(Tizibt M.) Ethiopian immigrants in Denver and its environs had the privilege of meeting Ato Seye Abraha, who discussed vital geopolitical issues pertaining to our country and beyond. I would like to express my appreciation and gratitude to Ato Seye for making this possible, and the organizers for arranging this forum, no matter what their motives could be. The hall was filled to its capacity. Personally, I have always been against Ato Seye’s unfair imprisonment for over six years. In fact, what happened to Ato Seye and his family was totally unacceptable and it was unequivocally a typical miscarriage of justice which left a dark spot in the history of the legal system in Ethiopia. I am happy that Ato Seye is free and out at last, and I hope the story of the proverbial chicken doesn’t apply to him any more. It was evident from his tone of voice that Ato Seye has grown even stronger over the years behind bars even if we saw that he was a bit wirier physically than we knew him as a high profile government official. Ato Seye started with a fairly long speech revolving around major issues in our country and the Horn: the challenges of democracy in Ethiopia especially following the aftermath of the 2007 national elections, the Ethio-Eritrean conflict, the Somali situation, the contribution of Ethiopians in the diaspora, the split of TPLF and the ensuing split within EPRDF leading to his detention along with his brethren, his personal vision and future political action, inter alia. Most of what Ato Seye said in his opening speech was quite praiseworthy even if it was replete with defamation of the EPRDF and incumbent government here and there. He might have been implying that TPLF/EPRDF has gone worse after his expulsion. I feel that this would be unacceptable to supporters of the ruling party who may argue otherwise that it has actually gotten better after Seye and Co left. Nor would it be appealing to the members of opposition or haters of EPRDF who may argue that EPRDF is as bad as it has ever been. Those of us in the Diaspora are already sick of hate politics. We were expecting a speech of reconciliation and vision which was here and there amidst Ato Seye’s speech, but not as much as we expected. Despite his fairly good lengthy introductory speech, Ato Seye didn’t do well in the Q&A session. It appears that Ato Seye expected funs with cheerleaders in Denver, perhaps due to his experience in Washington D.C. People from the audience came up with tough questions and unfortunately they were labeled supporters of the EPRDF by Ato Seye himself. He said that he was happy to learn that supporters of the EPRDF were in attendance. It is erroneous to assume that anyone who throws questions unpleasant to him is a member of the ruling party. It doesn’t take someone to be a member of EPRDF to raise questions concerning our country. Every reasonable Ethiopian is equally concerned about the well-being of Ethiopia. It is also equally wrong to assume that people who are opposed to the current government are funs and cheerleaders for the oppositions. It was also very unfortunate that Ato Seye got emotional unpredictably after a few questions and instead of addressing the questions which were brought up in the discussion, he was rather talking a lot about his credentials. This is unbecoming of a man of his political profile. Most Ethiopians know the credentials of Ato Seye pretty well and we are grateful to him and to our fallen countrymen and women who made the sun shine throughout our country through their precious sacrifices. Yet we deserved to hear legitimate responses to all legitimate questions which were raised by our fellow Ethiopians. I assume that Ato Seye was attempting to commit most of the questions to his memory rather than noting them down in order to address them accordingly. Nevertheless, it was unfortunate that most of the questions in the first two rounds of the Q&A session were not raised at all or were not addressed adequately some of which are listed below. I hope the people close to Ato Seye can bring these questions to his attention. (I apologize for those who brought up these questions if I misrepresent them. But I assume that the general sense of the questions remains intact.) What would be the major repercussions if you were to push the Ethio-Eritrean war further culminating in regime change? Can you share your views about this? How could you charge the Prime Minister only few months after you crowned him for a second term? Why didn’t you remove him rather than renewing his term if you already had those treason charges against him in mind? You were a member of the central command during the Ethio-Eritrean war. It is reportedly said that as a member, you signed a document with the top army generals to be submitted to the prime minister who took executive decisions to bring the war to a halt on the basis of the recommendations given to him. Did you really sign that document which was presented to the prime minister leading to the termination of the Ethio-Eritrean war? Why should only the government be blamed for the mistakes leading to the aftermath of the 2005 elections? Why do we forget other stakeholders like Kinijit, for instance? What are your views regarding EFFORT? If EFFORT were not owned by TPLF, why would the institutions under it be headed by handpicked, high profile party members? If they were owned by TPLF, wouldn’t this contradict the supreme law of the land? How can the intervention of the Ethiopian army into Somalia be labeled a cover up for the 2005 election crisis? Top leaders of the Union of Islamic Courts (UIC) were waging multiple jihads against our country openly. How would you respond to this? Would Ato Gebru, W/ro Aregash and Co be able to exercise their democratic rights in Tigray given the suffocating atmosphere by the regional government? What would their future be like? You wanted us to be united, but we couldn’t be united because of the Ethiopian government’s attempt to divide us along ethnic lines. How would the unity be materialized as long as we have a government which continues to divide us as per its prime agenda? What segments of the Oromo people are imprisoned in Ethiopia? Are they ordinary Oromos or members of OLF, which withdrew from the transitional government rejecting peaceful means of struggle and got engaged in armed struggle? If you were to take political power, how would your party be different from the ruling party? How could we be confident that you would bring about real change beyond ‘yegulicha meqeyayer’? I know that there were many more questions. These are only some that came to my memory as I composed this short piece. Even if Ato Seye got emotional and simply ignored most of the questions in the first set, he was not able to deal with most questions in the second set as the time for the rented auditorium was already over. Given the prominence of Ato Seye in Ethiopian politics, the organizers of this occasion should have reserved the auditorium for more hours and started the meeting early. This could have enabled us to discuss and learn more. To reserve an auditorium only for three hours was not well thought about in the first place. On top of that, the time concept of many fellow Ethiopians in our area is disappointing at best and nauseating at worst. We have failed time and again to be cognizant of the need to be on time for appointments and occasions. Being late by only an hour is guaranteed, if not more. This breeds a vicious cycle: people say that organizers wouldn’t start on time; and organizers on the other hand say that they cannot start on time because the audiences are not in yet. This cycle should be broken and the ball is in the organizers’ court. As I said above, Ato Seye’s speech was stuffed with attacks against a party he was a staunch leader of and even if he was saying that he would be accountable for some of the mistakes done, he should take a lion’s share for the wrongs of the party, which in his own words, turned to him at last. A funny point Ato Seye made in this regard was why TPLF couldn’t be a democratic party. He said that it was because of its militaristic mentality. Is he commenting on this because he is no more a member of it? Why wasn’t he able to see the drawbacks while he was in power? Why at hindsight? What the hell was he doing as a top figure of the party? As far as I’m concerned, the party cannot be less democratic that it was when Ato Seye was up there. I believe in the principle that credit should be given where/when it is due, but I don’t believe in the idea of giving credit to someone for their present action on the basis of previous service and contribution. That would be absolutely wrong. We will judge him now for his current standing and practice. We respect and admire Ato Seye for his past service. That goes without saying. I have always looked up to him as a military leader. Nevertheless, I didn’t see the degree of political maturity and sophistication I was expecting in his stature before I attended the meeting yesterday. In fact, I left the auditorium with discontent. Blaming only the incumbent government is not sufficient. Others responsible for the current suffocating political atmosphere in our country should also take or be given their due. We should never be one sided. In fact, that would be counterproductive. As a continuation of his blame targeted at the Ethiopian government, Ato Seye also made Shabia and the Ethiopian leadership just one and the same on the ground that both do not want to see democracy evolving and flourishing in their respective countries. It is unfair to any reasonable person to juxtapose Shabia and the EPRDF on the same platter for comparison. We know pretty well that there is no glimpse of democracy in Eritrea as there is some in Ethiopia even if it is still at its infancy. As Ato Seye pointed out in his speech, the whereabouts of the G-15 in Eritrea is unknown and we don’t know what may have happened to them due to the ruthlessness of the regime to our north. Many more have not been accounted for. In our case, Ato Seye was at least brought before the court and eventually released even if we know the deep-rooted tribulations of our legal system. If the Ethiopian government were the same as the Eritrean dictatorship, Ato Seye would have kept on languishing behind bars until now. Even if it is undeservedly late, we are happy to see him out. What’s more, there is no other political entity other than PFDJ in Eritrea, but there are scores of them in Ethiopia even if they scramble to their feet when we feel that they are maturing. I don’t want to say much about the disparity between the Ethiopian and Eritrean governments. All I wanted to say is that the Ethiopian government should never be equated with the Eritrean Shabia only because Ato Seye was imprisoned on no ground. Yet we sympathize with Ato Seye regarding his imprisonment as pointed out above, and our respect for him continues to exist. I can’t agree with Ato Seye any better about his remark regarding the contribution of Ethiopians in the Diaspora. Ato Seye clearly articulated the fact that Ethiopians in the Diaspora have got the opportunity to put in their own share to the betterment of our country citing the availability of resources and wherewithals. He stated that if Ethiopians in the Diaspora were able to use the resources available at their disposal, they could really accomplish a lot of good work. He also pointed out that it is very unfortunate Ethiopians in the Diaspora are observed being at logger heads with each other rather than working together cooperatively and in love. He advised that they should change this unhealthy scuffle and work in unison to contribute constructively for the well-being of our country. Advice well made and well taken! In response, I would like to throw a piece of advice to Ato Seye: you should be careful about failing into the hate syndrome of the vocal Diaspora. You need to have strong advisors who are in a position to discuss your major moves with you, and at times challenge you, rather than embrace those who would bring you empty eulogies (‘kentu widase’). Such people are weak and they would only weaken you and the party you envision. I know that you wouldn’t fall into such a trap; I’m just making a heads-up remark. Regarding his personal vision and future political life, Ato Seye pointed out that he will pursue politics not for vengeance, but for bringing about real favorable change in our country. What a vision! As he pointed out in his speech, what we aspire to see is political parties that peacefully vie and strive to realize a democratic Ethiopia in which the rights of nations, nationalities, and peoples as well as individuals are respected, the right the freedom of speech and expressions are cherished, and the freedom of assembly will be restored, and so on. Ato Seye also pointed out that he would wait until situations are conducive for political action. He wants to give it time before embarking on it. I can’t appreciate Ato Seye enough on this. This is a sign of wisdom. Rather than hastily establishing a political party that is doomed to failure soon after it is founded, it would be a great idea to give it time, establish it on a solid rock and make sure that it is a viable and vibrant political party that would contribute immensely to the political landscape of our country. With lots of respect and love, tizibtm@yahoo.com Tizibt M. |