Abiy and Esaias and the Amhara Chauvinists

(By Yusuf Abdulkadir, 03.01.2021)

Over the last three or four months, huge demonstrations have been staged by Tigrayans and supporters of the cause of the people of Tigray in many parts of the world. However, the recent demonstrations in Washington DC go beyond just demonstrations signifying the need for something hopefully in the offing! Eritreans in the US held a huge demonstration in Washington DC drawing participants from near and far in the US condemning Esaias, the fascist, and his criminal war on Tigray. Similar rallies have been held in European cities clearly indicating the re-awakening and determination of Eritrea’s sons and daughters to fight for freedom and democracy and against a tyrant. Tigrayans in the diaspora have been voices of the voiceless people of Tigray in an hitherto unprecedented unity of purpose and action. Rallies and demonstrations and the famous ‘Digital Woyane’ have, on the social media front, fought hard against Abiy, Esaias and the chauvinists so that the crimes they’re committing in Tigray are exposed and that they are made accountable. Last week’s mammoth demo jointly by Tigrayans and Oromos as well as the demonstration by Eritreans held in Washington DC tells a lot about what needs to be done going forward. Why? Let’s take a close look at what the so-called leaders and the elites of Eritrea, Ethiopia, the Amhara region and Somalia are doing and have been doing. Oromiya’s Ijjoole Oromiya have held numerous rallies and demonstrations in many European cities and in the United States. They have condemned and told the world how the people of Oromiya are suffering under the fascist rule of Abiy. Tens of thousands of Oromos have been subjected to mass arrests and mass killings and imprisonment of men, women and children. It has also been a systematic criminal act of denying the Oromo people their leaders so that Abiy could hold on to power with Esaias’s support. A recent ugly pronouncement by Abiy’s Prosperity Party operative says they must dry up the waters in order to kill all the fish once and for all, referring to the elimination of Oromo freedom fighters. The dictators and chauvinists in the Horn of Africa, namely, Esaias of Eritrea, Abiy of Ethiopia, the Amhara chauvinists and Somalia’s Farmajo, have formed what many have called the Unholy Alliance against peaceful opposition, democratic unity and federalism, democratic elections, stability and socio-economic development. In the case of Ethiopia, as a result of the peaceful democratic procedure of the transfer of power from the outgoing PM to the incoming PM about three years ago, people had great hope peace, democracy and development would be strengthened and that any political differences would be solved through dialogue and democratic elections. Thus, the TPLF having accepted the EPRDF leadership election results and the subsequent Parliament endorsement of the PM, decided to leave the EPRDF coalition to become a loyal opposition party in its region within the county’s democratic federal constitution. However, Abiy, Esaias and the Amhara chauvinists were rather set on a course of launching unjustified war on Tigray in the name of ‘enforcing law and order’, where no such problem existed.  They are committing war crimes and crime against humanity which the whole world now knows and which the people of Tigray are valiantly fighting against. The Amhara chauvinist extremists were right from the beginning against the new order in which all nationalities would live as equals enjoying self-rule within a democratic federal Ethiopia.  They re-emerged with the time-worn slogan ‘Ethiopianess’ which everybody knows means ‘Amhara fuedal supremacy’ which is an anathema to Ethiopia’s majority nationalities who had suffered centuries of oppression, ignorance and poverty under a backward and repressive feudal system, bent on land grabbing as happened in western Tigray, Benishangul and other places. The chauvinists have been instigating hate speech through their media channels, including government electronic and print, from within and outside the country directed at the extermination of the people of Tigray. They have been promoting a chauvinist line which rejects the management of diversity in Ethiopia through participatory democracy in which nationalities administer their regions themselves while coming together at Federal institutions level for collective leadership (Parliament, etc.) In Eritrea, Esaias’s dictatorial and repressive rule is very well known to the world. Eritrea is now a country whose population has diminished conspicuously with many fleeing the country everyday through all sorts of ways. Eritrea is also a country with no rule of law system, no constitution, no political parties, no elections, no parliament … the list goes on. What is worse is the elimination of any opposition through summary killings, assassinations, kidnappings, harsh imprisonment, turning the country into hell on earth. Esaias’s ambition is to rule the Horn of Africa by placing his puppets in the countries in the region, pitting one ethnic group or country against another in an endless situation of instability, conflict, ignorance and poverty. In Somalia, the dictator in the making following the foot-steps of his mentors Esaias and Abiy has been trying to dismantle the federal structure and postpone elections illegally putting Somalia again in turmoil, triggering a very angry response from the people and most political parties in Somalia. So now, the question is: how can the fight against Abiy, Esaias and the chauvinists be strengthened? How should freedom fighters, democratic parties, movements and civil societies and community organizations respond to a coalition of anti-democratic, anti-freedom and fascist political parties and chauvinist organizations? So that a more effective political block is formed! So that the removal and subsequent accountability of the dictators is speeded up! There lies the answer: While the organizational independence of all parties and organizations and the subsequent decision of the people of a country or region or organization should be guaranteed, the formation of a broad-based anti-fascist and anti-chauvinist solidarity forum (not military) is an important way forward to ensure the fastest route to root out fascism and chauvinism from the Horn of Africa, rendering the region a place of equality, peace, democracy and development. Important objectives of such a broad-based solidarity forum of anti-fascism in the Horn would be to promote brotherly/sisterly relationships and solidarity among people of the participating countries, joint activities to do with organizing conferences, rallies and demonstrations, exchange of information and experiences and engagement with institutions. It should be obvious that there is a shared vision of freedom in which one needs the other in the same situation, while the right to self-determination remains with each people. Such a solidarity forum should start among the diaspora in all the continents before it is possible to organize same in the member countries. In this connection, it is proper to learn from the World War II anti-fascist alliance between the United Kingdom, the United States and the Soviet Union.  Two contrasting and opposing camps joined together to fight and eliminate German fascism, which was then the worst enemy of mankind responsible for the destruction and death of millions, including the genocide of six million Jews!