all decisions without any open debate. In the three thousands year long history of the Ethiopian empire, governance was based on the subservience of the people to the ruler. In the case of Meles and his party, the people adopted an attitude of being increasingly less obedient to EPRDF out of dissatisfaction with the dominant role Tigreans play in the EPRDF.

Assefa Admassie leads an independent research institute – the Ethiopian Economic Association.  He says that “Meles and his mates are not open to new ideas. They have not shaken off the Marxist ideology of their days in the bush. They are stubborn just as the emperors in the past. And now Meles Zenawi rejects every criticism of foreigners regarding his heavy-handedness against the opposition. For centuries, the imperial rulers succeeded in isolating Ethiopia from the outside world. But such a policy cannot work any more as we live in a very different world. One third of all the national budget of the Ethiopian government is being paid for by foreign governments”.

Meles Zenawi is a very important ally of the West. In the American perception, Ethiopia, the second populous country in Africa holds a key position in the struggle against international terrorism. But in the eyes of the Ethiopian people, Meles Zenawi’s government has lost any credibility. Due to the government’s violence during the last days, the chance or possibility that the government would recover or regain its legitimacy has become even slimmer. The turbulent times in Ethiopia have not gone away at all.

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*The article appeared on the front page of the NRC Handelsblad newspaper. It also contains a photograph of Ethiopian school children, one of whom was making the V sign with her fingers symbolizing the CUD.

**This is sadly the kind of argument the incumbent Tigrean regime and its exponents such as the Reporter Newspaper (owned and published by a  Tigrean ethnonationalist who is loyal to the now ousted Tigrean ethnonationalist group led by Seye Abraham and Co.) are promoting. Reporter Newspaper has consistently tried to misrepresent the CUD as a group which is bent on bringing down the constitutional government of TPLF by street violence. The 3 million people who showed up at Mesquel square on the 8^th of May 2005 sent a shock wave down the spines of all Tigrean ethnonationalists who could not foresee this massive force that the CUD has mobilized. The following day, the Reporter Newspaper which was only too happy to profusely report on the public rally called by TPLF the previous day (7^th of May), kept silent. Its website disappeared from the scene following the 8^th of May public rally by CUD supporters. The massive appearance of CUD supporters on 8^th of May 2005 proved to be a painful political hiccup for the Reporter Newspaper and all Tigrean ethonationalists who sought the continuation of the rule of TPLF in Ethiopia indefinitely by pitting one ethnic group against the other as they have done for the last 14 years. In this experiment ethnic nationalism during the last 14 years, the majority of the people who have become beneficiaries of this divisive apartheid system happen to be members and supporters of the TPLF who come from a particular geographical area and represent one ethnic group.

Other websites owned and run by Tigrean ethnonationalists (AIGA, DEKI ALULA, HAMBASHA, ETHIO-OBSERVER, TIGRAI NET, TIGRAI ONLINE, ENA, TECOLA HAGOS, WALTA, WOYIN, RADIO FANA, SELAM TV, etc) also share and promote similar views or are actively engaged in disseminating false information which depicts the CUD leadership currently in prison as an extremist group or as a group which is bent on harming a particular ethnic group identified with TPLF. All these groups share one thing in common i,e they believe in the supremacy of group rights over individual rights. Hence, their hatred for CUD which openly champions the supremacy of individual rights over group rights and rejects the ethnicist policies of TPLF government– a government which has failed to perceive all Ethiopians as equals irrespective of ethnic or religious shibboleth. Ball-pen mercenaries such as Paul Henze of the Rand Corporation, a man least known for his intellectual integrity and objectivity, have been promoting such views as can be gleaned from the recent writings of this man on the AIGA website – a website owned and run by the extremist Tigrean ethnonationalists of the TPLF.