When Ethiopian Troops and Afar Rebels Unite: A Shift in Political Dynamics

VIEWPOINT

When Ethiopian troops team up with Afar rebels, expect change!


By Yohannes Zer’om
Dec 8, 2003

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Finally it seems it is sinking in the mind of Ethiopian soldiers who were former TPLF rebels that there is something un-Ethiopian about Prime Minister Meles Zenawi.

The Afar people are no secessionists. Their legitimate claim is “we have been Ethiopians since creation and no force would rob us of our inalienable rights to remain Ethiopians forever.”

The only person who is opposed to this fundamental right of the Afar people is, ironically, the prime minister.

Meles has been fighting against the Afar Revolutionary Democratic Unity Front (ARDUF) rebels since he seized power in May 1991.

ARDUF rebels claim their Red Sea-straddling home region has been annexed by Eritrea. When they carried this message to the United Nations in New York City during the so-called Eritrean Referendum in 1993, they met with other diplomats from around the world.

The diplomats confided in the Afar leaders that an Ethiopian leader leading a campaign for the weakening and destruction of an allegedly his own country, a leader who solicits the support of the UN system to turn his country into a landlocked, besieged nation is unheard of, and could be a perfect example to do a lasting damage to the national interests of the Ethiopian people, and pose a permanent threat to the peace in the region.”

The discourse went on. “Imagine what could have the People’s Republic of China (Mainland China), which is a huge maritime military force surrounded by sea, would have done to Taiwan if Taiwan were the only access to the sea for the Mainland China. With all its huge resources, mainland China is claiming sovereignty rights over Taiwan up to the present, and no other nation has messed with the firm stand of Beijing. The reason is the Chinese have historical and legal rights over Taiwan. The facts stand there.”

And another one pulled in the Indo-Pakistani case, and the logic flows in the same tone. “Imagine what could have the Government of India done if the only access to the sea was through Kashmir, over which India and Pakistan have gone to war several times until things stalled over the threat of a nuclear war.”

“But what makes the Ethiopian case unique and sad in the history of nations is the Afars, unlike the Taiwanese or the Kashmiri who are fighting for their own breakaway status, are locked up in a grim war against their “own government” which wants to assert Ethiopia as a landlocked nation, dismissing solid historical and legal evidences in favor of Eritrea.”

The baffled foreign diplomats further warned the Afars: “If you believe Meles is an Ethiopian, advise him. If you don’t, get rid of him.”

Ten years have passed since the Afar encountered diplomats in New York City, and little has changed in the determination of the prime minister of Ethiopia to liquidate the Afar people by means of force because the Afars could not give up their Ethiopian nationality to fulfill the wish of Meles Zenawi.

But that seems to be changing since November 15, 2003, when a government army unit was sent to wipe out ARDUF rebels in Afar region but retreated to Maichew, southern Tigrai region, after leaving 14 soldiers behind in the ranks of the Afar rebels.

Meles has been on record as the chief guardian of Eritrean interests in Ethiopia. When leaders of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) woke up from their decades of slumber and found out that the TPLF leader was the main Eritrean culprit in the Ethiopian powerhouse, they teamed up to remove him without bloodshed.

The 1998-2000 Ethiopia-Eritrea War had taught the TPLF dissidents enough lesson that the leader who in public was acting like he were opposed to Eritrea, was the main enemy who turned the victorious Ethiopian Army’s advance around, and crowned the aggressor with a victory in an independent boundary commission he conspired to set up with the Eritrean tyrnant.

Knowing that his actions would one day be exposed and that may cost him his life, Meles had prepared years ahead, and when the TPLF leaders ganged up against him, Meles took the TPLF dissidents to task. They accused him of treason but made the big blunder that they would remove a mercenary through negotiation. It cost them dearly. Along with them, the Security Minister, Kinfe Gebre-Medhin, was cut short in a dramatic cold-blooded murder. To make the demise of TPLF a full circle, Meles extended his assault into the army generals and other high-ranking army officers who played a key role in routing the Shaebia army. All those who were pillars of TPLF but were suspects who were working to remove Meles were either purged or locked up at Tatek Military Camp for over a long time.

TPLF died unceremoniously in April 2001. The stalwarts of TPLF like Siye Abraha were locked up in prison under trumped-up charges of corruption. Subsequently, Meles empowered B’aden, a traditionally anti-TPLF and pro-Meles group headed by Addisu Legesee and Bereket Simon (the future threat to the popular opposition UEDF would undoubtedly come from this highly dangerous and mercenary group), and the rout against TPLF was completed with precision.

But Meles did not stop there. He did not want to give the impression that he destroyed TPLF. To do so on the part of Meles was tantamount to cutting his lifeline to the powerhouse – TPLF. If he said TPLF is gone forever, he was simply cutting the thin thread that deceptively attached him to Tigrai, where he was born and raised , like many other Eritreans born and raised in Ethiopia, and gave the impression that they were Ethiopians until they came back along with the marauding troops of Shaebia and proved themselves sworn enemies of the country that did so much good to their upbringing.

Meles had to maintain the name and say TPLF was well and alive. He knew abandoning Tigrai would backfire and destroy him immediately, in the same fashion the Derg abandoned Tigrai to TPLF in 1989, where TPLF found a treasure trove of tens of thousands of youths willing to become cannon fodders of TPLF gunners. He is aware of the enmity Tigrai has harbored toward him, therefore keeping the region under his control was A Must! He re-grouped his own henchmen and filled all the posts vacated by the purged TPLF dissidents.

Today politically- emaciated TPLF is the subject of ridicule of B’aden , who publicly brag that TPLF had ruled Ethiopia for 12 years, and it was B’aden’s time to rule the country for years to come, of course with the masked Eritrean premier being on top. It is presumed that about 80% key army and security positions are taken up by the up-and-coming mercenary B’aden group.

To sum up our point, when the government troops who were sent on a combat mission to wipe out ARDUF rebels in mid November, and in the stead staged a mock battle, and retreated to Maichew (Tigrai region), than returning to Woldia or Dessie (B’aden-controlled Amhara region), it was an act of mutiny against the regime of Meles Zenawi. The clear message sent out by our troops was: “Masked Eritrean agents can no longer pit Ethiopians against Ethiopians.”

With the growing understanding in the army against who is in power in Ethiopia, the days of Eritrean agents that have held the country hostage for several years may be nearer than what we might have anticipated.

In such development, the United Ethiopian Democratic Forces (UEDF) would be duly reminded to expedite the coalition process of the various opposition parties under its canopy. It would be naïve to try to advise the veteran leaders of UEDF that elections would be conducted if only Meles guarantees a “total victory.” There is no doubt UEDF would win over the hated Eritrean regime provided fair and free elections are held. However, Meles would resort to giving a ‘semblance of democracy,’ bring in a coterie of ‘neutral monitoring groups,’ but the means would never justify the end. He would make sure the election outcome would not kick him out of office. He would use the maximum lethal force to crush any would-be contender, in this case UEDF. So before time runs out, the unity of the civilian and military force of the nation should gain momentum early on, before the nation faces a vendatta by a leader who has a more sinister design for the country that he has neither the moral nor the legal right to represent.

To stem the long overdue liberation of Ethiopia, the hirelings of the regime would bring old and new tactics to the fore. Individuals who are driven by their vested interests, and who pain themselves to twist the course of the nationwide anti-Meles political thought and action to their selfish goals, would continue to harp on the chord: “Forget Assab! Forget Badme! Focus on ‘poverty reduction’ being spearheaded by our ‘visionary’ leaders.”

They will tell us that the regime is spending millions of dollars on construction and development projects. Notwithstanding the huge World Bank and other loans the government gets, and out of which a fragment is spent for show-casing to the lending financial institutions, the political idiots would tell us how the Meles regime is covering roads and streets with concrete asphalt. We have to be able to clear the political cataract from the public eye to help any remaining doubters that the Eritrean agent is tightening the noose around the neck of the country, and no road construction would make up for the systematic destruction of the civil society of Ethiopia.

On a similar note, there is a possibility that Eritrea may start war with Ethiopia. In fact, there is strong evidence that Eritrean tyrant Isaias Afewerki may try his second chance at wrecking havoc on Ethiopia, avenging his humiliating defeat in the previous war.

Meles has in his own words admitted the war against Eritrea was conducted by an anti-people’s group that he purged as TPLF dissidents.

Meles’ confidant, Bereket Simon, had publicly lamented (though later went numb for his own advantage) over the deportation of Eritreans from Ethiopia. As an Eritrean, Bereket had only eyes for deported Eritreans. He never felt the pain when over 130,000 Ethiopians were herded out of Eritrea as early as May 1991. Those Ethiopian civilians killed by Eritrean mobs in Eritrean towns during the course of the 1998-2000 war were nothing to Bereket, who is, despite his second-in-command status, practically the de facto leader of B’aden.

When Meles blamed the TPLF dissidents for the war against Eritrea, it shows Meles had never had any hand in the victory the Ethiopian army landed over Shaebia. Rather the opposite was true. He was derailing Ethiopia’s drive against the Eritrean invaders, which was later revealed in the documents the Boundary Commission released in April 2002. If Eritrea launches another round of armed attack against Ethiopia, it has nothing to do with Meles Zenawi’s undisputed servitude to Eritrea. It is purely based on the Eritrean regime’s survival strategy: a bankrupt Eritrea that salivated to feast on the “Sheep of Shame” discarded by more than 50 nations, the Eritrea of Isaias Afewerki that has continued to lose hope in peaceful co-existence, would dearly embrace war as a defense mechanism to escape its bleak predicament as “relative peace has not brought dividends to its empty coffers.”