Jawar advances two points to doubt the “new” change in the faction’s program. On one hand, he argues that the OLF, which I presume means the faction which opposes General Gelchu’s faction, has never closed the door of resolving the Oromo problem within the frame work of greater Ethiopia. The second point advances is the refrain of self-determination by the people to determine the future of unity or separation. In both cases Jawar seems to have good points but only to a limited degree.
The OLF faction which opposes General Kemal Gelchu new position has been saying that the future of the Oromo people will be decided by the people of Oromo whether or not they want to remain within Ethiopia or not. And as Jawar points out the leaders of the new change use the same language in their new declaration. But, and this is a very important but, the Dawud faction has not dropped the idea that it would work among the Oromo people to choose unity with Ethiopia, whereas the Kemal Gelcu faction, to gather from the various declarations and explanations they have given, seems to be ready to work for unity. As far as I see it, this is a very important distinction between the various factions and the faction led General Kemal.
As a number of former members of the OLF now admit, the OLF copied the idea of self-determination up to and including secession from EPLF. It also copied the tactic of playing on the phrase self-determination to camouflage their intentions and political objectives. In the various negotiations with EPLF they brought always this point instead of saying outright that they wanted separation of secession. As was shown in the so-called referendum, they voted for the people.
I have one small disagreement with Jawar Mohamed and it is: General Kemal may or may not believe in what is he saying, although I tend to believe that he is sincere, we should give him time and see what he does. When I say let us see him in action I do not mean to suspect his motives, but rather because I am worried that he may not be as free as we would him to be from Isaias Afeworki. When he was asked whether he could leave Eritrea, he answered the question in such a way that I have a lingering doubt that he is as free as he would like to be.
