Bring it on!

ንልባም ብምክሪ፡ ንአድጊ ብበትሪ ！

By Aesop

02/04/2021

Why are Tigrai’s persecutors crying these days? Didn’t they claim that the “law enforcement” operation was over? Didn’t they declare that they have executed the key “junta” leaders? Well, they are crying for two reasons: (1) They know Tigrai’s center of gravity rests on the Tigrean people, and 2. They know the global narrative on the Tigrean genocide is approaching the truth. The table is turning against Tigrai’s enemies!

Tigrai’s enemies know that executing leaders will never subdue Tigrai. They are cognizant of Tigrai’s history, culture, psychology. To mention some: A. Tigreans are proud people who claim the Axumite civilization- one time world power. They know Tigreans wish to spearhead African renaissance- a land where development and democracy triumph and dictators are trumped. B. Tigreans defeated foreign invasion long before Adwa in Dogali. It is the Dogali example that furnished Ethiopia’s independence. C. Tigreans would rather starve than surrender. They choose death over dishonor- per Churchill’s dictum. So, Tigrai’s enemies really know that the power of whoever leads Tigrai rests on the mentality, not the capital (remember Mekelle was not always the capital of Tigrai), or an ally of Tigrai. Anyone who wants to subdue a particular Tigrean leader must exterminate all Tigreans. That is why it has remained impossible for foreign and domestic enemies to defeat Tigrai.

Second, the global narrative pertaining the war in Tigrai has changed. In other words, the truth about the Tigrai war has come out. This is a natural process. But Tegaru diaspora have effectively exposed what Tigrai’s enemies have been doing against helpless children, women, the elderly, and the disabled of Tigrai before it is too late. I say truth will naturally come out for a reason. Today, we all know that 90 percent of native Americans died during the European occupation. We also know that 6 million Jews died before the Nazi regime was defeated. A million Tutsis were hacked away before the UN could intervene in 1994. The genocide in Yugoslavia and, most recently, in Myanmar are also cases in point. Tegaru diaspora and those fighting to preserve their people on the ground have effectively prevented the complete extermination of Tigrai by steering global public opinion towards the truth. The mission of Tigrai’s enemies has faltered, hence, their wailing!

Now, we must understand how and why powerful nations act. Ultimately, nations become powerful only if they reflect the opinion of their masses.  A country that ignored the concern of its citizens is unable to recruit committed public servants, including soldiers, who will uphold and defend their national interest. That is why democratic countries, especially those in the West, are more powerful than more populous and more resource endowed nations of the world. Western countries are powerful because, relatively speaking, they listen to their people. I am not arguing that elites in those nations will never ignore public opinion and pursue narrow commercial interests. That has happened in history. But that approach has never for long lasted in democratic countries, especially in the midst of a catastrophic humanitarian crisis as we are witnessing in Tigrai. Again, I am not arguing that Tigrai is the center of attention in the world. Ball I am saying is this: today, Tigrai is no longer a polity whose fate could be determined by some random diplomat assigned to Ethiopia. Cudos! to Tegaru diaspora who have ensured this will never happen on their watch!

America is the leader of this free/Western world. Its leaders can not promote a foreign policy that is antithetical to the values of the majority people. No ordinary person, including American, wants to see famine, war, injustice, and genocide in a world that American claims to lead. President Joe Bidens phrase that: “ we lead not by example of power, but power of our example! ” should be taken in that context. Anyone should expect that a top American diplomat, spokesperson, general, or ambassador who goes against this basic tenet is working against his/her own administration, thereby putting his/her own career at risk. If the American people no longer want to witness genocide in the world on America’s watch, officials of the incumbent government administration should work to make it happen. Same formulae applies to every nation claiming to be democratic. So, Tegaru diaspora should tell their representatives that they no longer wish to see Tigrean children dying, girls raped, and the elderly displaced. They should urge (not convince) all people, including scholars, journalists, and human rights defenders to take a look (objectively) at what is really happening against civilian (unarmed) Tegaru all over that phantom called Ethiopia.

It is because this happened (somewhat) that the dictators in Addis Ababa and Asmara panicked. The world (its people) are gradually saying that these “emperors” are naked. That is why the Addis Ababa dictator is calling for “a media counteroffensive”. One could wage a counteroffensive in war because war, as Clausewitz put it, is a “fog”. One could wage a counteroffensive during war because there are many factors open to chance and miscalculations. But media is a different story. Basically, a media is a conduit one propagates something that adds value to the people. A successful media is essentially one that disseminates the truth. One cannot survive in the media by suppressing the truth as one might survive in a war by raping, looting, and displacing innocent civilians.

The regimes in Addis Ababa and in Asmara have succeeded by suppressing information- the one thing media needs to survive. Now, they are trying to agitate their supporters to spread the lies that the world has already discovered. Are they going to say that Eritrean soldiers have not entered Tigrai? Are they going to claim that the 2.2 million Tigrean children in need of emergency food aid have been taken care of already? Will they argue that Ethiopia/Eritrean soldiers have not killed a single civilian as their leader in Addis openly stated while reports show 52,000  civilian death toll? Are they going to tell the world that the “law enforcement operation” is concluded? Will they say the hospitals, communication, power, banking, and factories are intact in Tigrai? Are they going to tell us that the 43,000 infants in Tigrai have been vaccinated for Polio, Measles, TB, and other maladies? What about the HIV positive, diabetic, and TB patients in urgent need of life saving medication? Do they not matter? Their media counteroffensive they seek to launch will crumble simply because the serious truths they seek to throw under the rag can never set them free.