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Changing Times and Changing Roles
Our
readers are fairly familiar with this Nharnet Editorial Topic by now.
The Nharnet Team has been using the topic when ever it sees changes in
attitude, political alignment or other significant changes in the
political Eritrean arena. Generally speaking, it has been accepted that
change is good. The Nharnet Team wants to qualify it though by saying
change is good if it is for the better. At times change is for the
worse. One can look at all the ups and downs of the Eritrean struggle
for independence. Many setbacks have been witnessed during the last two
years itself. There are those who may tell us that change at any rate
is better than stagnancy and we understand the circumstances where that
holds true and we do not have any qualm with them.
The
first time we used the topic was when the opposition dominated the
demonstration in Washington DC despite an all out effort by the
government to stop it and later to diminish it by calling its own
demonstration. The roles switched in which the government found itself
in the minority role.
The
second time we used the topic was when the Secretary General, Hiruy
suspended the membership of the largest organization, ELF-RC from ENA
after its delegation walked out from the nomination and election of the
ENA meeting. Hiruy who had been anti the opposition for so long with
out any known organizational back bone suspending the main founder of
ENA was a role change worth writing about.
In
any case it is the change in role at this political stage that you are
interested to hear from us. We are certain every one interested is
watching the changes. Even some who are in the die hard PFDJ followers'
group are all ears towards changes taking place in the opposition camp.
The curiosity is aroused from the change of roles of important political
figures in the opposition and other changes in the horn. Some of the
changes in roles that we can mention are the following:
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The stand of
Mr. Adhanom Ghebremariam: A very short time before he disassociated
him self from PFDJ, he had asked members of ELF-RC to leave the hall
where he was leading a meeting. He called them "weitotat" and added "mesarhi
nay woyane" to mean traitors who are instruments of TPLF. Trust us;
we do not bring this up to open old wounds. We do not need to. We
have enough open wounds we can't heel to be looking for others. We
just want to bring the change to light. Now, he is the most outspoken
advocate of coordination with the Ethiopian government. Now, he is
the one who is said to be open to the idea of openly advocating for
any kind of help from Ethiopia to get rid of Isayas. What a change!
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The Political
Stand of Ahmed Nasser: There are many changes and switches in his
stand through out the years; it is hard to account for all of them.
The main change is though his stand about abiding by democratic
centralism or rule of law. He is the same Ahmed Nasser who ordered
the liquidation of the military unit of 149 in June of 1977 because
'they refuse to abide by democratic centralism'. It is really a
change that has baffled many who were in ELF and all Eritreans who are
familiar with the politics of that time. What is even more surprising
is that members of his current organization, ELF-NC, are hammering an
article written by Seyoum O. Michael back in 1977 namely 'haoo bel
falulay'. It is a well known trade mark of Seyoum that he is a bold
leader who means what he says. He is consistent on his stand of
abiding by the democratic centralism that he expects others to abide
by. They think they can shove the responsibility to Seyoum what
Ahmed decided as a chairman. They keep coming back to it in
the hope it will hurt Seyoum. We have news for them. It shows
the consistent leadership of Seyoum. It shows that he is a leader he
can live with what he expects from others. To the contrary, it
hurts Ahmed and his organization every time they dwell on it as those
who were attacked and those who witnessed the time know who made the
decision. They cannot take credit for him of good things that
happen and transfer the responsibility to others on the so not
flattering aspects of his decisions. They forget that they are
preaching to the same generation who has first hand knowledge of the
happenings of the time. The other switch of Ahmed's stand is about
the unity of the ethnic nationalities in Eritrea. He seems to have
adopted the political stand of "Bihere Tigrinia" is oppressing the
other ethnic groups. We are awaiting a full report of a meeting he
conducted in Kessela, the Sudan in which he justified his new stand by
giving two examples: 1, the fishery industry in the Affar area is
taken by the Tigrinia Speaking; and 2, land is taken from the Kunama
by the same highlanders. The 4+1 literature has also started to
replace the often used phrase, “the struggle of Eritrean people for
independence”, with the “struggle of all nationalities against the
occupation.” This will be no doubt the change of the year.
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Ethiopians like
Mesfin Woldemariam are speaking out for the implementation of the
boarder demarcation while many Eritreans in the opposition camp refuse
to call on Ethiopia to accept the international ruling. The ENA
leadership in the USA refused to consider a banner calling on Ethiopia
to abide by the international ruling demarcation in their
demonstration. Notwithstanding the false and manufactured
insinuations by the administrator of Eritreana.com, this was one of
the main reasons that ELF-RC members and supporters were not willing
to participate in the demonstration. This is a good lesson to those
who were making a mockery of our genuine call for the two parties to
abide by the ruling and for Ethiopia to abide by what it had signed to
do so. It is a change of role worth noting when Ethiopians take a
bolder and clearer stand about an issue that has left a large piece of
land at the hands of the Ethiopian government and a demarcation ruling
from the International Community. Yes, we thank the Security Council
for reaffirming their stand on the issue. We also think the Council
has the right to bring the blunders committed by PFDJ to light and
demand to stop. The ruling is for Eritrea and its people and
not for the dictator. We here by call on the Security Council and
the rest of the International Community to stay the course. It
is quite alarming when the world bodies including Ethiopian
intellectuals have a better stand on the issue that directly impacts
war and sovereignty than a number of our own educated personalities
and political leaders.
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The Transfer of
power to 'meseretat' by the prior members of ELF-RC: This is good
one. Those who supported the split from ELF-RC echoed loud and clear
that they were going take over the power from the old guard, the old
leadership. Ahmed and Dr. Beyene declared their failure and vowed to
hand over the power to 'meseretat'. They trashed the historic
democratic culture of ELF-RC, a practice of abiding by the rule of law
and democratic centralism, and opted for a split. Now, who is in
power? Where are the 'meseretat'? How that is those who
declared they failed are still leading? Even though these
questions are curiously interesting, this issue becomes juicy when one
looks at the changes that took place in the leadership of ELF-RC.
Let's look at the leadership roster. Seyoum came to be the chairman
just a couple of months before the end of 2002. Were they referring
to him as 'the old guard'? Menghisteab and Hammed Ali Ibrahim (Head of
Field Affairs) are late comers to the Executive committee. Tecle,
Gime, Berhane, and Assefaw who are in the Executive Committee are new
from the 'meseretat'. We just want to bring to our readers'
attention as who really transferred power to the bases. Was
their move to keep the old guard such as Ahmed, Dr. Habte and Yusuf
Berhanu in power or to transfer the power? As they say, action speaks
louder than words. Dr. Habte told his audience in the meeting he
conducted in Washington DC to follow the example of the meseretat of
his organization. It sounds like he was advising them to keep the old
status quo. When did keeping power at the hands of the few who led
for decades change its message to mean handing over power to the
bases?
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Hiruy wants to
call others "wedo gheba". To the youngsters who do not remember the
political terminologies of the pre-independence era, 'wedo gheba'
meant those who were leaving the struggle and switched sides to the
enemy voluntarily. The 'Derg', ruling military junta of Ethiopia at
that time, named them 'wedo gheba' to show that they willingly chose
to be on its side. Now, Hiruy is "afraid" that Mesfin will try to get
the opposition to be "wedo geba" to Isayas' PFDJ. The reason why we
bring this up as a change of role is that Hiruy had already joined the
Isayas camp. He was a volunteer campaigner who traveled in and
outside the country to the Sudan preaching for Isayas. Doesn't it
make it ironic for him to label others as such? To make it worse, the
word was not used to the best of The Team's knowledge for Eritreans
switching sides within Eritrean political forces. If it fits any
one, it fits him for the way he came to be Secretariat General. He is
in a position where he cannot voice a stand on the border
demarcation. That is where the word would be meaningful its true
message is taken into consideration.
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Awate Team:
The team transformed from seemingly independent news providers and
editorial writers to one sided advocates of certain groups. They were
pro PFDJ senseless war of 1998. Most of our readers remember their
editorial article of 'wgah tibel ember'. Salih Yonus said in Tigrinia
' I will always stand on the side of my country no matter who started
the war' in the meeting he conducted as a guest of Washington DC
Eritrean Public Forum. Now, they never mention the threat voiced by
some in the Ethiopian leadership. Now, they advocate that Eritrea has
to engage in endless dialogue because Ethiopians do not feel accepting
the ruling. They make mockery of the right, just and nationalist
stand about the demarcation. They had a field day about ELF-RC
holding its congress in Ethiopia while they seem to praise those who
have questionable relationship with Ethiopia. They tried to undermine
the service and contribution of M. Ali Ibrahim as recruit of Tahdai
while praising others whose contribution does not even compare to
his. They insulted many of our leaders by shamelessly writing those
who stayed in their organization are due to their friendship with
Ibrahim. It did not matter to them all of their contribution in the
struggle. They omitted the education of some of our members while
giving others unsubstantiated and false credit. In short, Qadi was in
a mission to destroy an organization that is the true back bone of the
democratic forces of the opposition. As we said long time ago when
they were reporting false information such as trips that were not
taken, and reporting other distortions; they can side with who ever
they choose to do so as long as they do not pretend to be
independent. On the other hand we saw a courageous step by the
administrators of dekebat web site of owning up to their faults,
asking apology, and changing their policy towards serving without
biases. Can the Awate team do the same? Do they have the same level
of courage or integrity? They reported that Seyoum withdrew from the
5th ENA meeting they very well knew the leadership there
decided on the walk out collectively. They tried to say that Ahmed
did not withdraw but resigned. They did not want to tell the fact
that his resignation came after he proposed the walk out and voted for
the walk out and actually physically walked out of the meeting place
before Seyoum did.
We
brought up all of these matters to remind our readers the switches and
changes taking place in the Eritrean opposition camp. Changing and
switching political stands from time to time is not bad in it self.
When the change is irrational, contradicts to previous nationalistic
views, lacks transparency, or wavers on national sovereignty matters; it
becomes problematic and diminishes the credibility of the leader and
organization he or she is leading. These switches and changes are the
root causes of what has been hampering the opposition from working
together and being effective. Every one who changes his /her stand
makes excuses and attacks others to cover his/her own change. There is
no coming clean with the changes. Insults and attacks are used instead
of explaining stands and answering questions directly and honestly.
Otherwise, they would not be so detrimental. That what our readers
should stand against. With every day passing, the truth of the
interference is coming out. Independent, in fact critics of the
organization and the leadership are confirming it. Ethiopian magazines
are exposing it. It just happens ELF-RC saw the fear and the worry that
is in every one's mind now days ahead of time. For us, it is not a
matter of being right as some defamers suggest, it is a matter of seeing
the danger of external interference in strictly internal matters.
Independence is worth it. Didn't our people pay for it about long
enough? Why shouldn't we care about it? What is independence without
sovereignty? Can we have freedom if we are told what to do and how to
vote?
The Nharnet Team
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