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Editorials
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December: Dates in Eritrean History (With a reading on Peace Conference of Dec. 1950)
Do you know:
Nharnet.com is pleased to continue sharing with its readers a short list of important dates in Eritrean history that occurred during the month of December.
31 December 1950
When the United Nations General Assembly voted on 2 December 1950 to federate Eritrea with Ethiopia with unfulfilled guarantees that Eritrea would have its own “democratic government”, the Eritrean political parties of the day saw to it that reconciliation was a necessary start of a new political era. That event was called Gubae Selam, a big conference held on 31 December 1950 at Cinema Impero in Asmara with 4,000 persons taking part. Nharnet.com felt the importance of reposting a story about that event that was contributed to this website on 31 December two years ago. We believe those who did not have the chance to go over it before will find this reading informative and interesting. ** Elders, heads of religious institutions and leaders of nascent political parties, who were at each other’s throat only weeks earlier, were [present at Gubae Selam]. According to the newspaper Hanti Eritra of the succeeding week, “thousands of Moslems and Christians who observed the political leaders embracing one another at Cinema Impero had their hearts filled with joy and their eyes with tears”. It was an event that has not yet been repeated since that time by Eritreans of different political viewpoints.
As readings in modern Eritrean political history attest, the Eritrean people were put to a fateful test in the 1940’s when they had to decide on their self-determination without being fully aware what it was all about. Our people’s situation in that critical period was described in a nutshell by the American journalist Dan Connell who put it this way:
The outcome of our people’s less preparedness for a struggle for self-determination and the intervention of outside forces promoting their own interests resulted in the adoption by the UN General Assembly of Resolution 390 A (V) of 2 December 1950.
As we know, Eritrea at that time was in a disturbing political turmoil with as many as 15 political organizations trying to voice the wishes of segments of the people. Some of those parties espoused diametrically opposed political views. After the failure of Waala Biet Ghiorghis (24 Nov. 1946), they were not only unable to see eye to eye to one another, but were also engaged in mutual killing incidents.
However, when Resolution 390 A (V) was passed, they knew that a new political situation was ushered in and that they had to face it with better understanding and a degree of mutual acceptance. As stated in Alemseged Tesfai’s 2001 book, Aynifelale, the Peace Conference manifested that Eritreans from the very start knew their internal problems were not that easy but that they were destined to live together. They were indeed willing to live together.
It thus took them only four weeks to organize Gubae Selam, their version of national conference for peace and reconciliation. At that point, the unionists and those who stood for independence accepted the reality as it presented itself and pledged to make the federal arrangement a working system.
Among the first speakers at the Conference was Azmatch Zerom Kifle of the unionist side who suggested that 31 December be celebrated as “Eritrea Day” every year. Understandably, Ethiopia would not allow such annual celebration under the name of Eritrea but at least the unionists were starting to feel that with Resolution 390 A (V), there will continue to be something called Eritrea and Eritreans.
The independentists attended the Peace Conference with all their weight. Ibrahim Sultan, Tessema Asberom, Woldeab Woldemariam and the rest were there. They were for sure more interested in promoting the Federation than the other side.
Speaking at the occasion, Ibrahim Sultan announced that the Independence Block would henceforth be called the Eritrean Democratic Party to clearly show that the struggle for self-determination was about over and that an era of struggle for democracy and peace was commenced. He and his comrades-in-struggle knew very well that things would not be normalized in one go, but that a working atmosphere had to be established so that Eritreans can live together. Ibrahim Sultan added:
The Peace Conference agreed on four major Resolutions that were published in all the local newspapers of the time. The Resolutions can be paraphrased as follows:
For sure, one cannot reconciliation make happen within a short time among political and social forces that were in conflict for nearly a decade. However, one can still commend the political leaders of the day for their prompt action to start healing wounds at a conference before entering a new era.
At this point, we can clearly refer to May 1991 and see the failure of Isayas Afeworki and his colleagues who did not give a thought to making peace and reconciliation with their erstwhile political rivals and try to start a new era as our fathers did it with their Gubae Selam.
But it is not only Isayas Afework who had failed to emulate the Eritrean elders of December 1950. About 27 months had passed since the Berlin meeting of G-13. Another 21 months had also passed since the G-15 was born as a creeping opposition to the dictatorial system in Eritrea. To this day the opposition, old and new, has failed to hold reconciliation seminar, let alone a national peace conference.
Eritrea of today is in dire need of a national conference for salvation and democracy that can be accomplished only through collective action against the dictatorship. Let us wish it would be realized within the year ahead.
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